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Mika interview with Le Parisien, 4 February 2021


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Mika in mourning: his confidences on the death of his mother
  • By admin
  • February 4, 2021

 

In September 2019, Mika revealed that his mother had brain cancer. A fight that she unfortunately did not win. The singer announced, this Thursday, February 4, the death of his mother.

 

A long fight against the disease. In September 2019, Mika revealed that his mother had brain cancer. ” A very large tumor […] Extremely aggressive brain cancer », he lamented to Paris Match. Terrible news which obviously affected the daily life of his family. ” From that moment, life, the album, everything comes to a halt. My sisters, my brother, my father and I, we put ourselves in a bubble, we hide. After the operation, we go back to this little house in Italy. We close the door and we stay together. Then chemotherapy begins in France », Detailed the artist of Lebanese origin. Except that in addition to this battle, Joannie Penniman had to redouble her efforts to stay alive, sinceshe also contracted Covid-19. The consequences of this virus were terrible for her, who was already suffering from the disease. ” Sunday afternoon, when I was going to do a live for the Italian channel Rai Uno, my mother was taken by ambulance to intensive care “, He revealed last April on his Instagram account. Nevertheless, this courageous mother did not intend to give up. His state of health was then stabilized. A small victory which unfortunately was short-lived.

 

« She left shortly after … »

 

Last September – just one year after the revelation of this cancer -, the news was not really good.

« His already worrying state of health has deteriorated because of the Covid »,

He lamented in the columns of Paris Match. If she was ” exit His condition was no less worrying.

 

Finally, Joannie Penniman surrendered last December. It was during an interview that Mika announced this sad news. This Friday February 5, France 5 will broadcast an acoustic concert by the singer, which was recorded at the Royal Opera of Versailles on December 16. As viewers will discover, the ex-coach of The Voice talks about his mother, who inspired several songs.

 

The latter had even made the trip.

All my family was present at this concert and even my mother, who trained me, was there in a wheelchair », He confides with tenderness in the columns of the Parisian this Thursday, February 4.

And to outbid: ” In a way, I was doing this gig for her … “.

A beautiful tribute for the one who will have been able to see her son one last time on stage, and moreover in a prestigious place. ” She left shortly after …», He reveals, his throat tied, hoping:« Certainly proud of who I had become … bequeathing me the same requirement for the future … never give in to the easy way, continue to explore new creative horizons … that’s what she gave me “. No doubt his lucky star will watch over the grain.

 

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Twitter

 

Mika likes

 

:france:

"Beaucoup de gens ont dit qu'il fallait oublier 2020. Pour moi, il ne faut surtout pas oublier. Etre autant déstabilisé m'a permis de regarder autour et voir qu'il y avait d'autres façons de faire les choses"
Génial @mikasounds

Géniale itw par @ConradssonP

 

:uk:

"A lot of people have said that 2020 should be forgotten. For me, it is important not to forget. Being so destabilized allowed me to look around and see that there were other ways of doing things"
Awesome @mikasounds

Awesome itw by @ConradssonP

 

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10 hours ago, Prisca said:

I'm really sad to hear that Joannie Penniman passed away. :sad:

 

I also think that Mika did many things right.

He wanted her to sing for his last album and he made her doing this after an important surgery although his family couldn't understand why. I kind of have the feeling that he was aware of the fact that his mom is maybe not that long anymore among us and unfortunately he was right. :sad: Her voice at the album is a nice memory. :original:

 

I also think that the fact that he played her cover version of Tiny Love at the New Year's Eve concert was a really nice gift to her.

 

I'm also really happy that she could assist his concert at Versailles that is shown now, so that there was at least somehing positive for her in 2020.

 

I send Mika and his family all the love I have and all the power in the world.

 

:rip: Joannie Penniman

 

I moved your post here from the Versailles gig thread.

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INSTAGRAM

https://www.instagram.com/p/CK64qe3sj6b/

 
 
Le chanteur Mika a enregistré le 16 décembre dernier un concert sans aucun instrument amplifié dans le prestigieux Opéra royal de Versailles qui est diffusé ce vendredi 5 février sur France 5.

📸@fredug

leparisien_146726258_2864933353789064_5867536395443991492_n.thumb.jpg.aca84b05f6849757cd45ea5df283e7c3.jpg

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CK4R6kkqnZM/

 

Portrait du chanteur Mika qui a enregistré un concert intimiste à l’opéra royal de Versailles pour la télévision • the singer @mikainstagram 02/2021 #music #pop #mika #musician #pianist #singer #portrait #pictureoftheday #photooftheday #instagood @france5 @leparisien

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

So, I wanted to write a bit more about this interview, he talks about so many interesting things there... but for the most part, I'd probably just quote what he says and comment it with a :wub2: . - :naughty: Like what he says about the pureness of the Versailles gig, the details he tells about the day when he left the School of Economy, about how he became friends with Ida, about how the past year has been for him, about curiosity, writing songs... The only point I can't follow so much is what the says about banality, I don't really understand why that is so extraordinary to him. But obviously he is in a different position than I am. My life is banality, especially these days, so I'm rather looking for a bit of adventure - while his life is adventure, so I can imagine he's looking for the opposite. I think everyone needs both in their lives, tho in different percentages, depending on your personality. 

But maybe I understand it wrong - I would understand it as a sort of "everyday life", because he talks about studying, vacuuming and cleaning - and well, these are routines that give you a certain stability. But if they are your life, you just want to get away from it all occasionally - one reason why I love traveling to gigs, lol! :lol: But he also talks about the destabilization (I think he used that word in the other interview, here he says unsettling) in these times, (which I also can relate to, as my usual routines don't work anymore with my kids at home in lockdown) - so I wonder if the thing about banality maybe refers more to cherishing the little things in life? Like taking a walk in the nature with open eyes. Or go shopping with all your senses once the stores open up again, or just not having to worry anymore about keeping a distance of 1.5m to other people. I can very much relate to that!

 

Also I wanted to comment about him deciding to destroy the Revelation tour stage set and move on. That might seem shocking, but tbh it didn't come as a surprise to me. I couldn't have imagined him after more than a year to just continue the tour where it ended, to do the same thing again - as he says, life has changed and so have we. What I found surprising about it is that a year ago in Strasbourg he already said the stage set would get destroyed after this gig, so my first thought was whether he might have changed his mind about that, and now changed it again? But I suppose the stage set he's talking about now might be the backdrop he's used for the Australia/NZ tour and probably would've used for the US one. Also after the Imaginarium tour he told us that the stage set was destroyed. I think that's what he meant in the settestorie interview by starting anew and burning things. That's just how he is, he doesn't cling to things, but keeps moving forward. I could learn some things from him, looking at the basement room I'm sitting in right now, which contains so much stuff that it rather resembles a storage room! :lmfao: I'm just so bad at throwing away stuff. :facepalm: Tho sometimes I really feel like throwing it all in the bin, to make me feel more free if I don't have to look at all those piles of stuff every day.

 

Anyway I'm sure by moving on he doesn't mean he wants to do something completely different. He said many times that on stage he feels at home, so it's nothing I worry about. But what his next album/project/tour will look like exactly, he probably doesn't know yet himself. Wherever curiosity will take him. :wub2:

 

 

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10 hours ago, mellody said:

about how he became friends with Ida, about how the past year has been for him, about curiosity

I love your little analyses after interviews. So of course I’m here to dive right in with you 😆

For all of us fans, a lot of things Mika does is very relatable to us - in whatever little way possible. Like how he told the story about his first encounter with Ida. I could just imagine that his eyes would widen in complete awe. It goes to show how he perceived this particular event different from maybe the majority of people (how many would’ve thought “oh man that’s arrogant”, for example?) and how seeing the beauty in this moment opened him up for a beautiful friendship. 
And that reminds me of my oldest son, we can walk the same path but he will always point out the things that are not obvious to me, but beautiful to him. Perspective changes things. A positive perspective opens doors, always. Especially in these times we shouldn’t rob ourselves the opportunity to such experiences.
 

10 hours ago, mellody said:

The only point I can't follow so much is what the says about banality, I don't really understand why that is so extraordinary to him.

I actually think it is exactly as you say. His life’s routine changed to something that is more like any other’s during lockdown. The way we think his life is extraordinary, it just goes to show he thinks the same way about our little domestic lives 🤣 I think that’s precious, because from superstars (in general, not specifically Mika) you could maybe suspect that our lives (and therefore we as people) are incredibly boring to them. Mika continuously appreciates life and isn’t number by it all. It is something I believe is very important to him (always see the beauty in things, isn’t that is life motto?). 
 

10 hours ago, mellody said:

But he also talks about the destabilization (I think he used that word in the other interview, here he says unsettling) in these times

I thought it was interesting to read this. Because of course everyone was being destabilized during this pandemic, but I thought that him living the irregular life he has with all of these different projects going on simultaneously, it was just another project change for him.
Now how I understand him talking about this: his coping mechanism was to immerse himself completely in work - we know how much he did in 2020 and continues to do still now here in the beginning of 2021. He’s always been incredibly active and focused, otherwise he wouldn’t be where he is now artistically and professionally speaking, but even he felt destabilized! He’s human after all 😆

 

10 hours ago, mellody said:

 I'm just so bad at throwing away stuff. :facepalm:

Oh my, do you have hoarder tendencies 🤣 during lockdown I actually made it a mission to reduce reduce reduce. It took a pandemic to make me organize and realize this though (although there’s always a reorganizing element with three kids running around). There is a term in Feng Shui (the art of free flow of energy in your living/work spaces), my mom always reminds me to “clear my clutter”! If Mika doesn’t cling onto things, I guess it means he lives by this in his professional life: to make room for new, you have to get rid of old that is blocking your flow of energy to be able to create etc. 

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12 hours ago, mellody said:

 

 

Also I wanted to comment about him deciding to destroy the Revelation tour stage set and move on. That might seem shocking, but tbh it didn't come as a surprise to me. I couldn't have imagined him after more than a year to just continue the tour where it ended, to do the same thing again - as he says, life has changed and so have we. What I found surprising about it is that a year ago in Strasbourg he already said the stage set would get destroyed after this gig, so my first thought was whether he might have changed his mind about that, and now changed it again? But I suppose the stage set he's talking about now might be the backdrop he's used for the Australia/NZ tour and probably would've used for the US one. 

 

 

 

In Strasbourg he said that the stage under his feets will be destroyed

So I suppose he was only refering to the rainbow stuff and had to keep the smallest parts for the end of the tour

Btw , before the pandemic stopped everything ,I sometimes wondered how he'd adjust the set (or not ?) if his mother had passed away before the end of the tour ?

Singing with her picture in the background would be so heartbreaking !

 

He said in many interviews that the album and the tour was a tribute ,to her while she was still with them .....imo it may be another reason to have a restart now 

 

I also loved the story about Ida .....and it seems that the responsible of the Royal collège of music is a very cool guy!

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23 hours ago, holdingyourdrink said:

always see the beauty in things, isn’t that is life motto?

 

I think in the passage des arts interview he said that his motto is to stay curious. :teehee: But I know what you mean. And it's certainly connected with curiosity.

 

23 hours ago, holdingyourdrink said:

thought that him living the irregular life he has with all of these different projects going on simultaneously, it was just another project change for him.
Now how I understand him talking about this: his coping mechanism was to immerse himself completely in work

 

I see now where I got the "destabilized" from, it IS this interview - in French he uses the word "déstabilisé", Google translates it to "unsettling". You'd think his life is very irregular, but here he talks about a clear path. I do suppose, compared to the tour that was planned, it was very similar to the feeling as it was for us. We knew what we would be doing for the next few months, and then suddenly everything became obsolete with the lockdown. For us, that's things like going to work, bringing the kids to kindergarten/school, stuff like that. And for him it's touring, it was all planned for months. And then, nothing. I think that's why it wasn't just another project change for him, but very similar to our experience.

 

And I understand very well why he says it was also liberating to him, I think many people felt that way. You're caught in the daily routine, whether that's work/kids or touring/promo - you think it has to be this way, it gives stability, but at the same time you're sort of caught in this treadmill. So when it suddenly stopped... you just wonder how it is even possible to stop everything, you think "But I can't, I have to do this!", and then the lockdown comes and you realize you don't have to. It's destabilizing, but it's also liberating. Well ok, at least it was for a bit, until it became the new normal. :aah:

 

I don't know if his coping mechanism was to immerse himself completely in work. He talked many times about the decompression of his brain, that the pressure was off him for, like, the first time in his life. In the first MFC live he joined he said he's trying to figure out how to just "be". I think he did things that he felt like doing, without the pressure of touring or writing or promo that usually is on him. Like, he wanted a sixpack for years, and as we saw in Xfactor, he finally made his dream come true last summer. :biggrin2: And I do think that it was more this studying, thinking about philosophical questions, solving problems while cleaning the flat, that helped him to cope.

 

23 hours ago, holdingyourdrink said:

Oh my, do you have hoarder tendencies 🤣

 

No, in fact I'm just slow, as with pretty much everything. :teehee: I do like to declutter, but I take my time for it - it's nothing I can do while my kids jump around me. :aah: And what I mean by being bad at throwing away stuff is really throwing it in the bin, I'm just too attached to things to find that easy. I do love to sell stuff on the fleamarket - some items also on ebay, but that's not as direct, not the same experience, so I tend to procrastinate that. I've always loved fleamarkets. Just that during lockdown I neither have the peace to declutter nor the fleamarkets where I can get rid of the stuff that I want to get rid of. Well, I did some decluttering and also threw away some stuff after the first lockdown, but then in August we had put solar collectors on our roof and all the technical stuff we need for it in the basement takes up room now where things were stored, so all the space gained by decluttering in spring is gone again, lol! :naughty: 

It's definitely true what you say about making room for new things, also about Feng Shui (I have a book about that too), all that stuff does indeed block me and I should make it a priority to deal with it.

 

Anyway, it also has advantages to be a collector as I am - all the Mika videos I've collected over the years might've seemed a bit unnecessary to me a year ago, as after posting them I never watched them again. But they helped and still help me a lot to get through these concertless times. :blush:

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9 hours ago, mellody said:

We knew what we would be doing for the next few months, and then suddenly everything became obsolete with the lockdown.

That is very true. Especially what you say about this;

 

9 hours ago, mellody said:

So when it suddenly stopped... you just wonder how it is even possible to stop everything, you think "But I can't, I have to do this!", and then the lockdown comes and you realize you don't have to. It's destabilizing, but it's also liberating.

And then when you have the liberty to decompress your brain, that is a luxury we don’t give ourselves time to do in the fast paced society that we’re in. Didn’t you also find it liberating? I was actually slowly breathing for the first time in maybe years during the first lockdown, so to say. I LOVED it that we didn’t “have” or “should” do anything. The realization a lot of things are trivial, was a big eye opener. But... with a time of complete decompression, there also comes the moment of complete boredom 😆 and I personally compensated that by being incredibly active in other things (drawing, learning Italian, playing the piano again, going on more runs because I HAVE TO GET OUT 🤣). 
Him immersing himself in work is maybe also part of who he is, and maybe he’s always this busy normally, but I can also understand there was maybe a need for him to counteract that moment of absolute lockdown. 

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9 minutes ago, holdingyourdrink said:

The realization a lot of things are trivial, was a big eye opener.

 

Maybe that's what he means by banality. I have the feeling that I'm getting a knot in my brain trying to explain what I want to say with this, because all of this is full of contrasts and contradictions. But what you wrote there rings a bell with me in connection to his words about banality.

 

And yes, as I said, I also felt liberated at the beginning. As long as hubby can take time off work and we can share taking care of the kids, lockdown certainly has advantages. :teehee:

 

Anyway I can't say that I got bored. What I felt was the need for self-determined change. Everything around me changed, my whole life was changed by circumstances that I have no control over. So as soon as it was possible again, I felt I needed to change some things, to give me back the feeling that I have at least a little control over my life. That's what motivated me to do more sports, learn more Italian, take online courses, stuff like that.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Oh dear God, how did I not know before now? This explains some responses I got in another thread. I am shocked and so very saddened to hear that Joannie passed away last December. I knew of her illness, but shamefully this news had passed me by, and I believed her to still be with us, still battling on like the incredibly strong woman she was. I'm so very sorry. My heart goes out to Mika and his family, I wish them all peace, strength and love. RIP Joannie. :rip:

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