L.E.J, short for Lucie, Élisa and Juliette, sometimes Elijay, is a French band composed of three women from Saint-Denis, a city in Paris' suburbs. They became famous by condensing numerous top songs from the summer of 2015 into a mashup performance.[1][2][3] Their song mashup Summer 2015 had millions of plays on YouTube as of August 2015 and was thus a global hit in less than a month.[4] Their music is based on classical and world music, described by MTV reviewer Joseph Lamour as "eclectic".[5] According to Seventeen magazine, the three vocalists have been best friends since childhood, and have been performing together since 2013.[6] Reviewer Hannah Orenstein described their sound as "pared-down but strong."[6] Juliette plays the cello and sings backups while Elisa and Lucie are the main singers.[7]
History
Beginnings
All three members were born in 1993: Lucie on 21 November, Elisa on 26 August, and Juliette on 3 September. They are childhood friends from Saint Denis, and have known each other since they were toddlers.[8] Their passion has always been music: Juliette studied cello at the Conservatoire de Saint-Denis,[8] and Lucie and Elisa studied vocal technique at the Maîtrise de Radio France, a prestigious French singing school, acquiring solid classical training. Lucie Lebrun also plays the piano and the saxophone, and Elisa Paris plays the piano and the harp.
In October 2013, they competed in a contest organized by the French band Tryo, covering one of their songs with vocal harmonies. It was the first time they had all sung together as a band. They won the contest and got to perform for a large audience; at that point, according to one source, the group did not yet have a name.[8] They decided to go on with the band and kept posting videos on their YouTube channel, covering various artists and posting their first summer mashup in 2014.[9][10] To a large extent, the group connected with listeners through social networks.[8]
On 1 August 2015, they posted a mashup of 11 worldwide hits of 2015, Summer 2015. It was an immediate success, getting hundreds of thousands of views within two days. On 3 August, Time magazine shared their mashup[14] which launched a craze around the video and brought them millions of views on YouTube in less than a month. French and international media took an immediate interest in the three young women, who were a bit overwhelmed by this unanticipated turn of events. Indeed, they had never intended their video to have such an impact and had not foreseen such a success.[15] Elisa said in an interview that the women would not have worn their pajamas when recording Summer 2015 if they had known that the video would go viral.[8]
During 2016, L.E.J went on concert tours, both in France and abroad. The tour of France began on 27 May, when they played at Paris's Olympia Hall.[18] During that time, they also went to Canada (they played in Montréal on 14 March) and to the United States (they performed at the South By Southwest Festival and in New York City).[19][20][21] In the summer, they toured French festivals, including playing in front of tens of thousands of people at Main Square Festival,[22] and in the fanzone of Saint-Denis for the final of the UEFA Euro 2016. They went back on tour in the fall of 2016, kicking it off with 3 sold-out concerts at the Olympia Hall on 21, 22 October, and 23rd, and ending the tour with a last concert in Rennes on 13 December.[23] They also performed at the closing ceremony of the Cannes Film Festival on 22 May 2016, with French musician Ibrahim Maalouf.[24] In total, L.E.J played around a 100 concerts in the year 2016.
On 4 August 2016, they posted Summer 2016 on YouTube, which is a mashup of 2016's hits, the same way they had done in 2015. It contained 23 songs and got more than 5 million views.[25]
In September 2016, their second original composition, Le Verbe, was released on YouTube. It features Dave Crowe from Heymoonshaker, and the video was shot in the form of an advertising spot for Audi.[26]
On 10 February 2017, the band won the award for Stage Revelation at the 32nd Victoires de la Musique ceremony, a French award ceremony that recognizes achievements in the music industry. It is the French equivalent of the Grammy Awards.[29]
They toured French festivals in the summer of 2017, presenting a newly arranged show.
Their first original album was originally announced for 2017, but due mainly to their tour, the band postponed it to early 2018. It will be composed of songs the three women will write, mostly in French, and they expressed feeling tremendous pressure not to disappoint anybody. Paris said that recording this album would be the band's greatest challenge.[8] In an interview they gave to Purecharts, the women of L.E.J said they were proud of their work so far. They teased the new album, explaining that some songs will be a lot more produced than previous tracks, with a greater exploitation of Juliette's cello.[30]
2018: First original album
They announced their upcoming original album for March/April 2018.[31] In January, they toured Australia for three shows in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney as part of the French acts of the 2018 So Frenchy So Chic in the Park Festival.[32] They were well received by both audiences and press reviews.[33]
The first single "La Nuit" was released on 6 April 2018.
^joseph lamour, 5 August 2015, MTV News, These Besties Formed A Band And Mashed Up All Your Favorite Summer Hits, Retrieved 7 August 2015, "...BFFs Lucia, Elisa and Juliet formed a band called LEJ (or Elijay) where they sing music with classical and world music influences. In addition to their own eclectic music, the trio creates awesome mashups...."
^ abcdefMargaux Duguet (6 August 2015). "Elisa du groupe L.E.J : "Summer 2015 a été fait sur un coup de tête"". Europe 1. Retrieved 1 September 2015. ...(in French)... (from Google translate)...the three female students of 21 years ... The Tryo group launches a competition for amateurs . " Juliette said: ' it is done ' and posted a video ' at the tears ", tells Elisa . And it works because the three friends win the contest and sing in a festival with Tryo . " It was our first big stage, we even had no name yet ," recalled the girl, " people asked us if we did anything, so we decided to go ."...
^"Les Nommés 2016". LES GLOBES DE CRISTAL - Les prix de l'Art et La Culture (in French). Archived from the original on 19 December 2016. Retrieved 19 February 2017.
