Gabriel Yacoub

Yacoub was born in Paris on 4 February 1952^[1] to a Lebanese father and a French mother.^[2] His early musical interests, in the 1960s, was American folk music, first by Bob Dylan, then by Woody Guthrie^[1] and real American traditional music.^[3] He was inspired, but looked for something with French cultural roots.^[3] He became a guitarist and singer with the group of harpist Alan Stivell who introduced him to traditional Breton music^[3] and toured France in 1971.^[1][4]

Before founding Malicorne, Gabriel and his then wife Marie Sauvet recorded the experimental album Pierre de Grenoble in 1973.^[4][5] This was originally intended to be the name of the group. It included contributions from Breton guitarist-singer Dan Ar Braz.^[6] In 1973, they co-founded Malicorne, to revive traditional French music^[3] and combined modern instruments, including guitar, electric guitar and bass guitar, with traditional instruments such as bagpipes, hurdy-gurdy and krumhorns.^[1][5] Gabriel played guitars, mandolin, Epinette des Vosges and banjo, while Marie played electric dulcimer, bouzouki and hurdy-gurdy. They made a number of successful albums, of which the 1976 Almanach was regarded as the most popular.^[5]

In 1978, Yacoub recorded a solo album called Trad. Arr., which featured English fiddler Barry Dransfield as guest;^[7] he played traditional French tunes with acoustic guitar, and began to write and compose original songs.^[1]

After disbanding for the first time, at the end of 1981, Malicorne reformed in different configurations in 1984, in 1986 and again from 1987 to 1989.^[8] The group played in its original line-up for a single concert on 15 July 2010, in La Rochelle^[8][5] and finally, in November 2011, with a new line-up. In August 2017, a concert in Paimpol, as part of the Sea Shanty Festival, was the band's last appearance.^[8]

In 1986, the final year of Malicorne, Yacoub recorded Elementary Level of Faith,^[9] an album of electric folk-rock, with the Hungarian composer Ivan Lantos and the singer and keyboardist Nikki Matheson.^[1] In 1990, his next album, Bel, was back to acoustic guitar.^[1] It features a string quartet as well as bagpipes played by Jean-Pierre Rasle (who had previously recorded, from 1982 to 1983, with the Albion Band). Yacoub toured as a duo with Marie in 1990. In 1994 he released Quatre, featuring an orchestra and a choir. He worked with fiddler Nathalie Riviere and bassist Yannick Hardouin from 1998.^[1]

In February 1995, he performed at the Palais des Sports, in Paris, opening for Bernard Lavilliers, and in May that year at La Cigale.^[9]

In 2002, he wrote a book of poetry and lyrics, called Les choses les plus simples ("The simplest things"), distributed by Harmonia Mundi^[10][11] and recorded an album of his own songs in English, The Simple Things We Said.^[12]

In July 2013, Yacoub was honoured as an officer of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.^[13]

Yacoub died after a long illness at a hospital in Bourges on 22 January 2025, at the age of 72.^[4][14][5]

Yacoub made many recordings, with Marie Yacoub (before, during and after Malicorne), as lead singer and musician with Malicorne, and solo, including:^[1][10]