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Lebanese Teenage Singer Joins Global Pop Band

Producer Simon Fuller poses on his star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
Producer Simon Fuller poses on his star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
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Lebanese Teenage Singer Joins Global Pop Band

Producer Simon Fuller poses on his star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
Producer Simon Fuller poses on his star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

A teenage singer from Lebanon this week became the latest to join a global pop band formed by Simon Fuller, the man behind the Spice Girls and “American Idol,” which aims to transform young unknowns into internet superstars.

That may seem a grandiose ambition during a global pandemic. But Now United, with over a dozen teenagers drawn from across the world, is plowing ahead, recording and filming new music in the skyscraper-studded city of Dubai this week.

Nour Ardakani, 18, told The Associated Press during her visit Wednesday to the UAE that she’s “honored" to represent Lebanon.

“Arts and music are so important in times like these,” she said.

“Lebanon is going through so much.”

Ardakani scored the 16th spot in the band after a series of Zoom auditions from quarantine that drew talented contenders from the Middle East. The band, similar to Fuller’s previous projects in show business, represents a career kick-starting platform for those dreaming of being catapulted from obscurity to teen pop fame.

The group, which includes aspiring singer-dancers from across the world, including Russia, India, China, Mexico and Finland, has attracted over 100 million fans on social media and this year got a nomination from MTV Video Music Awards.

Ardakani said she lives a “very normal life” for a Beirut-born teenager, but for years has posted ukulele songs and simple R&B covers she recorded in her bedroom. When her warm, dreamy voice caught the attention of the Now United scouts, she was spirited through auditions and flown in to join to her international peers.

“I’m so excited to make memories with everyone and tour the world,” she said, while admitting that with the surging pandemic, "I guess we don’t know.”

Beirut, Ardakani’s hometown, has been grappling with an array of crises: an economic collapse, a worsening coronavirus outbreak and a massive explosion that demolished businesses and homes across the capital last month.

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Composer of Piaf's 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' Dies Aged 95

Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
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Composer of Piaf's 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' Dies Aged 95

Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File

Songwriter and singer Charles Dumont, who composed the song "Non, je ne regrette rien" ("No, I do not regret anything") made world famous by Edith Piaf, has died aged 95, his partner told AFP Monday.
Dumont, who had also collaborated with American singer Barbra Streisand and French-Italian 1960s star Dalida, died at home after a long illness.
French Culture Minister Rachida Dati called Dumont "a towering figure of French chanson".
A trumpeter by training, Dumont saw his career transformed at the turn of the 1960s when he convinced the star singer Piaf to perform one of his compositions, after having been forcefully refused several times.
"We turned up at her home, and she let us in," Dumont told AFP in 2018 about the day in 1960 when he managed to see Piaf together with his lyricist, Michel Vaucaire.
"I played the piece on the piano, and ... we became inseparable," he said, adding that the song -- which he had written in 1956 aged 27 -- revived Piaf's career that he said had been flagging.
"Non, je ne regrette rien" has since become an unforgettable classic of Piaf, who died in 1963.
"My mother gave birth to me, but Edith Piaf brought me into the world," Dumont told AFP in a 2015 interview.
"Without her, I would never have done everything I did, neither as a composer nor as a singer," he added.
For Dumont, this meeting marked the beginning of a fruitful working relationship with Piaf, resulting in his writing more than 30 songs for her.
'Goodbye young man'
On occasion she straightened him out, like one night after a concert when he complained to her that the audience had not been good.
"She looked me straight in the eye and said: 'It's not them who are bad. It's you who was no good'," he remembered.
The collaboration with Piaf gave Dumont the confidence to approach Streisand, who was already a star in the 1960s and well on her way to becoming one of the biggest-selling recording artists ever.
A music publisher suggested he should offer her his services, advice he later described as "destiny" giving him "a kick in the behind".
He went to New York, and played for her on a piano in her dressing room in a Broadway theater. "She said to me 'I like this very much. I'll make the record. Goodbye young man'," he said.
Streisand released a single with Dumont's "Le Mur" sung in French on the A side, and its English version "I've Been Here" on the B side, in 1966.
Dumont's last appearance on stage was in 2019 in Paris.
"When you come back in front of an audience, who come to see you as they came 20, 30 or 40 years ago and give you the same welcome, then they give you back your 20s," he said.