TisF Dances to the Sounds of Dalida.

Under her real name of Yolanda Gigliotti, Dalida was born in Cairo on 17th January 1933.  She came from an Italian family which had emigrated to Egypt, and was the only daughter between two sons, Orlando her elder brother and Bruno, her younger. Their father Pietro, was the Principal Violinist for the Cairo Opera.  In her teenage years, she was destined to follow a career as a secretary. In 1951, she secretly entered a beauty pageant. Three years later, she took part in the Miss Egypt contest and won first prize. She was then hired as an actress to make films in Cairo, the Hollywood of the Middle East. There she was spotted by a French film producer. Yolanda, who had become Dalila, dreamt of Paris. Despite her family's misgivings, on 24th December 1954, she caught a flight to Paris. Times were hard. French cinema had no place for her. So in order to make ends meet, she took singing lessons.

She was booked for a cabaret on the Champs Elysées, and later on at the Villa d'Este. She was introduced as the "Revelation of French Song".  Bruno Coquatrix had just bought an old Parisian cinema, the "Olympia", where he put on a variety show, "The Number Ones of Tomorrow". Dalila was invited and she chose to perform "Stranger in Paradise". On that occasion, she met two men: Lucien Morisse, Artistic Director of Radio Europe 1, and Eddy Barclay, a record producer. They had decided to discover the pearl that would help them launch both their respective businesses. Dalila, now having become DALIDA, seemed to be the artiste they needed.  She recorded her first single on the Barclay label, "Madonna", but it was with "Bambino" that Dalida would make her mark. It was an enormous success.

The 1970s also saw the birth of variety shows on television. She took advantage of this, since she was regularly invited to appear on TV in France and abroad. In the Arab countries, Dalida was hugely appreciated. Everyone knew of her origins in Cairo, Egypt. That reinforced the link between her and the public there. Her return to Egypt in the 1970s and her travels to Lebanon gave her the idea to record in Arabic. In 1977 she took a traditional Egyptian folk song "Salma Ya Salama", and released it in France and the Middle East. The success was staggering. She eventually recorded it in five languages.

During her 37 years of uninterrupted success, she found the time to make several films, but she had to wait until 1986 for a real meaty role. She didn't mind making herself look older for Youssef Chahine's film "The Sixth Day", in which she showed what a great actress she could be. Critics praised her performance.  But from their ivory towers, even goddesses have crises of faith and suffer from heartache. Dalida wasn't immune to this. The endgame of all exceptional tragic stories was already underway. All the years of work had tired her out, she was exhausted. She felt more and more alone and sensed that as her artistic life had grown, that of the woman inside had shrunk. She had neither husband nor children and the years were beginning to weigh down on her.  She sang: "I want to die on stage... ".

But, thinking that life had nothing else to give her, she decided to go to sleep forever on the night of 2nd May 1987, and left her final message: "Forgive me, life has become unbearable for me".

For more information about this Fabulous Entertainer please visit: www.dalida.com