Friday, 5 October 2018 12:12PM
France has said goodbye to Charles Aznavour, demonstrating the late singer's status as a national icon at a farewell attended by President Emmanuel Macron, his two predecessors and the leader of Armenia, the country of Aznavour's roots.
Celebrities, among them the now-frail actor Jean-Paul Belmondo, attended the ceremony on Friday under clear blue Paris skies for the singer-songwriter who died this week at 94.
Pallbearers carried Aznavour's Tricolour-draped coffin into the courtyard at the Les Invalides military museum where Napoleon is buried in the heart of the French capital.
Aznavour, whose global reach was enhanced by his ability to sing in half a dozen languages, died at his villa in the village of Mouries, in the southern French Alpilles region, on Sunday night.
Aznavour, born in Paris on May 22, 1924, to Armenian parents – his birth name Shahnour Aznavourian – grew up on the Left Bank of Paris and began performing at the age of nine.
His first public performances were at Armenian gatherings where his father and older sister Aida sang while he danced.
He broke from the shadows penning songs for Edith Piaf in the years after World War 2, and later brought rapt audiences to their feet at venues as far away as New York's Carnegie Hall.
Macron, due to go on an official visit next week to Armenia that Aznavour had hoped to attend, stood side-by-side with Armenia's leaders for a ceremony that began with an army band rendition of Armenia's national anthem, then France's.
