Daniel Lavoie

Daniel Lavoie (born Joseph-Hubert-Gérald Lavoie on March 17, 1949) is a Canadian musician, actor, and singer best known for his song "Ils s'aiment" and the role of Frollo in musical Notre-Dame de Paris. He releases albums and performs on stage in Canada and France and tours in Canada and Europe. Daniel Lavoie was born in Dunrea, Manitoba on March 17, 1949. He is bilingual in English and French, since his family was part of a small French-speaking community in the predominantly anglophone province. He is the eldest of six children.

His father was a shopkeeper and his mother a housewife. Daniel took piano lessons with nuns as a little boy and continued his musical education in a French-language Jesuit boarding school, Collège de St-Boniface (now Université de Saint-Boniface), in St. Boniface neighborhood of Winnipeg, Manitoba. In 1967, Daniel Lavoie won the CBC's competition for singer-songwriters, in the television program, "Jeunesse Oblige". Soon after that he began touring Quebec's music clubs with groups (Spectre, then Dieu de l'amour vous aime).

At that time he changed his name from Gérald to Daniel. In 1973 Daniel Lavoie recorded his first single, "Marie connue", and in 1974, his second, "S'endormir pour une rose". His first album A court terme (1975) had moderate success.