Jean Ferrat was a leading light of post-war French chanson. He used to write protest songs, but he also alternated between love songs and poetic songs. He often struggled with censorship. Well-known for being a great composer, he set to music a lot of poems by Louis Aragon and made them famous. “C’est beau la vie” sounds very similar to several of his love songs. It was and still is a great success, and it is part of French chanson’s classics.
