On the occasion of the 29th edition of the Fête de la musique, Frédéric Mitterrand, Minister of Culture and Communication, created the Barbara Prize and presented it to the first laureate: Carmen Maria Vega.

To pay tribute to him, Frédéric Mitterrand, Minister of Culture and
of Communication, wanted to create the Barbara Prize to encourage
and reward a young artist/songwriter/performer
whose talent is in Barbara’s wake.
The 1st edition of the Barbara Prize took place Monday, June 21 at 12:00, in
Christine Lagarde, Minister of Economy, Industry and
and Frédéric Mitterrand, Minister of Culture and
Communication.
The jury has chosen Carmen Maria Vega as the first laureate of the
Barbara Award, saluting an artist full of character and a
insolent talent.
The jury of the 1st edition of the Barbara Prize was composed of:
- Camille Bazbaz, singer-songwriter
- Marie-Paule Belle, singer
- Gérard Daguerre, Barbara’s musician and pianist
- Gérard Depardieu, actor
- Liane Foly, singer
- Richard Galliano, accordionist
- Emily Loizeau, singer-songwriter
- Guesch Patti, singer
- Martin Pénet, journalist and historian
- Alexandre Tharaud, pianist
For the past two or three years, the name Carmen Maria Vega has been
growing up in the “to discover” sections and in the conciliabules of the
professionals: this Carmen is one of the most female characters
which has appeared for a long time in the French song.
Between traditional song, punk fables, neo-realist rock and swing
manouche, she sings first person musky emotions
and acid portraits that you can hardly believe they really look like
to this Guatemalan-Lyonnaise brown as night and bright as
the razor blade.
And, besides, Carmen Maria Vega is not alone in being Carmen Maria
Vega. Her marital status name is also the name of a band: her singing,
Max Lavegie on guitar, writing and composition, Alain Arnaudet at
bass and Toma Milteau to the drums. From the beginning, we have been
calls the Carmen, even when we were a duo.” Four years ago,
she meets guitarist Max, who has been
sound engineer in Great Britain. Carmen and he work first
a jazz repertoire to perform in local clubs. We were
very bad. How to make My Funny Valentine without being lame? It’s
while Max wrote "The Liar."
The song, with its jazz swing and its devastating insolence, is a
revealing: Max will develop a repertoire in his colors. And La
Liar will serve as his standard and business card. The duo enters the
Conservatoire de Lyon en classe de musiques actuelles, cursus qui
includes a performance in a famous venue "A Thou Bout
of Chant". Carmen Maria Vega appears there for her first concert,
with three songs and a lot of stage fright: this one performance brings them
a dozen concerts. We must work urgently to build a
directory and chain dates, a well-stocked calendar filled by the
F2F Music turner. Recording an album is constantly
pushed back, the band content itself with maxis for sale during concerts,
since they always have a current on stage with more than two hundred
dates and a host of awards: the Chantier des Francos, the Fair, the
off du Printemps de Bourges, two awards at the Chorus des Hauts-
Seine and the two dates and not least: The prices of the public and the
jury at “Alors Chante…” in Montauban…
Carmen also wrote the song as an actress: Ma
Mother put me in theater class when I was seven and for me the
stage is obvious, while the studio is more tedious.”
Result: Carmen Maria Vega is already the #1 buzz of the song
when, in 2008, Universal Publishing and the AZ label
The relay of the excellent OL label from the beginning, Gourmets Recordingz.
The album is recorded in two sessions of ten days of studio between
Brussels (at the famous ICP) and Paris under the leadership of Max en
with Vincent Carpentier, Fred Jaillard and Xavier Bussy, team
of magicians from the album "Comme un manouche sans guitare" by Thomas
Dutronc. We find there the energy and the gouaille of Carmen Maria Vega on
scene: the daily life of mismatched hearts, lives conquered by
alcohol, the cruelty of the time, the little familiar hatreds… She loves
these rough, funny, poignant stories.