Many artists had two or three hits. A random sampling:
Splish splash by César et les Romains: Correctly pronoundced in French "Spleeesh Splash," it’s remarkably faithful to the Bobby Darin original. There’s a party happening out on the living room carpet ("le tapis"), with records playing and jeunes filles in attendance, while the singer checks out the action from behind the cracked door of la salle de bain.
Cowgirl doreé by Reneé Martel: From Sherbrooke, Quebec. Both parents were professional singers. She favored covers of country and country-pop songs. I looked it up: "dore," adjective; " feminine "doreé." Gilded, golden. Golden cowgirl. Rhinestone cowboy? Yup. (My French professors smile and nod approvingly.)
Le beau petit sous-marin jaune by Les Baronets: "Sous-marin," submarine. "Jaune," yellow. A tight squeeze into the Lennon-McCartney melody, but it worked somehow.
The ubiquitous Petula Clark
She’s not French, but deserves honorable mention after recording dozens of English hit songs in French, and in German and Italian. It was an album of mostly covers, "Les Grandes Successes de Petula Clark," that welcomed me to this little traveled, surprise-filled corner of popular music.
"I Will Follow Him" by Peggy March. We’ve all heard it, and probably sang along more times that we’d admit. Maybe one oldie fan in a thousand knows that it was originally a French song. I didn’t until I played track one, side one, Chariot, of "Les Grandes Successes," and compared the writer credits with those on Peggy March’s album. The cover search has taught me that you never know what you’re going to find, or what information will pop up where it’s least expected.
Turn it up and sing along, say the oldies stations. Okay, I will. Dans le temps ("Downtown."). Entre nous, elle est fou ("She’s A Fool," a true copy right down to the shack-a-doo background vocals). C’est ma chanson ("This Is My Song."). Hello Dolly (Yes). Fortunately, writers can work alone. French covers aren’t the sort of thing on which everyone in the office can agree.