"Mom is gone"

“Icon”: chanson singer Françoise Hardy (80) dead

Françoise Hardy in April 1965 in New York

(Bild: AFP)

At the age of 18, Françoise Hardy landed a surprise hit with "Tous les garçons et les filles", followed by a decades-long career in which she established herself as a singer, composer and style icon. At the age of 80, Hardy has now died after a serious illness.

"Mom is gone," wrote her son Thomas Dutronc on online networks on Tuesday evening. He also published a photo showing him as a child with his mother.

First guitar at 16
Hardy, who was born in Paris in 1944, became famous in 1962 with her hit "Tous les garçons et les filles", which the then 18-year-old Frenchwoman had written herself.

Hardy had only received her first guitar two years earlier, at the age of 16.

"French icon"
In 2023, the US magazine "Rolling Stone" included her in its list of the 200 greatest singers of all time - as the only representative of France. "All my life I've been in search of beautiful melodies. Listening to them takes me to seventh heaven," said Hardy in 2018.

All my life I've been searching for beautiful melodies. Hearing them takes me to seventh heaven.

Die französische Sängerin Françoise Hardy im Jahr 2018

"My whole childhood"
France's Culture Minister Rachida Dati paid tribute to a "legend of French chanson" in the online networks. "For me, she is my entire childhood," declared French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal in the online service X, calling Hardy a "French icon". "Enormous sadness. She inspired me a lot...", wrote singer Michel Polnareff.

A relationship full of disappointments
Hardy's great love was Jacques Dutronc, who also hit the charts in the 60s with hits such as "Et moi, et moi, et moi" (1966). She had a son with him, Thomas, who also became a singer. But the relationship was full of disappointments, and their problems also permeated Hardy's musical work.

Singer Françoise Hardy at Paris airport on her return from a US tour in 1965.

(Bild: AFP)

Cancer
The chansonnière had been suffering from cancer since 2004. She spoke out in favor of euthanasia: "To let someone who is terminally ill suffer unbearably until they die is inhumane," Hardy said in 2021. Last year, Hardy told the magazine "Paris Match" that she wanted to go "soon and quickly, without too many trials", such as not being able to breathe.