was born in 1942. He studied art at the Beaux Arts in Toulon before turning to poetry and has published two volumes of his poems. In 1968 he moved to Paris where he met Alain Boublil, who introduced him to songwriting with the daunting task of co-writing the lyrics for Les Misérables. Since then, he has written songs for a variety of artists and, recently, some of his poetry has been set to music by Franck Pourcel.