Eddie Barclay

Édouard Ruault (26 January 1921 – 13 May 2005), better known as Eddie Barclay, was a French music producer whose singers included Jacques Brel, Dalida and Charles Aznavour. He founded record label Barclay.

Ruault, the son of a café waiter and a post office worker, was born in Paris on January 26, 1921. He spent much of his early childhood with his grandmother in Taverny (in today's Val-d'Oise). His parents bought the Café de la Poste bar in the middle of Paris while he was a child and at the age of 15 he left school to work in the café. He had not enjoyed his studies but he taught himself music and piano. He particularly liked American jazz and embraced the music of Fats Waller. He often visited the Hot Club de France to hear the quintet of Stéphane Grappelli and Django Reinhardt.

He became a pianist at "L'Étape" club in rue Godot-de-Mauroy, Paris, where his half-hour sets alternated with the young Louis de Funès, also at the start of his career. When the German occupiers of France banned jazz, he held regular social gatherings with other zazous at his home to listen to jazz records and illegal radio stations. Pierre-Louis Guérin employed him as a pianist at Guérin's first nightclub, "Le Club".