Âge tendre et têtes de bois : Nostalgia,television and popular music in contemporary France

Emotion, elation and escapism

Several of the programmes in this study produce a particularly affective brand of nostalgia, emphasising the value of individual chanson performers and their work. For example, in a special edition of the weekly early-evening entertainment and talk show, Vivement dimanche, devoted to the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon, the long-serving presenter Michel Drucker, something of a national institution who launched his career during the 1960s, asserts before the studio and television audiences that the singers Michelle Torr and François Deguelt are ‘dans votre mémoire et dans votre cœur’ (22 October 2006). Similarly, in a special edition of the game show Questions pour un champion, also dedicated to Âge tendre et têtes de bois, the quiz master Julien Lepers, himself a singer-songwriter, highlights the emotional impact of Michelle Torr’s performances: ‘Elle ne cesse de nous chavirer le cœur’ (Questions pour un champion, 28 December 2009). In effect, chanson artists such as Deguelt and Torr are represented, to use the terms of Sedikides et al., as a source of collective ‘self continuity over time and in the face of change’ (2008b: 230).

Television representations of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois tour and cruise give rise to expressions of joy and elation, rather than the ‘bittersweetness’ that, as previously mentioned, several commentators associate with nostalgia. Denise Fabre, a former continuity announcer on French television, who introduces the concerts, refers to the tour and cruise in terms of ‘bonheur’ as well as ‘tendresse’ ⁹ (Service Maximum, 14 October 2008). In an interview with the humorist Yves Lecoq during an edition of Les Grands du rire, a Saturday-afternoon programme combining interviews and replays of comedy sketches, the veteran singer Rika Zaraï similarly explains how she selects songs whose choruses evoke ‘le bonheur’ and ‘la fête’ (28 April 2007), including ‘C’est ça la France’ (1973), which mentions ‘l’amour’, ‘la joie’ and ‘l’espérance’. The presenter, columnist, lyricist and musician Fréderic Zeitoun, another compère on the tour, describes in his regular slot during the weekday morning magazine programme C’est au programme how the Âge tendre et têtes de bois team ‘a rit comme c’est pas possible’ for four days (26 April 2010). In his Saturday-night entertainment show, the presenter Patrick Sébastien describes how the joy that nostalgia brings to audiences provides a welcome respite from the gloom of everyday life. Sébastien’s comments indeed suggest a malaise within contemporary French society: ‘le public participe et c’est ce que qu’on veut, de la joie; de la bonne humeur on en a besoin en ce moment’ (Les Années bonheur, 29 November 2008). Indeed, in 2009–10 Sébastien, generally disaffected with the contemporary French political scene, launched a movement, albeit shortlived, called Droit au respect et à la dignité (DARD). In effect, the ‘bonheur’ expressed in Sébastien’s nostalgia programme serves to counter within contemporary France a perceived sense of ‘discontinuity’ and ‘turmoil’, to use respectively the terms of Fred Davis and Stephen Brown.

Television coverage also expresses joy in the past as well as in the present. In the documentary Le Retour des yéyés, Michelle Torr describes young people during the 1960s generally as the ‘génération de joie’ (21 June 2007). The programming indeed often promotes a rather simplistic view of the 1960s in particular as a ‘happy’ decade. On Drucker’s show, Torr also comments, ‘C’était une époque heureuse les années 60’ (Vivement dimanche, 22 October 2006). In the entertainment and talk show, Le Temps des yé-yé, presented by Frédérique Courtadon, Torr similarly describes the 1960s as ‘une époque géniale … que du bonheur’ (15 January 2007) – a period during which she realised her personal and professional ambition to perform in public. Sylvie Vartan, a key figure in the yé-yé pop music scene during the early 1960s, also exclaims in the documentary Le Retour des yéyés, ‘Qu’est-ce qu’on était heureux!’ (21 June 2007), while in a news report Annie Gautrat (a singer known to audiences as Stone) evokes the ‘moments heureux’ of both her own and other people’s experiences of youth (Journal de 20 heures, 16 January 2010).

The documentary Le Retour des yéyés (21 June 2007) represents a more mixed, ambivalent, ‘bittersweet’ view of nostalgia. The singer Richard Anthony describes how listeners might associate certain songs with their own life experiences, both positive and negative. The song ‘J’entends siffler le train’ (a French adaptation of Hedy West’s ‘500 Miles’), with its image of lovers parting at a train station, is cited as an example of this ambivalence. Nancy Holloway, an American singer who pursued a successful career in France, also defines nostalgia in mixed terms: ‘C’est pas la tristesse, c’est mélancolique et jolie et tendre et triste des fois’. The documentary genre possibly lends itself more readily to a more considered and nuanced view of the nostalgia as a ‘reflective’ process, to use Boym’s terms, in that it ‘dwells on the ambivalences of human longing’ (2001: xviii).

For the most part, nevertheless, the nostalgic television coverage of popular music generates what Davis (1979) refers to as ‘simple nostalgia’, unquestioningly representing the past more positively than the present. For instance, in the early-evening weekday magazine programme On a tout essayé, presented by Laurent Ruquier, the singer Frank Alamo views the 1960s as ‘les années d’insouciance’ – a time when young people were not affected by concerns such as taxes, road speed restrictions and serious illness (13 April 2006). In the documentary Le Retour des yéyés, Michelle Torr also views the era as more optimistic than the present (‘On avait tout devant nous’). Although the 1960s in France, as in other Western countries, saw a considerable rise in consumerism, Torr argues that the 1960s was, in fact, a less materialistic period. Indeed, she goes as far as stating that there was no need for refrigerators or cars (21 June 2007).

Television coverage also generates ‘simple nostalgia’ where the subject of popular music is concerned, promoting the view that the songs of the 1960s were good quality if not better than some of those on offer today. For example, Frank Alamo regards the 1960s as a golden age of ‘bonnes chansons, bonnes mélodies’ that people still remember (Le Temps des yé-yé, 15 January 2007). Pierre Douglas, another compère on the tour, also remarks in interview how appreciative audience members are when he signs their programmes at concerts during the interval. Compliments include ‘Ça, c’était de la musique !’ (Vivement dimanche, 10 May 2009) and ‘Mieux que ceux [singers] d’aujourd’hui il n’y a pas photo!’ (Journal de 20 heures, 16 January 2010). In effect, such representations generate the kind of self-esteem that Sedikides et al (2008a; 2008b) associate with nostalgia. Moreover, they reflect ‘the notion of pilgrimage’ and the ‘sense of quasi-religious faith in the power of music icons’ that John Connell and Chris Gibson (2003: 223) identify in their study of popular-music tourism. However, while Connell and Gibson regard popular-music tourism as ‘at once celebrating the music’s obsolescence and yet keeping its cultural meanings alive’, the nostalgic television coverage of popular music, in contrast, actually appears to prioritise ‘keeping [music’s] cultural meanings alive’ over ‘celebrating’ its ‘obsolescence’ (2003: 223).

In generating ‘simple nostalgia’, certain programmes encourage viewers to indulge in what Connell and Gibson (2003) refer to in their study of music and tourism, as ‘living out “retro” fantasies, of “being young again”’, ‘commodity fetishism’, and ‘place fetishisation’ (2003: 223). For example, the presenter Michel Drucker advises the studio audience and viewers who wish to ‘revivre’ the 1960s to attend the Âge tendre et têtes de bois concerts, announcing a related CD release and detailing a long list of performers, dates and venues (Vivement dimanche, 22 October 2006). ¹⁰ The fantasy of returning to one’s youth is effectively represented in an interview with the fashion designer Paco Rabanne, who describes feeling 30 years old again on listening to the energetic performance of ‘Les filles, c’est pour faire l’amour’ by the group Galanter Mareva (Le Temps des yé-yé, 15 January 2007). In effect, the long-standing variétés programming genre with its intrinsically escapist qualities lends itself to representing the fantasy of a return to one’s youth. ¹¹ In the special edition of Questions pour un champion, the presenter Julien Lepers evokes the ‘plaisir de revisiter les années 60, 70, 80’, a sentiment shared by the studio audience who respond (or are prompted to respond) with applause. Indeed, ‘plaisir’ is for Lepers the ‘maître mot’ of the evening (28 December 2009). A news interview featuring Âge tendre et têtes de bois concert-goers further supports the fantasy of a return to youth – one of the audience members describes how the concerts allow concert-goers to ‘retrouve nos 20, 30 ans’ and ‘rappelle notre jeunesse’ (Journal de 20 heures, 16 January 2010). In his regular C’est au programme slot, Frédéric Zeitoun also regards the Âge tendre et têtes de bois cruise in positive terms as a way of helping holidaymakers ‘retrouve[r] leur jeunesse’ (9 April 2010). Certain programmes feature members of the public revisiting their youth and effectively indulging in ‘commodity fetishism’ as they look through their own personal memorabilia. For instance, in Drucker’s Vivement dimanche, Michel, an interviewee, recounts during one particular item his memory of buying his first transistor radio (22 October 2006). In the documentary, Le Retour des yéyés, an interviewee from Les Viollins, Hautes Alpes, looks through his 45 rpm record collection in his attic, describes how he still feels 20 years old, and evokes the ‘souvenirs extraordinaires’ of his youth – parties (‘boums’) as well as flirting with Sylvie, his future wife (21 June 2007). Similarly, in a report featured in the early-evening magazine programme Sept à huit, Lili, a passenger on board the cruise liner, describes how at the age of 14 she also flirted with her future husband while listening to Pascal Danel’s 1967 hit ‘Les Neiges du Kilimandjaro’ (23 August 2009).

While the fantasy return to youth is a significant feature of the coverage, one particular programme generates a more ambivalent view of the past. In Vivement dimanche (22 October 2006), Michel Drucker, 63 years old at the time, initially highlights the 1960s with its optimism as preferable to the present. For Drucker, the songs revisited in his programme remind viewers of 1964–5 when the Algerian War was over and France enjoyed full employment, a time before HIV/AIDS, ¹² a period without any ‘angoisse de demain’, when parents assumed that their children would lead better lives than their own. However, Drucker’s younger co-presenter Faustine Bollaert (at the time 27 years old) effectively challenges such a positive view of the 1960s. Bollaert enumerates various examples of what makes the 1960s not ‘si génial’, although her evidence is relatively flimsy: singers’ hairstyles such as Dick Rivers’ long quiff and Mireille Mathieu’s mushroom cut, the 2CV car and its soft suspension, the weight gain associated with the oral contraceptive pill, and the fact that France had just two black-and-white television channels, whereas 183 are currently available (Drucker argues in response that no one actually watches all these channels). While the generational conflict between Drucker and Bollaert appears to be staged mainly for comic effect, it nonetheless illustrates a reluctance to accept unquestioningly the idealisation of the 1960s. In effect, this interaction between Drucker and Bollaert represents a more ‘reflexive’ form of nostalgia – one which, according to Davis’s terms, raises ‘questions concerning the truth, accuracy, completeness or representativeness of the nostalgic claim’ (1979: 21), and which also contains features of Boym’s ‘reflective’ nostalgia: ‘dwelling on the ambivalences of human longing’ and ‘calling [the truth] into doubt’ (2001: xviii).

Social connectedness: nation and generation

While emotion, elation and escapism into the past are key features of nostalgia programming, a strong sense of what Zhou et al. (2008) and Wildschut et al. (2010) identify as ‘social connectedness’ is promoted. In effect, contemporary French television continues a tradition of promoting social, national and generational cohesion established by Charles de Gaulle when the medium of television was taking off in France during the 1960s. ¹³ In Vivement dimanche the singer François Deguelt encourages the audience, in a moment of communion, to sing the chorus of ‘Il y a le ciel’ (22 October 2006), a sentimental summer love song. In a similar vein, the presenter Julien Lepers evokes in Questions pour un champion, the ‘plaisir d’être ensemble … plaisir de terminer cette décennie ensemble’ (28 December 2009). Coverage of the cruise features interactions between passengers and artists during autograph sessions (e.g. Sept à huit, 23 August 2009). In one particular news report, a passenger comments that the performers are ‘abordables’ (Le 19/20 Édition nationale, 26 March 2010). Reporting on the cruise for the daytime magazine, C’est au programme, Frédéric Zeitoun highlights the connection fostered between the artists on the cruise as well as that between artists and the audience of holidaymakers. Emphasised are singers’ ‘véritable plaisir à être là’ and their ‘véritable contact avec le public’ (26 April 2010). In Vivement dimanche the singer Isabelle Aubret describes the relationship between artists and their audiences as loving, nurturing and based on reciprocity: ‘Le public c’est un enfant, un seul enfant; un rendez-vous d’amour’ (10 May 2009). In a report filmed on board the cruise liner during Mireille Dumas’s magazine programme Vie privée vie publique, one particular audience member recounts how she is able to meet and tell the singer Jean-Jacques Debout in person how she felt moved by his ‘fragilité’ during her youth (13 December 2006). In the same programme Debout highlights how audiences identify closely with the singer Richard Anthony, one of the main attractions of the tour: ‘le public se connaît en lui’ (Vie privée vie publique, 13 December 2006).

The joy to be derived from nostalgia is identified as a specifically French national phenomenon. For example, a report from on board the Âge tendre et têtes de bois cruise liner describes how ‘La France des trente glorieuses chavire de bonheur’ (Sept à huit, 23 August 2009). Similarly, in the special themed edition of the quiz show Questions pour un champion, the host Julien Lepers (himself a singer during this period) refers to Denise Fabre as a ‘symbole de la joie de vivre des années 60, 70, 80 dont le rire a fait vibrer la France entière’. At times, nostalgia programming performs, to use Boym’s terms, a ‘restorative’ function, which emphasises nostos and a strong sense of French national pride. In his magazine programme, Laurent Ruquier introduces ‘les artistes qui ont fait les belles heures de la chanson française’, citing a long list of successful performers who have ‘cartonné’, playing to audiences exceeding 7000 (On a tout essayé, 13 April 2006). The very mention by Marcel Amont of Georges Brassens, one of the great figures of French chanson, in the show Toutes les idoles que j’aime is enough to elicit the applause of the studio audience (1 November 2010). Annie Cordy, an artist who has recorded over 500 songs, is granted the status of national treasure by Julien Lepers, who refers to her as ‘notre tata nationale’ (Questions pour un champion, 28 December 2009). The importance of French national identity within the broader context of postcolonial Francophone culture is also asserted by Lepers in a reference to the Québécoise singer Fabienne Thiebault, who has pursued a successful career in France: ‘la plus française des québécoises, une des voix les plus populaires des la francophonie’ (Questions pour un champion, 28 December 2009). The documentary, Le Retour des yéyés (21 June 2007), adopts a less Francocentric perspective, highlighting the influence of the USA on the development of youth-oriented popular music and culture in France during the 1960s, the sense of ‘emancipation’ that such influence produced, as well as the feelings of gratitude that young people in France are said to have experienced at the time.

Social cohesion is further promoted in coverage that highlights the harmonious working relationships within the team involved in bringing the Âge tendre et têtes de bois tour and cruise to audiences. In Drucker’s Vivement dimanche, Isabelle Aubret describes how ‘émouvant’ it is working and living with the other artists (10 May 2009); in C’est au programme (26 April 2010) Sophie Darrel highlights the ‘ambiance formidable’, and Gérard Palaprat compares life on the tour to an ‘Eden flottant’, while in Les Grands du rire the singer-songwriter Christian Delagrange describes the atmosphere between the various artists as ‘insoupçonnable’ (20 June 2009). In Mireille Dumas’s interview programme, Vie privée vie publique, the presenter likens the atmosphere behind the scenes to that of a ‘colonie de vacances’ (13 December 2006). In a later edition of the programme featuring a report on the tour, we are informed that there is no ‘bataille d’égos’, Denise Fabre, the tour compère, is identified explicitly as the ‘chef de bande’ who possesses an ‘esprit d’équipe’, while the tour producer Michel Algay argues that such a working environment is preferable to the pretentiousness within certain other show-business circles ‘avec les producteurs qui se la jouent et les artistes qui se la jouent’. The emphasis is firmly on Republican equality – a virtue is made of the fact that artists, musicians and technicians, around 150 people in total, all eat in the same canteen at the same tables (Vie privée vie publique l’hebdo, 19 March 2010). In Drucker’s Vivement dimanche, the experience is likened by Sheila to a ‘vie de foraine’ and by Sophie Darrel to circus life, while, for Herbert Léonard, the tour is ‘convivial’, and for Hervé Vilard, the tour represents ‘quelque chose de fraternel’, which, in his view, is palpable to audiences (10 May 2009). Several performers also describe in interview a strong impression of belonging to a family: Herbert Léonard, Charles Dumont (Vie privée vie publique l’hebdo, 19 March 2010), Sheila (Vivement dimanche, 10 May 2009), and David Alexandre Winter (C’est au programme, 26 April 2010).

While the cruise is represented in terms of harmony and the Republican values of equality and fraternity, there is on occasion the suggestion of an internal group hierarchy amongst performers. In a report featured in the magazine programme Sept à huit, Richard Anthony is described by Michel Algay as ‘Dieu’, and light-hearted discussion takes place concerning the respective positions of performers in a group photograph (23 July 2009). In another report, the singer Annie Philippe describes her fellow artists Richard Anthony and Michelle Torr as the stars of the show, although the latter denies this, insisting on a shared sense of collective endeavour: ‘Il n’y a pas de star, il y a une belle idée de réunir tous ces artistes’ (Vie privée vie publique, 13 December 2006).

The harmonious representation of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois team is identified as compensating for a perceived lack of fraternity within the music, media and show-business industries. The presenter Michel Drucker highlights the ‘mode’ and ‘cruauté’ of the ‘métier’, as artists wait in vain for the telephone to ring (Vivement dimanche, 10 May 2009). Several programmes recount how individual performers fell from favour following their initial success, for example, Jean Sarrus from the group Les Charlots (‘Quand les stars se retrouvent sur la paille’ in 100% Mag, 15 May 2009), and describe the wilderness years that some have experienced (Le Retour des yéyés, 21 June 2007). Although the music business is represented as a fickle world, the nostalgia programming highlights the redemptive force of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon, as artists prove they are able to return to performing, in some cases from virtual obscurity. The Sept à huit magazine programme describes how the singer Michel Orso has spent 35 years in the ‘desert’, but is now able to make a living following his ‘renaissance’ (23 July 2009). Frédéric Zeitoun regards the tour as a second chance for artists, ‘qui ont raté une marche’; ‘qui ont peut-être pas eu le rendez-vous qu’ils avaient, qu’ils devaient avoir avec le public … Grâce à cette tournée il y a une espèce de revanche qui se fait.’ Zeitoun cites the case of the singer Georgette Lemaire, who was often compared to Mireille Mathieu, but did not achieve the same degree of success and renown. According to Zeitoun, Lemaire’s participation in the cruise allows her to ‘prendre une revanche sur la vie’ following ‘les déserts’ and ‘années galères’ (C’est au programme, 9 April 2010). The presenter Jean-Pierre Coffe also stresses the amount of hard work undertaken by artists in order for them to maintain their performing careers, amounting to ‘quarante ans de travail’ (Vivement dimanche, 22 October 2006). In addition, several programmes reinforce a strong work ethic via reference to the number of concerts performed per day and their duration (Vivement dimanche, 10 May 2009; Le Journal de 20 heures, 16 January 2010; Le 19/20 Édition nationale, 26 March 2010).

The programming in this study contributes in particular to the promotion of cross-generational cohesion. In the early-evening magazine programme On a tout essayé, Frank Alamo highlights the wide age range of audience members attending concerts: those who were 18 when he launched his performing career; their sons and daughters, now 35 to 40 years old; and finally, their sons and daughters, between the ages of 10 and 20 (13 April 2006). In a subsequent television appearance, Alamo again emphasises the popularity of the tours across the generations (Le Temps des yé-yé, 15 January 2007), while the ‘simulated’ or ‘vicarious’ nostalgia experienced by young concert goers is highlighted by Michelle Torr (Vivement dimanche, 22 October 2006). In Vivement dimanche Michel Drucker conveys this sense of continuity and shared culture between generations: ‘Même la jeune génération danse sur les airs des années 60’ (22 October 2006). Indeed, Drucker argues in the introduction to his programme against age discrimination and underlines the contemporary relevance of the 1960s, as well as the interest that it presents to today’s audiences: ‘Pas de racisme de l’âge, pas de jeunisme aujourd’hui sur France 2 … Et les anneés 60 c’est une époque qui est toujours présente’ (22 October 2006). In a similar vein, the presenter Patrick Sébastien effectively opposes generational divisions and the limitation of musical coverage and taste to particular periods: ‘Il n’y a pas de frontière pour nous entre les époques. On aime les gens de cœur … qui ont du talent’ (Les Années bonheur, 29 November 2008). In a similar vein, the presenter Olivier Minne remarks how the song, Les Boutons dorés (Jacques Datin and Maurice Vidalin, 1959), which describes the plight of an orphan, has enjoyed enduring popularity (Toutes les idoles que j’aime. 1 November 2010). In Drucker’s Vivement dimanche, the singer Michel Orso delivers a particularly rousing message of cross-generational optimism and solidarity to audiences both in the studio and at home: ‘Pour ceux qui pourraient perdre courage, gardez confiance, jeune, pas jeune, la route est longue’ (10 May 2009).

On occasion, the programming insists on the relevance of 1960s popular-music culture specifically to today’s youth. Indeed, in Vivement dimanche Michelle Torr highlights ‘une génération de chansons qui a marqué’, which continue to be performed by today’s young, up-and-coming artists (22 October 2006), while Michel Drucker argues that the songs of the 1960s clearly appeal to the ‘génération 2000’ (Le Temps des yé-yé, 15 January 2007). Vivement dimanche includes a performance by a troupe of young rock ‘n’ roll dancers (10 May 2009), while Village départ, a series of live outside-broadcast talk shows from various Tour de France venues, discusses the Âge tendre et têtes de bois tour mascot, Charlotte, the young daughter of the show’s producers (25 July 2008). Moreover, the importance of family, regeneration and generational cohesion is highlighted: attention is drawn to the fact that Kevin and Marvin, the grandsons of the singer-songwriter Leny Escudéro, accompany him on the tour (On a tout essayé, 18 April 2007; Toutes les idoles que j’aime, 1 November 2010; Les Années bonheur, 29 November 2008), and Richard Anthony is applauded following his observation that he has raised 11 children (Les Années bonheur, 29 November 2008).

At times, generational differences are emphasised. In Vivement dimanche, Michelle Torr evokes the stereotypical fearlessness of youth when discussing her early appearance as a support act for Jacques Brel in Avignon: ‘Lorsqu’on est très jeune on ne doute de rien à 14, 15 ans’ (22 October 2006). In the documentary Le Retour des yéyés, Frank Alamo recounts how the 1960s television show Âge tendre et têtes de bois expressed the specific ‘état d’esprit’ of young people at the time (21 June 2007). In the same programme the singer Nancy Holloway explicitly associates ageing with a slower pace of life: ‘Les vieux marchent plus longtemps, ils pensent plus longtemps et je suis une des vieilles personnes; je suis comme ça et j’aime bien’ (21 June 2007). In an edition of Pour le plaisir, an afternoon nostalgia discussion show broadcast weekdays during 2006, the 1960s are associated with stricter parenting. Cited is the example of Sophie, a young singer whose parents did not allow her to sign a recording contract as she was under 21, the age of majority at the time (29 March 2006). A generation gap is also expressed in terms of differing levels of popular-music knowledge among audiences: viewers are informed in On a tout essayé (13 April 2006) that Frank Alamo and Jean-Jacques Debout might mean little to today’s young people.

The generation gap is, however, represented in more ambivalent terms in a further discussion between Michel Drucker and his younger co-presenter Faustine Bollaert in Vivement dimanche (22 October 2006). Initially, the gap is reinforced when Drucker asks Bollaert what the 1960s means to her – ‘une gamine de 27 ans’. She responds cheekily, ‘Pour moi c’est avant Jésus Christ’. Jeered by members of the studio audience, Bollaert teases them with a stereotypical description of the ageing baby-boomer generation: ‘Les fans de Johnny Hallyday défonçaient encore les strapontins pendant les concerts. Aujourd’hui ils mettent un quart d’heure pour se lever.’ Although humorous and lighthearted, such discourse nonetheless serves effectively to reinforce generational differences. ¹⁴ Bollaert then proceeds to close the generation gap with her assertion that ‘pour les trentenaires d’aujourd’hui les années 60 restent malgré tout une grande source d’inspiration. Aujourd’hui on veut s’habiller comme Françoise Hardy, on veut danser comme Brigitte Bardot.’ Furthermore, Bollaert discusses how she spent the day with a group of over-sixties, admitting that she is ‘crevée’ after learning to dance rock ‘n’ roll. In effect, while the programme shows that youth is, to use Andy Bennett’s terms, a ‘contested term, the site of a struggle between different post-Second World War generations, each of whom lay claim to a particular knowledge about youth and what it means to be “young”’ (2001: 152), later life represents a similarly problematic category.

Cultural values

While representing nostalgia as an ‘emotion’ or ‘experience’, coverage of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon also contributes towards defining nostalgia as a cultural value in contemporary France. Great emphasis is placed on commercialisation: on several occasions spin-off CDs and DVDs of the tour are plugged during programmes. Audience members are also filmed purchasing tour souvenirs. They are also regarded as having a crucial role in determining which artists will perform the following year, as we see them at concerts filling in questionnaires, which ask them to state their preferred performers. Such a process is compared to the kind of public voting that takes place on television music talent shows in France like Star Academy (Vie privée vie publique, 13 December 2006; Sept à huit, 23 August 2009). Although television views Âge tendre et têtes de bois in commercial terms, the fact that most of the coverage broadcast by the main national terrestrial/free-to-air providers originates from the public service broadcaster France Télévisions rather than privately owned generalist channels (TF1, M6) suggests that the tour is not considered by the latter to be a potential ratings and commercial winner.

While lending itself to what Pickering and Keightley term ‘commercial exploitation’ (2006: 922), television coverage of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon problematises the status of the nostalgia tour within French culture. A France 2 news report (16 January 2010) evokes the huge differences within French public opinion: some class the tour artists as ‘idoles’, while others regard them as ‘has-beens’. In his regular slot, Fréderic Zeitoun also recognises that the tour has been an object of derision (C’est au programme, 9 April 2010), while Frank Alamo reveals in an interview with Mireille Dumas that certain artists who regarded it as ‘ringard’ declined an invitation to participate (Vie privée vie publique, 13 December 2006). In a France 3 news report the tour producer Michel Algay resists charges of ‘ringardise’, arguing instead in favour of varied and eclectic musical tastes: ‘C’est la preuve qu’il n’y a pas d’artiste ringard, parce que le public il aime peut-être bien le rap, il aime aussi ses souvenirs, il aime bien Sheila il aime bien Hervé Vilard. En France on aime les artistes populaires’ (Le 19/20 Édition nationale, 26 March 2010). Indeed, Algay campaigned in 2010 for the recognition of Âge tendre et têtes de bois by the organisers of the annual Victoires de la musique, arguing in the press that the award ceremony does not fully represent the tastes of the public (see, for example, Ouest France, 2010; Le Progrès, 2010; Fouillac and Marolle, 2010; Sud Ouest, 2010; L’Est Républicain, 2010). Support for Âge tendre et têtes de bois is also expressed in television coverage via discourses of quality that emphasise its high production values: according to Fréderic Zeitoun, the tours have been devised with ‘beaucoup de classe and d’élégance’ (C’est au programme, 26 April 2010); Michel Drucker argues that the kind of well-written songs that feature in the tour programme will stand the test of time (Vivement Dimanche, 10 May 2009); and the Vivement Dimanche studio audience spontaneously applauds the singer Pierre Douglas when he observes that artists are able to sing live rather than lip-synch (Vivement Dimanche, 10 May 2009). In effect, television situates and problematises the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon within what Roy Shuker terms a subjective ‘musical hierarchy’, which may be constructed by critics, fans and performers: one which effectively ‘mirrors the broader, still widely accepted, high/low culture split’ (1998: 148).

The foregoing discussion has identified the main features of popular-music-related nostalgia in television coverage of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon. Joy in the present moment as well as in past memories is emphasised, rather than the ‘bittersweetness’ that is often associated with nostalgia. Such joy may serve, in line with the observations of Davis and Brown, to counter social disruption and instability. Television coverage also generates ‘simple nostalgia’, which unquestioningly views the past more positively than the present. In particular, ‘golden oldie’ songs are idealised – objects of collective pride and the kind of self-esteem that Sedikides et al. associate with nostalgia. Such ‘simple nostalgia’ for the singers and songs from the past also involves, to use Connell and Gibson’s terms, the ‘notion of pilgrimage’, a ‘sense of quasi-religious faith in the power of music icons’ and ‘keeping [the songs’] cultural meanings alive’. Certain programmes also encourage what Connell and Gibson term ‘living out “retro” fantasies, of “being young again”’, ‘commodity fetishism’, and ‘place fetishisation’ (2003: 223). However, television coverage of the Âge tendre et têtes de bois phenomenon does not, to use the terms of Juhl et al. (2010), go so far as to ‘buffer existential threat’, or provide what Routledge et al. (2008) term a ‘self-protection mechanism against death-related concerns’. In contrast, French press coverage appears to feature more discussion of bereavement, particularly following the deaths of the performers Gérard Blanc, Albert Raisner and Patrick Topaloff, as well as discussion of age-related health issues – in coverage, for example, of the singers Frank Alamo, Richard Anthony, Annie Cordy, Michel Orso and Rika Zaraï.

In addition to joy and escapism, television coverage promotes what Zhou et al. (2008) and Wildschut et al. (2010) identify as ‘social connectedness’ and performs, to use Boym’s terms (2001), a ‘restorative’ function, which emphasises nostos and a strong sense of French national pride. Coverage represents the Âge tendre et têtes de bois company in terms of harmony and the Republican values of equality and fraternity, and contributes to the promotion of cross-generational cohesion. Indeed, this initial study suggests that social and national cohesion in television nostalgia counters some of the socio-cultural developments in the media landscape that Kuhn has highlighted, notably new target and niche markets based on generation and the trans-nationalisation of the media landscape. This study has also shown how television coverage defines popular-music-related nostalgia not only as an ‘emotion’ or ‘experience’, but also in cultural terms: as a commercial force and according to its own problematic status within the wider musical and cultural field.

At times, the forms of televisual nostalgia outlined above are tempered with expressions of ambivalence or reticence. Indeed, coverage is what Boym terms ‘reflective’ insofar as it ‘dwells on the ambivalences of human longing’, and ‘calls [the truth] into doubt’ (2001: xviii). ¹⁵ It is also ‘reflexive’, to use Davis’s terms, in that it raise ‘questions concerning the truth, accuracy, completeness or representativeness of the nostalgic claim’. The television coverage discussed in this study does not, however, develop a more ‘interpreted’ form of nostalgia, which, according to Davis, ‘moves beyond issues of the historical accuracy or felicity of the nostalgic claim on the past and, even as the reaction unfolds, questions and, potentially at least, renders problematic the very reaction itself’ (1979: 24).

Given the socially cohesive power of nostalgia, further research might consider the extent to which nostalgia programming, to use Kuhn’s terms, ‘reflects the reality of a multi-ethnic and multicultural republic’ (2011: 95), given that this has been an important issue since the 2009 reorganisation of French public television (2011: 92–4). Indeed, Kuhn argues that French public broadcasting in particular ‘has long lacked role models from ethnic minority communities, while much programming fails to take account of the variegated ethnic composition of French society’ (2011: 95). According to Kuhn, ‘This is a difficult issue for French media policy stakeholders since it forms part of a much broader and highly contentious socio-political debate on how the tradition of universal republicanism can be reconciled with greater cultural pluralism’ (2011: 95). We might also usefully consider, in addition to the growth of new target and niche markets and trans-nationalisation, how far other recent developments in the television and broader media landscape, identified by Kuhn, might impact on the coverage of nostalgia: ongoing policy-making by the state, economic factors, technological innovation, the integration of different media, and the multichannel environment. Future research might examine further how particular programme genres shape nostalgia, compare different forms of mediated nostalgia (television, radio, press and internet), and view the combined study of nostalgia, the media and popular music within the broader context of academic work on French culture and memory. Ostensibly there would seem to be little relationship between the foregoing discussion on nostalgia and existing studies of cultural memory within the French context. These have concentrated on turbulent or traumatic episodes in French history, notably the two world wars; the Holocaust; the Algerian War; the ‘events’ of May 1968; ¹⁶ and official forms of remembrance and commemoration: ¹⁷ state funerals, ¹⁸ monuments, statues, street names, anniversaries, educational practice and legislation (the ‘memory laws’). ¹⁹ However, memory and nostalgia do share common features that could certainly be explored further. Both lend themselves to a plurality of competing forms; ²⁰ both involve interplay between the collective and the individual; ²¹ both emphasise the construction of national identity; ²² and both have the capacity to inform the present. ²³ Consideration of such features will ultimately allow a more integrated approach to the study of memory and nostalgia in France as well as in other contexts.