Can Carla prove she is first lady of song?

SHE has charmed the Queen, captivated Israel, impressed the US president and won over the hardest sell of all – the French.

But can Carla Bruni, 40, the model turned singer who married Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, in February, keep spinning the magic once her album comes out on Friday?

The Italian-born Ms Bruni – officially Bruni-Sarkozy – makes an unlikely spouse for any national leader. But in France, where a deep conservatism runs through its heartlands, she is in many ways the very antithesis of a first lady.

A self-described modern woman and formerly a single mother, she makes no secret of her freewheeling past, including high-profile trysts with the likes of Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton.

Yet while the French have been scandalised by Mr Sarkozy's lifestyle and his very public divorce months after winning office, they have taken to Ms Bruni in a big way.

With her high-society upbringing and easy elegance, she has won accolades from the press and favourable opinion poll ratings.

"She has even shown herself to be a very intelligent woman," Jean-Luc Parodi, a political analyst, said. "The way she has handled herself since her marriage shows a real finesse in understanding both the president and French society."

The title of the new album – her third – is revealing – Comme si de rien n'était (As If Nothing Had Happened). It comes out in several continental European countries on Friday, two days before a summit of world leaders in Paris.

At the Elysée Palace – where the first lady maintains an office but has yet to take up permanent residence – Ms Bruni's fortunes are of keen strategic interest. Pierre Charon, an aide and friend of Mr Sarkozy, has been assigned to guide her through the minefields of French politics.

"For the moment, she's a good card," said Colombe Pringle, executive editor of the celebrity magazine Point de Vue, before adding: "It can turn very fast … It might backlash.

"It's important that (the album] is good."

Mr Sarkozy took office in May 2007 with very high approval ratings, but within six months had used up that reservoir of support.

Then Ms Bruni came to the rescue.

Less than five months after their marriage in February, the culmination of a whirlwind romance, she has brought a measure of calm to the frenetic president and class to the presidential image – apparently without compromising her essential self.

Her curtsy to the Queen on Mr Sarkozy's first state visit to Britain in March, won people's hearts and helped to seal the deal.

"Carla-mania" had been born.

Album has already upset Colombians

CARLA Bruni, from a wealthy Turin family, made her name as a guitar-strumming singer in 2002, with her hit first album, Quelqu'un M'a Dit (Someone Told Me). Featuring folksy tunes and her cracked, sexy voice, it was a hit, selling two million copies. A second album was not.

Of the 14 songs on her new album, one, Ma Came (My Drug), has already received a bad review – from Fernando Araujo, Colombia's foreign minister, who took offence at the lyric: "You are my drug/ More deadly than Afghan heroin/ More dangerous than white Colombian".

Colombia produces more than 80 per cent of the world's cocaine, but Mr Araujo said: "Coming from the mouth of the wife of the president of France, this type of statement is very painful for Colombia."

Ms Bruni wrote most of the songs on the new album. In a concession to her official status, she will not give concerts and royalties will go the Foundation of France, which funds charities.

Will listeners get a musical peek into her love affair with Mr Sarkozy? Alas, not really. But she told the newspaper Libération one song, L'Amoureuse (Woman In Love), was "developed" if not written after meeting the president. She cited the passage: "The streets are gardens/ I dance on the sidewalks".