Lady Gaga performed ‘Mon truc en plumes’ during the Paris Olympics opening ceremony – check out footage of her performance below.
Gaga had been spotted in Paris for rehearsals earlier this week, fueling speculation that she’d performing during the ceremony. Per Uproxx, rumours first began swirling on July 11, when social media noticed that Thomas Jolly, the artistic director of the opening and closing ceremonies for the 2024 Summer Games, recently followed Gaga on Instagram.
The artist performed Zizi Jeanmaire’s French cabaret number (whose title translates to ‘My thing with feathers’) on some steps by the river Seine, accompanied by a troupe of eight dancers carrying pink feather fans. She later moved to the piano in the back half of the song.
Gaga’s mother is half-French and she previously has said that she has grown more confident speaking (and singing) in the language with practice.
The opening ceremony is the first in Olympic history to take place outside of a stadium, with the athletes travelling down the Seine on 85 boats on a four-mile parade.
Check out footage of Gaga’s cabaret-inspired performance below:
Lady Gaga performing "Mon truc en plumes" at the #OlympicGames pic.twitter.com/qVMcpnro3F
— Lady Gaga Now
(@ladygaganownet) July 26, 2024
There’s one thing I would bet my life on and it’s that Lady Gaga will EGOT pic.twitter.com/bni5J4kt9O
— Liv Marks (@OliviaLilyMarks) July 26, 2024
Gaga then took to Instagram to thank the organisers for including her in the ceremony.
“I feel so completely grateful to have been asked to open the Paris @Olympics 2024 this year,” she wrote. “I am also humbled to be asked by the Olympics organizing committee to sing such a special French song—a song to honor the French people and their tremendous history of art, music, and theatre. This song was sung by Zizi Jeanmaire, born in Paris a French ballerina, she famously sang “Mon Truc en Plumes” in 1961. The title means “My Thing with Feathers.”
“And this is not the first time we’ve crossed paths. Zizi starred in Cole Porter’s musical “Anything Goes” which was my first jazz release. Although I am not a French artist, I have always felt a very special connection with French people and singing French music—I wanted nothing more than to create a performance that would warm the heart of France, celebrate French art and music, and on such a momentous occasion remind everyone of one of the most magical cities on earth—Paris.
She continued: “We rented pom poms from Le Lido archive—a real French cabaret theater. We collaborated with Dior to create custom costumes, using naturally molted feathers. I studied French choreography that put a modern twist on a French classic. I rehearsed tirelessly to study a joyful French dance, brushing up on some old skills—I bet you didn’t know I used to dance at a 60’s French party on the lower east side when I was first starting out!
“I hope you love this performance as much as I do. And to everyone in France, thank you so much for welcoming me to your country to sing in honor of you—it’s a gift I’ll never forget! Congratulations to all the athletes who are competing in this year’s Olympic Games! It is my supreme honor to sing for you and cheer you on!! Watching the Olympic Games always makes me cry! Your talent is unimaginable. Let the games begin!”
This isn’t the first time the singer has been linked to the Olympic Games. In 2021, leaked documents reportedly revealed that Lady Gaga was set to perform at the opening ceremony of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, which was delayed until 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Gaga is expected to appear again later in the ceremony. It has been confirmed that she will duet with Celine Dion on the Édith Piaf classic ‘La Vie en Rose’.
The performance will mark Dion’s first time taking to the stage in over four years, following her being diagnosed with Stiff Person Syndrome – a rare, chronic neurological disorder that causes muscle stiffness and intense spasms.
She last took to the stage in 2020 when she performed in New York, and she was expected to embark on a world tour last year, but was forced to axe all scheduled dates due to the condition.
According to RTL, those operating at the Olympics have made every effort to keep the singer relaxed ahead of her comeback.
In other news, Gaga is also set to appear in Joker: Folie à Deux and recently revealed that she had to change her singing voice to play Harley “Lee” Quinn.
In a new interview with Empire magazine, the Oscar and Grammy winner said that she didn’t use many of her professional singing techniques during the film, as her character wouldn’t have known them.
“People know me by my stage name, Lady Gaga, right? That’s me as that performer, but that is not what this movie is; I’m playing a character,” she said.
“So I worked a lot on the way that I sang to come from Lee and to not come from me as a performer.”
“For me, there’s plenty of bum notes, actually, from Lee. I’m a trained singer, right? So even my breathing was different when I sang as Lee. When I breathe to sing onstage, I have this very controlled way to make sure that I’m on pitch, and it’s sustained at the right rhythm and amount of time, but Lee would never know how to do any of that.
She added: “So it’s like removing the technicality of the whole thing, removing my perceived art form from it all and completely being inside of who she is.”
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