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Iolanda Cristina Gigliotti (; 17 January 1933 – 3 May 1987), professionally known as Dalida (, ; ), was an Italian naturalized French singer and actress. Leading an international career, Dalida has sold over 140 million records worldwide. Some of her best known songs include "i=no", "i=no", "i=no", "i=no", "i=no", "i=no", "i=no", "i=no", and "i=no" featuring spoken word by film star Alain Delon.
Initially an actress, she made her debut in the film A Glass and a Cigarette by Niazi Mostafa in 1955. A year later, having signed with the Barclay record company, Dalida achieved her first success as a singer with "Bambino". Following this, she became the top-selling recording artist in France between 1957 and 1961. Her music charted in many countries in Europe and Latin America. She collaborated with singers such as Julio Iglesias, Charles Aznavour, Johnny Mathis and Petula Clark.
Although she made a few films during her career as a singer, she effectively reconnected with cinema with The Sixth Day, a film by Youssef Chahine released in 1986. In France, although the film was hailed by critics, it was a commercial failure.
Dalida was deeply disturbed by the suicide of her partner Luigi Tenco in 1967. Despite this, she forged ahead with her career, forming the record label International Show with her brother Orlando, recording more music and performing at concerts and music competitions. After struggling with bouts of depression for many years, Dalida killed herself by drug overdose on 3 May 1987.
The year they were married, the Gigliottis settled in the Shubra district of Cairo, where, between the births of Iolanda's older brother Orlando (1930–1992) and younger brother Bruno Gigliotti (1936), the Gigliotti family Mutamassirun. In addition to earnings from Giuseppina's work, their social status benefited when Pietro became concertmaster at Cairo's Khedivial Opera House, and the family bought a two-storey house.
At 10 months old, Gigliotti caught an eye infection and had to wear bandages for 40 days. Her father would play Lullaby on the violin to soothe her. She underwent eye operations between the ages of three and five. Having to wear glasses throughout elementary school, for which she was bullied, she later recalled: "I was enough of it, I would rather see the world in a blur than wear glasses, so I threw them through the window." Gigliotti attended the Scuola Tecnica Commerciale Maria Ausiliatrice, an Italian Catholic school located in northern Shubra.
In 1940, Allied forces took her father and other Italian men from their quarter to the Fayed prison camp in the desert near Cairo. When Pietro was released in 1944, he returned home a completely different person, so violent that Gigliotti and other children in the neighbourhood were scared of him. She later recalled, "I hated him when he beat me, I hated him especially when he beat my mom and brothers. I wanted him to die, and he did." Gigliotti was twelve when Pietro died of a brain abscess in 1945.
Shortly thereafter, her best friend Miranda encouraged her to compete in Miss Ondine, a minor Cairo beauty pageant which she entered on the assurance that it was just for fun and that her mother would not find out. When Gigliotti unexpectedly won second prize and Miranda won second runner-up, they were photographed and the photographs were published in newspapers Le journal d'Égypte and Le progrès égyptien. The next day, when her mother found out, she forcibly cut Gigliotti's hair short. Eventually, her mother relented and Gigliotti left her job to start modelling for Donna, a Cairo-based fashion house.
Three Egyptian film directors cast Gigliotti in their productions: Marco de Gastyne cast her in The Mask of Tutankhamun (1954) and Niazi Mostafa cast her in a supporting role in A Glass and a Cigarette (1954), on posters for which she appears with her newly adopted stage name Dalila because, as she explained in 1968, "it was a very frequent name in Egypt and I liked it a lot."
Dalila's difficulty in finding acting work throughout 1955 led her to try singing. Vidal introduced her to Roland Berger, a friend and professor who agreed to give her singing lessons seven days per week for a low fee. He was strict and used to yell, with Dalila responding even more loudly. Their lessons sometimes ended with her slamming the door, but she always returned the next day. Seeing her progress, Berger arranged for her to perform in the cabaret i=no on Champs-Élysées, where she was spotted by Jacques Paoli, the director of another cabaret, i=no. Paoli engaged her for a series of performances that proved to be popular, and Dalila received her first attention from the public in France, among whom was Bruno Coquatrix, the director of Olympia, who invited her to perform in his singing contest Les Numéros 1 de demain. Coquatrix later said: "Her voice is full of colour and volume, and has all that men love: gentleness, sensuality and eroticism." Dalila was also spotted by author and screenwriter Alfred Marchand, who advised to change her name to Dalida, since her pseudonym too closely resembled Delilah as depicted in the movie Samson and Delilah. She immediately followed the advice.
On 9 April 1956, Dalida participated in the singing contest Les Numéros 1 de demain, performing "i=no". Prior to the competition, Eddie Barclay, the owner of the largest record label in France, Barclay, and , the artistic director of the newly established radio station Europe n°1, met in Bar Romain (now i=no) and discussed what to do that evening. Barclay wanted to watch a film, whereas Morisse wanted to attend the singing competition, which was being held at Olympia Hall, then the largest venue in Paris. They settled their disagreement by playing 421, a dice game, which Morisse won. Together with their friend Coquatrix, they were greatly impressed after Dalida won the contest, and arranged a meeting with her. This event was later revisited in and books, and became regarded as fateful for Dalida's career. The three men went on to play a large part in launching her career.
Her first song "Madona" was recorded in June and was first released in August on an EP with three other songs. "Madona" was played on 28 August 1956 on Radio Europe n°1, which was Dalida's first radio appearance. The record achieved sufficient success and was followed by a second EP, Le Torrent, a month later, which received an equally encouraging welcome. Dalida continued performing live throughout the latter part of 1956, while her promoters worked on developing a song that would make her a star; Morisse asked lyricist Jacques Laurent to write a French language version of the Neapolitan song "i=no", which had won at the recent inaugural i=no and would become "i=no".
"i=no" was released in early December only as a promo single, but quickly received more public interest than all of her previous recordings. Morisse started to heavily promote it and it was placed as the first track on Dalida's debut album Son nom est Dalida, which was issued at the end of the same month. The album was immediately followed by a third EP titled Bambino. After debuting at number seven in January 1957, Bambino reached number one and went on to become the biggest-selling and one of the most beloved pop standard hits of the 1950s in France, Belgium, Canada and Switzerland. As the song knocked Doris Day's "Whatever Will Be, Will Be" off the top of the French charts, women began to emulate Dalida's makeup, resulting in an explosion of Rimmel sales, while men saw in her a talent, sensuality and sexiness. Bruno Coquatrix then named her "the first sex-symbol of the song". "Bambino" was Dalida's first number-one hit, and through 1957 it became the longest-running number one in world history, with a total of 39 consecutive weeks, a record that it still holds. It made Dalida an overnight star and gave her her first gold disc, the very first time that such an award had been received by a woman, on 19 September 1957 for sales of over 300,000. As the French music industry was then still in the background, "i=no" was described in 2007 by Bertrand Dicale of Le Figaro as "a launch that announced what will happen in the coming decades ... a start of really modern times where singer is more important than song". Promoting it in early 1957, Dalida also made her first TV appearance, and her contract was immediately extended for four years. Then she also received her first criticism from a journalist: "On stage, Dalida appears in beauty and warmth, highlighted by a presentation of extreme sobriety."
Dalida's experimentation with exotica resulted in "i=no", released for Christmas 1957. For this exotic song with accentuated vocals, Dalida delivered a TV appearance where, while sailing an imaginary gondola, the shoulder strap of her dress fell down. The reappearance of this video in the 1970s made the moment notable, and the public started to consider it iconic that Dalida dared to do such a thing on television during such a conventional time in society. Nevertheless, "i=no" debuted at number one in both the French and Canadian charts, where it spent four months, remaining in the top twenty for almost a year and becoming her biggest hit since "i=no". Its B side "i=no" also proved popular, reaching number one in Canada. Dalida then also started to perform more frequently in France, Belgium and Luxembourg.
By the end of April 1958, a radio programmer heard Dalida recording "i=no" in Barclay's Hoche studios in Paris. After immediately asking for a copy of the tape and broadcasting it, the radio station was swamped with phone calls from people asking for the number of the disc and when it would be available. As the song replaced "Gondolier" as number one in France, Dalida scored a still-current chart record in France of five songs simultaneously in the top ten. It was followed by her receipt of RMC's singer of the year award, which she went on to win for six consecutive years. In June she embarked upon her first "i=no" tour (Tour de France with Dalida), with a daily appearance in the city hosting each stage of the 1958 Tour de France, which she repeated several time in future decades. She also performed in Algiers during the summer, supporting the morale of French soldiers fighting the Algerian War, and held a new series of galas in France and Belgium that regularly ended with two hours of autograph signing. During this summer Dalida released her third album Gondolier, and also recorded several new songs such as "i=no", "i=no" and "i=no"; all of which were sales successes, each earning Dalida a gold disc. With "i=no", Dalida started French rock 'n' roll and also paved the way for foreign rock artists to enter the market, such as Paul Anka.
In late 1958, Dalida returned to film in her first on-screen role in four years, playing the supporting role of a singer-spy in the mystery film Rapt au deuxième bureau. A few months later, she appeared alongside Eddie Barclay in Brigade des mœurs, both starring as themselves. These two B movies were also used for promotion of her three songs "i=no", "i=no", and "i=no", and were released in September 1958 and March 1959, respectively.
On 9 October, she again performed at Bobino, this time for three weeks as the headline performer, where she promoted her latest releases "i=no", which peaked in the charts the same week, and "i=no". Topping the charts in January 1959, where it remained over most of the winter, "i=no" proved to be an ultimate holiday hit in France and Belgium, as Dalida could be seen promoting it on a Christmas-themed television set. The record's B side "i=no" also achieved success, topping the Canadian charts. According to her biographer Catherine Rihoit, her live television appearances "got her into the palms of society, keeping her position as a favorite singer of all age groups in the francophonie", and marked an era of late 1950s television shows. On 26 December 1958 Dalida was in New York with Morisse where they met Norman Granz, the American impresario of Ella Fitzgerald, who invited her to Hollywood and offered a fifteen-year contract to launch her career in the United States. She quickly rejected the offer, saying that she wanted to focus on her musical career in France where she was already well known with a secure fan base.
In late summer, Dalida was back in the studio to record her first major international hit. In the period from 1958 to 1959, "i=no" was recorded in three languages, propelling Dalida straight into the top three in six different European countries. The German-language version "i=no" topped the German charts for ten weeks in September and October, earning her another gold disc. It was the best-selling record of the year in Germany, and remains one of the most successful songs in the history of the country. During the closing night of the Berlin Film Festival on 28 September 1959, she was presented with a Golden Lion award by RTL as the best-selling musical artist of the year in Germany, and was saluted with a fanfare playing the verses of "i=no". The song was her first international hit, reaching half a million accumulated copies and remaining one of her greatest successes in Germany.
During the course of 1959, Dalida scored five Top 10 hits in French charts, most notably "i=no" and "i=no"; both of which earned gold discs. In Italy, RAI awarded her with i=no and Golden Wolf awards as the best-selling musical artist of the year in the country. These were her first two foreign awards and furthered her international recognition. Dalida also performed in successful sold-out concerts in Berlin, Athens and Cairo, delivering a sentimental performance in front of a crowd in the Rivoli cinema that she frequented as a child. On 23 September 1959, Dalida sang in a successful three-week run at Parisian i=no, where a jukebox was installed in recognition of her being dubbed "Mademoiselle Jukebox", the most listened-to artist on in France. By the end of the year, she had released her fifth and sixth albums, Le Disque d'or de Dalida and Love in Portofino (titled after her hit song "Love in Portofino"), and had already sold three and a half million records, the highest sales of all European artists.
The success was followed by her second Italian award i=no and a Golden Wolf as the best-selling musical artist of the year. Back in France, Dalida was not pleased by the emergence of the new musical style yé-yé, as the new singers would only briefly occupy the charts and then disappear. Also, since the appearance of new radio programs for youth such as Salut les copains, both music-hall songs and singers, such as Dalida, began to be regarded as obsolete. Dalida realized that she would have to make a drastic change to retain her image, and in September she covered the US hit "i=no". Now one of her signature songs, it became the first big yé-yé hit in France and became the second song to receive the title tube de l'été, displacing "i=no" from the top of the charts. Securing her position as a leading singer in France, "i=no" introduced Dalida to a whole new generation of young fans. Topping the charts across Western Europe and in Canada, the record was also her second to sell over a million and gained her a thirteenth golden disc.
This success was followed by "Milord", a number one in Austria, Germany and Italy, after which her first album issued solely for the Italian public was named. Dalida then completed a year-long world tour, performing in countries across Europe, in Canada and in several Arab states. In December, she issued an EP Joyeux Noël collecting four of the best-known holiday carols in French, and her New Year's show Réveillon de Paris broke the record for a TV audience, with nearly six million viewers.
In January 1961, Dalida covered The Drifters' "Save the last dance for me" as "i=no", reaching the top two. It remained her biggest French hit of the year as she undertook another year-long world tour, which started in Tehran on 18 February in front of the Iranian royal family in their Sa'dabad Palace. With a total of almost 200 dates, the last leg of the tour included Dalida's first own concert residency at the Olympia, which started on 6 December. Due to her recent love affair, her divorce from Morisse and her new yé-yé direction, several critics announced this to be "attestment of an end and downfall of Dalida". Dalida "brought the house down" according to Beuve-Méry of Le Monde; the month-long show was a sell-out success, with the first night being broadcast live by Radio Europe N°1. Among other musicians who attended, she was congratulated by Édith Piaf, who told her: "You are a winner, like me. After me, it will be you." Dalida also set the record for the largest public attendance and the longest-running concert residency at the Olympia, with a total of 52,000 spectators over the course of 30 days, a record that she would break herself in 1981. At the very end of the year, on 30 December, Dalida completed her world tour at the Ancienne Belgique in Brussels, Olympia's Belgian equivalent.
During 1961, Dalida issued a set of new Italian songs on the Canta in italiano EP, and also scored several top ten hits internationally such as "i=no" and "i=no". In April "Pépé" became a number one hit both in Austria and Germany, while "24 mille baisers" charted separately in Austria and France. She also issued two albums Dalida internationale and Loin de moi. During the spring in Italy, Dalida signed with film director Giorgio Simonelli and revived her film career with the first film in which she plays the main role. Originally titled Che femmina... e che dollari!, it was revoiced and retitled for a French audience as Parlez-moi d'amour, after one of the soundtrack songs. The movie also features several other recordings by Dalida, including the posthumously released "i=no". In contrast to her other previous movies, Che femmina... e che dollari! was not a commercial failure, with the moderate gross income eventually surpassing the low budget. Rihoit wrote: "sealing her appearance of the early 60's, since it is also her first color film, all the power and acting potential that Dalida carries in herself and transmits to the screen is clearly visible".
From April to July Dalida toured Italy and Vietnam. In Saigon, her popularity led to traffic congestion when she performed, but the local authorities interrupted her show during a rendition of "i=no" because the song was considered to be a political act. In May Dalida was back at the top of the international charts with "i=no", a cover of "Speedy Gonzales", which peaked in France, Belgium, Canada and Spain the following month and remains known as "one of the most memorable and nostalgic recordings of the yé-yé era", according to Le Parisien in 1987. The album of the same name was issued later in the year.
Although Dalida had filmed her first scopitone in 1961 for the song "i=no", starting a series of music videos that were followed by almost all yé-yé newcomers, her best critically and commercially received scopitone was recorded in September 1962 for the song "i=no", in which she paid tribute to the Allies' disembarkation in Normandy on 6 June 1944. Under the direction of the young Claude Lelouch, who later became one of the most acclaimed French directors, Dalida dressed as a soldier and walked through a war-torn forest in the middle of bombing accompanied by real scenes from the Second World War. This unusual image of Dalida found an audience and was a hit in cafes. Alongside Dalida's performance of the song on 26 September, in front of a crowd of 2,000 people on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower, "i=no" topped charts in France for two weeks and earned her another gold disc.
In January 1963 at Cortina d'Ampezzo, Dalida was awarded with the Oscar Mondiale del Successo dei Juke Box award for the most listened artist on in Europe. Later the same month, she made a shift from yé-yé in covering Ben E. King's "Stand by Me" as "i=no", which was followed by an equally melancholic string of recordings such as "i=no", a summer number one hit in Canada, and "i=no" which subsequently peaked at number two in Argentina and was recorded in five languages. "i=no" was awarded the Oscar mundial du success du disque for the most international sales by a French artist in 1963, and Dalida named her fourteenth studio album after it.
The 1963 world tour was extended into 1964 with only a few short breaks. The French leg of the tour started on 11 April 1964, during which Dalida traveled 30,000 kilometers solely by car over its five-month run, and had a public attendance in excess of 200,000. "The most iconic moment of the tour", according to her brother Orlando, was a concert at Draguignan on 14 August when "Dalida appeared with blond hair for the first time, and shocked the crowd that that didn't recognize her at first glance". After the concert in Pont-sur-Yonne on 2 September, Dalida accepted the offer of local truck drivers to become their godmother of honor. The tour was followed by a concert residency in the Olympia two days later when Dalida and other celebrities, Charles Aznavour, Françoise Hardy, Johnny Hallyday and Sylvie Vartan, were conveyed to the entrance of the Olympia by the same drivers on open trucks, forming a parade through the streets of Paris. The event generated even more interest in the sold-out three-week residency, which had already received a huge amount of media coverage. During the television transmission of the crowd at the entrance, a teenage fan said: "We can hardly wait for her Dalida to appear, we've been screaming for an hour and the atmosphere is so crazy", upon which the reporter turned to the camera, saying "the whole of Paris came to see the, only in front of the Olympia there are at least 2,000 people waiting in the street".
As Dalida was recording simultaneously with her concerts during the course of 1964, releases such as "i=no", "i=no" and "i=no" were poorly promoted on TV, eventually only entering the top twenty. "i=no" had peaked at number six in Canada earlier in the year, but on finishing the tour in November, Dalida returned to the studio to record "i=no", an orchestral sentimental pop ballad, which was a completely new genre in her repertoire. The song was rush-released and swiftly became s hit at the end of the year, earning Dalida another gold disc, the first in two years following "i=no". Following the success of "i=no", an album of the same name was released on 17 September. Dalida was awarded with a platinum disc for surpassing sales of over 10 million records since her debut in 1956. Specifically created for her, this was the first time in the music industry that the term "platinum disc" had been used.
Refusing to perform at Sanremo Music Festival, Dalida instead released the EP Sanremo 65 that included her latest Italian top ten hit "i=no". With new performances at Bobino and i=no in the following months, Dalida was in the top ten in France and Belgium with a cover of Rita Pavone's "i=no" that gained huge interest among children. The B side "i=no", written and composed by Charles Aznavour, peaked at number six in Turkey and was applauded by Lettres françaises, who wrote "Sainte Totoche enters the calendar" as it "evokes the women neglected by their husbands". Back on world tour in 1965, Dalida held concerts in Fort-de-France where she was welcomed by more than 20,000 enthusiastic Martinicans. France-Antilles reported that "only the President of the Republic had an ovation of this scale, during his visit in March 1964". The next day, Dalida herself rewarded Juliana Brown, the winner of the Dalida Song Contest which had been established in her honour. In a poll conducted by IFOP on 24 April 1965 Dalida was voted the favourite French singer of the decade, ahead of Édith Piaf.
During the summer, Dalida performed in Morocco and Algeria, played a supporting role in the Italian comedy movie Menage all'italiana alongside Ugo Tognazzi and, making her debut, Romina Power, and released one of her first records in single format, "i=no".
In October, the song "i=no" was released on her fourth EP of the year. It was also a chart-topping hit in Europe, Canada and Latin America, reaching number one in France and Italy, where it was the best-selling record of the year, beating "i=no" and receiving a gold certification. Accompanying it were "i=no" and "i=no", which were also well received in Belgium and Canada. The success of "i=no" concluded the most successful year in Dalida's career to date and produced the Il silenzio, which collected the year's releases.
1966 was marked by an extensive year-long world tour that started on 13 February in Paris, and ended on 31 December in Toulouse. With more than 150 dates, Dalida toured Canada, Latin America, Arab states and Europe. The year debuted with a number-one hit in Latin America, "El Cordobés", which was a product of a collaboration with bullfighter Manuel Benítez, to whom Dalida dedicated the song as they had a brief affair. In the same period, Dalida also started employing family members, with her cousin Rosy as her secretary, and brother Bruno as her artistic director. By the end of year, they had produced the successful Italian album Pensiamoci ogni sera and three more EPs. "i=no" did not achieve commercial success, but became one of her first power ballads, being based on experiences in her own life, and became a commercial success in the US when recorded by Cher as "The Way of Love". In contrast, "Bang Bang" was a number one hit in Argentina and Italy, where it was also the best-selling record of the year. "i=no" charted internationally and was accompanied by Dalida delivering energetic live performances with a tambourine. Dalida also returned to the wide screen, with a supporting role in the satirical French movie La Morale de l'histoire that included the unreleased song "i=no". During the summer in Rome, she was introduced to the new avant-garde singer-songwriter Luigi Tenco on an RAI set and they sang "i=no" as a duet. Later in September, her Italian managers suggested that she participate with Tenco in the next Sanremo Music Festival. Although in previous years she has turned down the festival, this time she accepted as she was in a secret relationship with Tenco.
Returning to television on 8 June, on the verge of tears she made her first TV appearance after four months, interpreting "i=no", a cover of Tom Jones' "Green, Green Grass of Home". With the lyrics "I was afraid that everything would be foreign to me, but nothing seems changed, it's good to open the gates of my house" the song was directly dedicated to her return to life, pointing at her Montmartre house. At the same time, her Italian album Dalida became a chart success and "i=no" topped several international charts, earning Dalida another gold disc. She also organized a four-month-long comeback tour from June to September, again performing daily in the cities hosting the stages of the Tour de France. The late summer period brought a re-release of "i=no" from 1959, and a new recording "i=no", the French version of "i=no" by Tenco. In September, Dalida issued her first compilation album De Bambino à Il silenzio, collecting her hits from 1956 to 1965, which was also one of the first greatest hits albums.
On the night of 5 October, Dalida premiered her third Olympia concert residency, which ran for a month. New songs such as "i=no", "i=no" and "i=no" marked a new direction in her career, orientating her repertoire towards more profound lyrics. Dressed in a long white dress that she would always wear on tours in future years, Dalida once again achieved a huge triumph at the venue. She was nicknamed Saint Dalida by the press. In France-Soir, wrote: "Dalida killed Mademoiselle Bambino. The new Dalida is born!".
"i=no" and "i=no" were minor hits of early 1968, but in September Dalida came back to huge success in France with "i=no". It was an instant number one hit with a fair chart performance in several other countries, eventually being recorded in two more languages. The EP was reissued for five more times, a personal record for Barclay, receiving gold certificate and an album of the same name was released. With an issue in single format, "i=no" also announced the end of a long EP era.
On 5 December 1968, in Paris city hall i=no, Dalida received the Medal of the president of the Republic from hands of General de Gaulle who summarised the "success, kindness and modesty of this woman" saying: "By giving you this medal, I wanted to honor a quality, a great lady of France." In France, she remains the only person from show-business to receive such distinction. During same event, Dalida became a Parisian citizen of honor, receiving the Medal of the city of Paris by the Council of Paris, and was also named "the Godmother of Montmartre pulbots", the old name for poor children of the neighborhood where she lived.
Spending 1969 on tour and private travellings to India, Dalida released several less successful recordings like "i=no", "i=no" and "i=no", all poorly promoted on TV and radio attracting some success in Turkey and France. "Oh Lady Mary" was released in autumn and remained her last Italian hit. Returning to German TV, Dalida danced casatchok on her new song "i=no", which was followed with release of three new albums: Canta in italiano, In Deutsch and Ma mère me disait, a sales topper in Poland. Dalida was also awarded with MIDEM, award for the best selling artist of the year in Italy, and her first Radio Luxembourg singer of the year award, which she went on to win for several more times.
In October 1971, Dalida intended to book herself at Olympia for her big Parisian comeback after four years. Bruno Coquatrix did not believe in her change of style and refused to produce the show so Dalida rented and paid the venue by herself. On 24 November, announced by posters thirty meters long and four meters high on the Champs-Élysées, Dalida premiered a sold-out three-week-long concert residency, with Mike Brant as opening act. Dalida again triumphed, with public and critics plebiscite new repertoire nicknaming her "the queen of the theater" and "a modern Phaedra". Seeing the success, Coquatrix offered "Dali" to return whenever she wants "without having to pay a single cent". Premiere night was both recorded on video and as live album Olympia 71, published a year later alongside Il faut du temps, while the video was first issued in 2012.
Through 1971 and 1972 Dalida held a series of successful worldwide concerts in Asia, Canada, Europe, Lebanon and Latin America. She continued to choose her new songs only for their poetic value, but still paid less attention to their commercial promotion, again traveling to Asia to develop a better understanding of herself. Each time Dalida would appear on TV performing "i=no", "i=no" or "i=no", as Jacques Pessis said: "masses of crazed fans were chanting 'Dali' for the first time, their new nickname for her. She shaped her early 1970s image without even trying... just expressing natural emotions she carried in that period". Inspired by Jesus Christ Superstar, Dalida also experimented with religious themes in songs "Jésus bambino" and "Jésus Kitsch". She came back to high sales in September 1972 with "i=no", a cover of The Godfathers title song. Peaking at number two and with over one-half million copies sold, it became a gross hit in France by the end of year and received gold certificate.
In late July, Dalida released another song that went to become her signature track: "i=no". The writer of the song Serge Lama recorded and released it earlier that year, but it did not receive any attention until it was spotted by Dalida who later mentioned: "when I saw it on television for the first time, I cried and I knew I have to record it". Dalida's intention to popularise Lama rather than getting a profit from song made her issue it as a B-side to single "i=no". After the release and two performances, her version became a hit, but Lama's original also drew public attention. Dalida's gestures and facial expressions while performing "i=no" were a natural expression of her personal connection to lyrics that deal with abandonment and despair. The renditions of the song during the future years left a huge impact on French society and shaped an image of Dalida, described by Vanity Fair as "ultimate drama queen". Both Lama and composer of the song Alice Dona frequently credited solely Dalida for being the one who made the song a success, and for boosting Lama's career. Eventually, covered by several singers mostly as tribute to Dalida, "i=no" also became a song frequently sung at competitions.
At the end of 1975, Dalida released a new album that gathered some songs from singles released in 1974 and 1975 plus some new material. Most of the songs were from the same genre except for the disco-genre song "i=no". This song, released as a single in January 1976, reached number 1 on the French charts and was both first disco hit in France and disco hit in French language. Achieving that, Dalida holds the title of "the inventor of French disco". Around the same time, the popularity of variety shows increasing in France and Dalida started making television appearances on a weekly basis there and across Europe.
Following her disco success, in mid-1976 she released a new album with newly recorded songs, most of them disco. The most notable one was "i=no" (number 7 in France and number 10 in Turkey). 1977 was a successful year for Dalida both in her private and professional life. She released three albums. One of them was live Olympia 77, released following her again four-week triumph at Olympia in 1977. The other two were albums with completely new songs. "i=no" became the first ever shaabi hit in the world. Originally sung in Egyptian Arabic, the song was translated into French, Italian, and German. Part of the lyrics are based on an old Egyptian folk song about homesickness and celebrating the Egyptian nation.
Dalida continued touring the world, including the US, for the second time since the 1950s, by playing two nights in New York City's Carnegie Hall in November 1978. The New York Times review of the Carnegie Hall concert praised Dalida's performance and noted its intimacy and intensity after she began to converse midway through it, revealing her personality. Most of the audience were French citizens. The concerts were almost sold out, but nevertheless, it was another triumph for her. Due to the concert, she was offered for the second time a contract to perform in the US, but she refused it again. In February, during her 1977 Canada tour, an obsessed fan tried to kidnap her by using a hammer but did not succeed.
Other hit performances of Dalida include "The Lambeth Walk", sung in English and French, and aforementioned "i=no", released in 1973 achieving success in 1977. In 1979, Dalida recorded her biggest disco hit, "i=no", written by Toto Cutugno. The song was a smash hit, peaking at number 1 on the French charts. By the end of 1979, she released the semi-biographical song "i=no" where she, through music, speaks about herself in a humorous way. Her debut of 1980 was marked by the release of a big disco hit, "i=no". Then she released the album Gigi in Paradisco, named for the title song, which was a sequel to her previous hit "i=no".
In 1979, Dalida met Lester Wilson. Agreeing to work together he became her choreographer for the upcoming spectacle in the Paris i=no, booked for January 1980. In total, Dalida performed for three hours per day for fifteen days with ten costume changes and twelve dancers in front of an audience of around 90,000 people. At i=no, the largest playing venue in Paris and one of the biggest in France, there was much the same triumph as in Olympia.
Following the spectacle, Dalida released the double live album Le Spectacle du Palais des Sports 1980 and organized a new European tour and a small World tour. She toured in the whole Western and Eastern Europe except Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Also, she held concerts in Brazil, the US and Canada. When she came back, she organized a tour across the whole of France delivering more than 20 sold-out concerts monthly across the French towns and cities. In 1980, problems in her private life appeared again and were reflected in the song "i=no".
At the beginning of 1982, she had many TV appearances singing still unreleased songs, followed by the release of a new dance album, Special Dalida. The most remembered songs of the album are the dance songs "i=no", "i=no" and the moody "i=no". Dalida was growing older, yet she launched a new world tour in 1982, spending most of the years from 1982 to 1984 playing sold-out concerts Rio de Janeiro to Europe and Asia. She made a lot of TV appearances in the 1980s almost every second week. In the summer of 1982, during the FIFA World Cup, like many other singers, Dalida released a song for the French team, "i=no" (#17 in France).
In the first part of 1983, she released several songs, the most notable being "i=no". The dance-pop song has very profound lyrics and has remained a big hit, one of the signature tracks by Dalida. Most of her songs of 1983 were gathered on her album released in mid-1983, Les P'tits Mots, which also featured such singles as "Lucas" and "Bravo".
By the beginning of 1984, her personal difficulties escalated again; she could not dedicate as much time to her career as she would have wanted. However, she recorded a new collection of mainly dance songs including "i=no" and "i=no". In mid-1984, she recorded the album Dali, a collection of all her songs released that year. To promote the album, a television special was later released on VHS named Dalida idéale; it was filmed in 1984, and directed by the then highly rated Jean-Christophe Averty. It includes Dalida singing in seven languages and dancing her way through a huge number of her earlier hits with the best video effects available at the time and wearing more than 40 outfits from the best French and international fashion designers, maintaining her "Glamour" and "DIVA" trademarks gained during the disco era in the late seventies.
She successfully engaged to keep the new radio station NRJ on air through her connections.
Dalida's eye problems returned. She underwent two major eye operations in 1985 and put her career on hold as the stage lights started to become difficult for her to endure. She released "i=no", a cover of George Michael's "Last Christmas". In early 1985, Dalida occasionally performed live and made numerous TV appearances. When her eyes recovered in mid-1985, she accepted the role of a young grandmother in the Youssef Chahine film The Sixth Day. The latter would become a commercial failure in France despite very favorable media criticism, especially from intellectuals. Little more than 50,000 entries would be made. As she always wanted to become an actress, she temporarily disregarded her singing career and fully devoted herself to the movie. She returned to France to promote it in late 1985.
In 1986, she released Le Visage de l'amour with more new recordings and some singles from the album, which became her last album. "i=no" and "i=no" were songs that failed to hit the charts upon their release. She did promote the album but not as well as she used to do previously, due to issues in her private life which had never been worse since 1967. Dalida, therefore, began spending more and more time alone at home or going out with friends to pass the time, further neglecting her career. Dalida ceased to create new material in the recording studio, instead devoting herself to perform concerts. Once again organising a lot of concerts on a monthly basis and singing her previously known hits, Dalida was then known for the amazing "show" performances, wearing her wardrobe from 1980 to 1982. She sang glamorous disco-dance songs from same period such as "i=no", "Gigi in paradisco", "i=no", "Monday, Tuesday...", "i=no".
By the beginning of 1987, Dalida was falling into a severe depression. A vacation offered no relief, and despite her struggles, she managed to mask her pain, giving the glamorous appearance of someone who still loved life. Although no new songs had been recorded, she toured internationally from Los Angeles to the Middle East. Being part of the music spotlight in 1978, many of her songs appeared daily on TV, as well as many notable TV appearances on talk shows from 1986 to 1987. Her last live TV appearance was at the César Awards night of March 7, 1987. Her last live performance took place in Antalya, Turkey from 27 to 29 April 1987, just before her suicide. Her performance was not recorded by the national television of Turkey which was the only TV channel in the country.
In January 1967, she took part in the Sanremo Festival with her new lover, Italian singer, songwriter, and actor Luigi Tenco. The song he presented was "i=no" ("Bye Love, Bye"), which he sang together with Dalida, but Tenco failed despite Dalida's performance. Tenco died by suicide on 27 January 1967, after learning that his song had been eliminated from the final competition. He was found by Dalida in his hotel room with a bullet wound in his left temple and a note announcing that his gesture was against the jury and public's choices during the competition. Prior to Tenco's suicide, Dalida and he had become engaged. One month later, Dalida attempted to take her own life by drug overdose at the i=no hotel in Paris. She spent five days in a coma and several months convalesce. Dalida returned to the stage the following October.
In December 1967, she became pregnant by a 22-year-old Italian student, Lucio. She had an abortion that left her infertile.
In September 1970, her former husband , to whom she was married from 1956 to 1961, killed himself by shooting himself in the head.
In April 1975, her close friend, singer Mike Brant, leapt to his death from an apartment in Paris. He was 28. Dalida had contributed to his success in France when he opened concerts for her in 1971 at L'Olympia.
In July 1983, , her lover from 1972 to 1981, killed himself by inhaling the exhaust gas of his Renault 5.
Dalida is buried at the Montmartre Cemetery, 18th Division, i=no.
Her output has also been the subject of various remix albums. Since her death, many of Dalida's hits have been remixed to modern techno and dance beats. Around 50 biographies have been written in her name. Place Dalida, a square on Montmartre, Paris, bears her name, and a street "i=no" in Laval, Quebec, Canada.
In 2005, Dalida was voted "Top 58th French person of all time" in a survey sponsored by the France 2 television channel. The only women from the show business which appeared in this list were Catherine Deneuve, Brigitte Bardot, Simone Signoret, Édith Piaf and Dalida.
| 1954 | Miss Ondine Cairo | Egypt | Beauty competition/pageant | Second PlaceLe journal d'Egypte on June 9, 1954 |
| 1958 | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar Awards | France | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar | Won |
| 1958 | Paris Olympia music hall Bravos | France | Paris Olympia music hall Bravos (Shared recognition with Yves Montand) | Won |
| 1959 | Platinum Oscar Awards | Italy | Platinum Oscar Award | Won |
| 1959 | Golden Wolf Awards | Italy | Golden Wolf Award | Won |
| 1959 | i=no Awards | France | i=no Award for Best Song | Won |
| 1959 | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar Awards | France | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar | Won |
| 1960 | Grand Prix Awards | Italy | Grand Prix Award for Best Italian Song (Shared award with Charles Aznavour) | Won |
| 1961 | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar Awards | Italy | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar | Won |
| 1962 | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar Awards | Italy | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar (Shared award with Johnny Hallyday) | Won |
| 1963 | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar Awards | France | Radio Monte Carlo Oscar for Most Successful International Artist | Won |
| 1964 | Juke Box Global Oscar Awards | Italy | Juke Box Global Oscar for The Year's Most-Played Artist on Jukeboxes in Italy | Won |
| 1965 | Chico Viola Prize | Brazil | Chico Viola Prize for "i=no" | Won |
| 1966 | Paris Olympia music hall Bravos | France | i=no | Won |
| 1967 | Golden Caravel Awards | Italy | Golden Caravel Award | Won |
| 1968 | Canzonissima Oscar | Italy | Canzonissima Oscar | Won |
| 1969 | MIDEM Prize | Italy | MIDEM Prize for Highest Selling Musical Artist | Won |
| 1969 | Radio Luxembourg Hit Parade Oscar Awards | France | Radio Luxembourg Hit Parade Oscar | Won |
| 1969 | Radio Luxembourg Hit Parade Oscar Awards | France | Radio Luxembourg Hit Parade Oscar | Won |
| 1972 | Popularity Oscar | France | Popularity Oscar for Most Popular Artist | Won |
| 1973 | APPCB (i=no) Awards | Belgium | Gold Medal Award | Won |
| 1974 | Golden Gigi award | Spain | Golden Gigi Award (Special award) for Extraordinary Record Sales | Won |
| 1974 | Golden Heart Awards | Spain | Golden Heart Award for Most Popular Artist in Spain | Won |
| 1975 | i=no Awards | France | Global Oscar Award (Oscar Mondial du Disque) for "i=no" and "i=no" | Won |
| 1975 | Oscar Awards | France | Eight Oscar Awards awarded at the Olympia "in recognition of extraordinary, rare, and, distinguished achievements" | Won |
| 1975 | Golden Lion Awards | Germany | Golden Lion | Won |
| 1976 | French Summer Carnaval Awards | France | French Summer Carnaval Award | Won |
| 1976 | French Academy Awards | France | French Academy Award for a number one single in nine countries | Won |
| 1979 | Radio Monte Carlo Awards | France | Belgium – Music Award | Won |
| 1981 | i=no Awards | Germany | i=no for Artist of the Year in Germany | Won |
| 1984 | Legion of Honour | France | Highest French order of merit for military and civil merits | Declined |
| 1985 | Golden Butterfly Awards | Turkey | Golden Butterfly Award | Won |
| 1987 | Dalida Award | Turkey | Dalida Award (Special Award) for Best Performance in Brussels, Belgium | Won |
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