D'eux is the best-selling French-language album of all time, with over 10 million copies sold worldwide. It was born from the meeting between France's most popular songwriter and the greatest voice of her generation.
Seven months of preparation
In 1994, Rene Angelil contacted Jean-Jacques Goldman to propose writing an entire album for Celine. Goldman accepted, but on one condition: he wanted time. For seven months, he studied Celine. He watched her interviews, analyzed her career, her relationship with the stage, her Quebec origins. He wanted to write lyrics that truly fit her, not generic songs.
Goldman produced dozens of demos, sung in his own voice, accompanied by detailed instructions on interpretation. He asked Celine to change certain vocal habits, soften her pronunciation, hold back her power. She understood instantly.
One week in the studio
The recording took place at Mega Studio in Paris and lasted one week. Goldman and Celine worked fast. Most vocals were recorded in one or two takes. Goldman would later say that working with Celine was "both a blessing and a curse": a blessing because she sings everything perfectly, a curse because there's nothing left to improve.
Enormous cultural impact
D'eux was released on March 30, 1995. The album sold 4.4 million copies in France alone, a record. The first single, Pour que tu m'aimes encore, spent 12 weeks at number 1. The second single, Je sais pas, confirmed the success.
The album marked a turning point in Celine's French-language career. Before D'eux, she was a star in Quebec. After D'eux, she was a star across the entire French-speaking world. The Goldman-Dion collaboration would continue with S'il suffisait d'aimer (1998), 1 fille et 4 types (2003) and Encore un soir (2016). In total, Goldman wrote 26 songs for Celine over thirty years.
Thirty years after D'eux, Goldman and Celine reunited on Dansons, released in April 2026. The circle is complete, and the Paris 2027 concerts will be an opportunity to hear these tracks as they've never been heard before.