My Favorite Composer Michel LeGrand Died Today

The world lost a great musician.

I just woke up and discovered that one of my favorite French composers Michel Legrand died. This might be an obscure piece of news to many. I don’t think most people were aware of this wonderful pianist and songwriter.

But, I looooved Michel Legrand more than almost any other composer.

His songs were magical!

I sang his songs when I first became a musician. His unique chord progressions in his melodies were haunting and memorable. His songs brought me to tears at times — even choking me up sometimes while singing them.

Michel Legrand was an accomplished jazz pianist. He won an Oscar for his wonderful hit song The Windmills Of Your Mind in 1968 which was featured in the movie The Thomas Crown Affair. If you watch that old classic movie you might be haunted like I was from his musical score! It elevated the movie to new heights in my opinion.

That song was one of the few I loved to sing and play on guitar even though it was written to be a piano song. Whenever I got to the chorus I got a chill. It was that well written.

I recall I performed it in a medley of songs I arranged at a concert in 1989 with a pianist. The medley also included Legrand hits The Summer Knows, from the movie Summer of 42', What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?, Summer me, Winter Me, and How Do You Keep the Music Playing? which was hit song in the 80s.

He also won Oscars for the movie Yentl. I loved to sing both of his songs from that movie too: The Way He Makes Me feel and Papa Can You Hear Me? — both recorded by Barbra Streisand.

Legrand wrote over 200 film and TV scores in his long and successful career. It seemed almost every song that you heard in the background of a movie back in the 60s and 70s were his compositions.

Remember when there were wonderful original songs in movies? The kind of songs that elevated the movies to an entirely new level?

Most likely it was a Legrand song.

He also collaborated with two of my favorite lyricists Alan and Marilyn Bergman and many other popular musicians over the years like Miles Davies, Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra and Edith Piaf.

He had planned to give concerts in Paris in April this year, but that sadly won’t happen.

I’ll sure miss you Mr. Legrand.

RIP and thank you for your inspiration.

Your music will live on.

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