Introducing Joe Dassin

Joseph Ira "Joe" Dassin (November 5, 1938 – August 20, 1980) was an American-born Jewish-French singer-songwriter.

He began his childhood first in New York City and Los Angeles. However, after his father fell victim to the Hollywood blacklist in 1950, he and his family moved from place to place across Europe.

Joe Dassin studied at the International School of Geneva and the Institut Le Rosey in Switzerland, and graduated in Grenoble. Joe Dassin moved back to the United States where he attended the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan from 1957 to 1963, winning an undergraduate Hopwood Award for fiction in 1958 and earning a Bachelor of Arts in 1961 and a Master of Arts in 1963, both in Anthropology.

Moving to France, Joe Dassin worked as a technician for his father and appeared as an actor in supporting roles in a number of movies directed by his father, including Topkapi where he played the role of "Josef".

On December 26, 1964, Joe Dassin signed up with CBS Records, making him the first French singer to sign up with an American record label.

By the early 1970s, Joe Dassin's songs were on the top of the charts in France and he had become very well known in that country. He was also a talented polyglot, recording songs in German, Spanish, Italian and Greek, as well as French and English.

Joe Dassin died of a heart attack during a vacation to Tahiti on August 20, 1980 (...)

Source of the introducing: WIKIPEDIA.

Some Joe Dassin songs may be found from this page.