Camélia Jordana, unassuming diva

From TV to reality

Paris 

12/08/2010 - 

The 2009 semi-finalist of the reality talent show, Nouvelle Star, has done impressively well. She could have foundered with a one-hit début album, but instead she has sought the help of some fine writers like Mathieu Boogaerts, Babx and Séverin, and doesn’t let the others call the shots, despite her tender age of 17. Here follows the portrait of a very grown-up novice.

As soon as Camélia Jordana was eliminated from the popular TV talent show, the head of Sony records asked her to do an album: “I almost said no on the phone, I was so busy saying goodbye to everyone!” she recalls. That was back in June 2009. In a little less than a year, the singer has come a long way. She has signed up with Jive Epic, one of Sony’s labels, recorded her first album, seen it released in March 2010, and made a batch of interviews and television appearances. She has also done a pretty impressive tour due to be followed by another from October 2010 to September 2011.

Things move fast with Camélia Jordana. Except when she’s ordering what to eat in a restaurant, that is. When we met on a hot summer’s afternoon in Paris, she hesitated for a long time between salmon salad and grilled vegetables on toast. There is nothing capricious about her – but she is nostalgic. Nostalgic for her father’s homemade chips, cooked the day before in the south of France where she hails from. “They were so good! And it was good to spend a day with my family too.”  

That was about the only time that she revealed just how young she really is, and showed a glimmer of fragility and dependence. On the whole, though, her confidence is verging on cocky given her age, and she runs the tight ship of an experienced woman: “Nouvelle Star did a lot to prepare me for my current career. Not just for the interviews and publicity, but for the stress too: singing live in front of an over-excited audience, with four million TV viewers and a jury judging you is really good training.”

Before joining this “televisual school”, Camélia had never had a singing lesson. “Sometimes, in the kitchen, I took a few singing tips from my mother, who used to be an opera singer. I sang so much that my parents used to asked me to pipe down.”

As a child, she was spoon fed with her parents’ Georges Brassens and Stevie Wonder records, and regularly watched the Sunday evening classical concerts broadcast on Arte, the French art channel, yet it was Britney Spears she identified with: “I used to imagine myself on TV, on video clips and in celebrity magazines. As I grew up, I gave up that dream and turned into a regular school kid.” The average teenager image contributed to her success in Nouvelle Star, since it cut such a contrast with her explosive personality and her stunning voice. The vocals are powerful, at times velvety, at times rough, sometimes even breathy, like a mix of Lily Allen’s lightness and Cat Power’s seriousness.

Debut album

On her first CD, Camélia found the help she needed to bring out her musical range. She chose the young Babx (two albums to his name and a talented writer) to oversee most of her titles, and included other refined writers like Mathieu Boogaerts, L, Séverin and Doriand. The result was a hitch-free album alternating 60s pop sounds with Gainsbourg-style sketches, pianistic tragedies and muted jazz.

It was an amazing achievement for a contestant whom everyone expected to be transformed into a sound puppet. “I received 400 offers of lyrics and tunes, and these were the writers who touched a chord with me. Hardly anyone had heard of them despite their huge talent. I was happy to see them enjoy some of the media hype that surrounds a Nouvelle Star contestant.”

Camélia wouldn’t have settled for anything else: “I couldn’t bear having ‘toi et moi là-bas, dans nos bras’ played everywhere for a month and then nothing else.” Under her jet-black hair, the young woman has quite some character. “I grew up in a family where discussions can get pretty heated and everyone talks really loudly. I doesn’t matter if I’m speaking to Copé or my eight-year old brother, if I don’t agree, I say so,” she says, referring to the television programme where she sounded off about the burqa to right-wing politician Jean-François Copé. Hot-blooded, decisive and intelligent, Camélia Jordana is perfectly lucid about the honeymoon she’s currently enjoying: “It’s obvious that it’s going to wane at some point. Maybe it’ll take off again, maybe it won’t, but whatever happens, I’m making the most of now.”

Camélia Jordana Camélia Jordana (Sony Music / Jive Epic) 2010

In concert at the Cigale, Paris, 8 November 2010.

Fleur  de la Haye

Translation : Anne-Marie  Harper