Charles Aznavour: ‘French Frank Sinatra’ dies aged 94

Charles Aznavour, the beloved French crooner who had a UK platinum hit with She, has died at the age of 94.

A spokesperson said the star passed away at one of his homes in the southeast of France, the BBC reports.

Born Shanour Aznavourian in 1924 to Armenian immigrants who had fled to Paris to escape Turkish persecution, Aznavour would later draw on his early experiences of poverty and isolation to infuse his music with pathos and poetry.

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“Luckily for me I was small and poor. I had a lot to write about,” the 5ft 3in performer would later joke, according to a 2015 profile in the Daily Mail.

In the 1940s, he began writing songs while working in a nightclub double act, launching an eight-decade entertainment career over which he “sold more than 180 million records and featured in over 60 films”, says the BBC.

Aznavour is estimated is said to have written or co-written more than 1,000 songs in his lifetime - not only in French but also in English, Italian, German, Spanish, Russian and Armenian. He was a familiar face on movie screens, too, most notably in the 1960 black comedy Shoot the Pianist.

While his mastery of the French “chanson” tradition secured him a legendary status alongside figures such as Edith Piaf and Jacques Brel, his style and influence extended beyond the borders of his homeland.

His song She - one of many he penned in English - was a No. 1 hit in the UK in 1974, and a 1999 cover by Elvis Costello also reached the top 20 after it appeared on the soundtrack to rom-com Notting Hill.

In that same year that She re-entered the charts, Aznavour was named Entertainer of the 20th Century in a poll of Time magazine readers. Even in his 90s, he was “still performing to packed stadiums”, says France 24.

His repertoire of beloved hits, combined with memorable film roles, drew frequent comparisons to Frank Sinatra, a parallel that he dismissed “with Gallic insouciance”, The Times reported in 2009. “Sinatra, he says, was a singer who acted; he is an actor who sings.”

Aznavour is survived by his third wife, Ulla Thorsell, whom he married in 1967, and his six adult children.