Enrico Macias in New York

A Peace Ambassador

27/10/1999 - 

It's 7.30pm on Sunday October 24th and there's already an excited crowd milling in front of the Lincoln Center in New York. Why all the fuss and excitement? Because in half-an-hour, singer star Enrico Macias is set to take to the stage and there's not a spare seat left in the house! Tickets are exchanging hands on the black market for exorbitant prices - and it's hardly surprising! When Enrico last performed in New York - at the Beacon Theater in 1996 - he brought the house down, the audience rising to their feet at the end of the show to give him a rousing standing ovation.

When the doors of the Lincoln Center finally open, 3,000 music fans throng into the lobby, hurrying to their seats to welcome Enrico Macias, recently appointed as the United Nation's official "Peace Ambassador". As I settle into my seat, I hear music fans on my right chattering away in Hebrew while a few rows back I catch the strains of Arabic. Enrico Macias, born in Constantine, Algeria, already appears to have done a good job in bringing the nations together.

The front row seats are already filling up with a host of prestigious guests, including Algerian ambassador Abdallah Baali, his wife, and the French ambassador Alain Dejammet. There's a sudden flurry of activity in the centre of the room as a pair of bodyguards escort a small man dressed in a smart black suit through the audience. The man is obviously important, because the crowd draws back in respectful silence, allowing Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the U.N., to make his way to his seat. Annan has come to pay his respects to his new Peace Ambassador, but also to listen to the music of Enrico Macias, his 'brother' and close friend. Enrico acknowledges Annan's presence as soon as he appears on stage, greeting the head of the U.N. in his opening speech.

As the lights go down and Enrico's musicians appear on stage, the audience is bursting with palpable tension - which explodes into shouting and near-hysterical applause when Enrico himself appears on stage. The atmosphere is infused with emotion right from the start of the show, the audience shedding symbolic tears of joy and hope as Enrico begins his concert for peace.

Going Home

The audience's emotion reaches a collective high when Enrico makes a moving personal announcement: "You don't know how happy it makes me to announce that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has personally invited me to return and perform in Algeria. The idea of setting foot on my native soil, returning to the land that I was forced to leave so many years ago now, fills me with immense joy."

Enrico's announcement is greeted by a wild outburst of "you-you" (high-pitched cries of joy which traditionally resound at Arab weddings and other celebrations). Enrico is visibly moved by this response, overcome with emotion at this most-welcome of gestures from the Algerian president. Following the announcement of these happy tidings, Enrico launches into an enthusiastic medley of his classics, thrilling the audience with live versions of "Les filles de mon pays", "L’Oriental", "Non je n’ai pas oublié" and "Paris tu m’as pris dans tes bras". Needless to say, the audience - made up of an unbelievably mixed crowd - break into rapturous applause at the end of each song. Perhaps several of the faces in the crowd tonight remember the same songs being sung all those years ago as hundreds of Algerians clambered on board boats wrenching them across the Mediterranean, far from their beloved country.

Enrico, Ambassador of Love

Peace was not the only subject Enrico raised on stage at the Lincoln Center - his concert also revolved around love, the singer expressing his sentiments for his wife, his daughter and even the wife of his best friend. Enrico paid a special tribute to his wife on stage in New York, singing an English version of his classic "Pour toutes ces raisons, je t’aime" (which was specially rewritten as "For all of this my love, je t’aime…" to mark the occasion). Another highpoint of the French star's New York show was when Enrico launched into a rendition of "Un berger vient de tomber", dedicating the song to President Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Anwar Sadat (the man for whom it was originally written) and the assassinated Israeli prime minister Itzhak Rabin. Backed by the haunting strains of the Oriental guitar, Enrico addressed his message of love and peace to an enrapt audience, addressing a special request to "my friend Kofi": "Help us work towards celebrating Christmas in Jerusalem one day!"

Ear-shattering applause greeted Enrico's call for peace and the singer had the greatest difficulty in obtaining silence to perform his final song. Enrico laid aside his microphone for this final number, moving upstage amidst the carpet of roses thrown by adoring fans and breaking into a moving a cappella version of "Enfants de tous pays, tendez vos mains meurtries, semez l’amour et puis donnez la vie…" ("Children of all countries, stretch out your bruised hands and sow the seeds of love and life"). And Enrico sowed his message in French, English, Hebrew, Arabic and Russian - to make sure that tonight, at least, that message did not fall on stony ground.

10.30pm on Sunday night and 3,000 people are milling about in front of the Lincoln Center in New York, bundling into a queue of yellow taxis. My head still full of the haunting sound of Oriental guitars, I walk away from the Lincoln Center and watch a young woman disappear into the night. The same young woman I'd watched all evening, sitting impassive and immobile in a back balcony, taking care to keep her hair tucked neatly inside her headscarf … A woman I'd seen nothing of but a pair of glowing eyes!

Myriem  Wong

Translation : Julie  Street