Enrico Macias

Algerian chanson singer Gaston Ghrenassia is better known by his stage name, Enrico Macias. Learning guitar as a child in the 1940s, Macias has been performing and traveling the world for over five decades now. His style is one heavily-influenced by French chanson singers of the early half of the 20th Century--and for good reason. In the early 1960s, Macias and his wife exiled themselves in Paris to escape the racial tensions that were raging in the lead up to Algeria's battle for independence. It's this mix of North African roots and Western European saturation that has made Macias' music so compelling to listeners of crooning vocal pop for all these years. His varied background has also played a huge role in his lyrics, which are sung in many different languages, including French, Spanish, Greek, Italian, Arabic and Hebrew.