Gilles (Jean Jacques Maurice Villard) creates in Lausanne the role of the devil in the History of the soldier of Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz and Igor Stravinski (1918). Manager and actor in Jacques Chip in Paris (1919-1924), then in Burgundy with the troop of Copiaus (1924-1929).

In 1940, in Lausanne, it founds the cabaret Sunstroke, place of resistance to the Nazism. Of return to Paris in 1947, it creates the cabaret At Gilles there. It occurs in duet (Gilles and Julien, 1932-1939, Edith and Gilles, 1940-1948, Gilles and Urfer, 1948-1975), interpreting its compositions (Dollar, 1932; The Three Bells, 1940; July 14th, 1942; Happiness, 1948; Venoge, 1954; Our Colonels, 1958) who do of him one of the fathers of the French song. Dramatic author, two of his parts were created with the Theater of Jorat, Passage de l' star (1950) and the Barn in Roud (1960).

Bibliography

A. Urfer, Which goes piano…, 1978

A. Décotte, the century of Gilles, 1995

Francillon, Literature, 3,185-192, 197