Media and public were kept away from the ceremony limited to Aznavour's closest entourage, including fellow artists Serge Lama and Emmanuelle Beart. Following the service the cortege headed for Montfort-l'Amaury, west of Paris, where Aznavour was laid to rest alongside his parents and son Patrick, who died aged just 25 in 1976. Active until the final days of his life, Aznavour, who had indicated he hoped to make it to 100, had as recently as last month performed two concerts on the other side of the globe in Japan. Next week he had been due to travel to Armenia to accompany French President Emmanuel Macron for a Francophone summit and had expressed the hope he would like to breathe his last on stage. That ceremony at the Invalides began with Aznavour's coffin, draped in the French tricolour flag, being carried into the cobbled courtyard to the Armenian lament, "Dle Yaman", played on a traditional dudek flute.

Source: The Local October 06, 2018 17:03 UTC