Artist: Marie Dubas
Author: Raymond Asso/Marguerite Monnot
Label: Pathé-Marconi
Year: 1936

Ex operetta star, future music hall sweetheart, chef de file for so many "chanteuses fantaisistes", Piaf in the first place. Marie was 20 years older than Edith. Music inspired by a Wal-Berg melody: Mon coeur est léger, introduced by Lys Gauty in 1934.

Chanson about a Foreign Legion soldier, while also rallying sympathy for the Front Populaire activists cause in 1936. Author Raymond Asso had served in l'Armée d'Orient. He also launched Piaf's career by keeping her away of the allegations concerning the murder of her first booking agent Louis Leplée. She begged Asso for new song material, he gave it to her. In those days she performed a lot for soldiers, so Mon légionnaire seemed a perfect choice. According to one of many Piaf legends, she then had an affair with a soldier who just like in the song had the word 'Personne' tattooed on his chest. (My name is nobody!) Piaf was enraged when she heard Marie Dubas' version before she even had the chance to cut her own. Both versions stand the test of time. In Marie's you can almost smell the burning sand: "Il était mince il était beau, Il sentait bon le sable chaud".