Chansonnier Jacques Brel (1929–78) made his debut in 1952 at a cabaret in his native Belgium, and shot to fame in Paris, where he was a contemporary of Édith Piaf and co, though his songs continued to hark back to the bleak ‘flat land’ of his native country. This dedicated archive centre and museum, set up by his daughter, France (named for Brel’s adopted home), contains more than a hundred hours of footage and another hundred of audio recordings, as well as thousands of photographs and articles.