Local music tops the album charts again in France with the Top 10 best selling albums of 2022 being sung in French according to figures released by SNEP, the French music industry association. In an analysis of the top 200 albums of 2022:
- 17 of the top 20 albums are French productions
- 154 French productions are ranked in the 200 best sellers of 2022 (77%)
- 32 first albums rank in the TOP 200 – including 26 French productions
These scores confirm a strong trend observed over the last 10 years, 17 to 19 French productions have systematically appeared in the top 20 annual scores.
New young artists continue to be well represented in the Top 200 with a dozen of them getting two albums in the annual ranking: Gazo, Harry Styles, Soolking, Laylow, SDM, Timal, Dinos, ZKR, Pomme, Sofiane Pamart, Franglish and Enhypen.
Female artists had 29 albums in the Top 200, 17 of which were French productions but this is a decline on 2021 when there were 39. 3 female artists are among the 20 best sellers: Angèle with Nonante cinq, Clara Luciani with Cœur and Mylène Farmer with L’emprise.
Urban music continues to take the lion’s share of the annual rankings with the following artists in the Top 200 – Orelsan, Ninho, Gazo, Lomepal, Vald, Tiakola, Jul (with 2 projects), Niska, Bigflo & Oli, Tayc and PLK.
French productions also dominate the best seller lists for classical and jazz categories. In the classical category, Sofiane Pamart takes the top 2 places with Gautier Capuçon taking 3rd place. Albums by Melody Gardot & P. Baden Powell, Gregory Porter and Ibrahim Maalouf topped the jazz category.
To view the complete SNEP Top 200 albums go here.
French music industry in 2022
- 17 albums of French speaking artists on the top 20 sales 2022
- 77% of album sales in 2022 are French productions
- 32 top rated debut albums in the Top 200
- 111 Bn streams in 2022 up 19% from 2021 – 82% are premium subscriptions
- 16 million physical albums sold in 2022
Local music increases its share of radio plays in 2022
Across the Top 100 radio plays, French language titles continued to prove popular with 40% of the total radio ranking audience. Since 2018 there has been a steady increase in the shar of French language titles reaching 40% of the total compared to 30% in 2018. This year, there are 43 French-language titles ranked in the Top 100 radio, including 16 in the top 50. Among the best performances, Amir (Parlophone) stands out with 2 hits ranked in the Top 30, “Ce soir” 11th and “Rétine” 28th.
The 100 most broadcast titles on radio amounted to more than 3.8 million broadcasts over the year as a whole which represents 20% of the total number of radio plays.
To view the complete SNEP Top 200 albums go here.
