Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 3.djvu/609

Many another example of Berlioz's poetic faculty might be adduced, but enough has already been said to indicate his exalted position among the song-composers of France. Although his eminence is now (perhaps a little too fully) recognised, far less of popular appreciation was granted to him in his lifetime than to several of his contemporaries, whose fleeting celebrity has since been eclipsed by his enduring fame. Among these lesser lights were Loïsa Puget (a favourite in pensions and convents), Th. Labarre, Grisar, Berat, de Latour, Thys, Lagoanère, Dupotz, Gatayes, Monfort, Chéret, Vimeux, Morel, etc. This group would be more correctly described as romance writers, since their songs are for the most part of a light character. More ambitious work has been done by Niedermeyer, Réber, and Gouvé, with whom may be classed the more modern writers, Saint-Saëns, Massé, Godard, Massenet, and Paladilhe.

Notwithstanding the manifest preference of the French for dramatic music, they have not neglected other forms. To operatic composers—for instance, such as Ambroise Thomas, Gounod, Delibes, Bizet, and David—France owes some of her choicest lyrics. And from German songs she has not withheld the tribute of genuine admiration. It is no mean glory to have been the first country outside Germany to give Schubert's songs an adequate interpretation. [See vol. iii. P. 357.] The art of singing is as well understood and taught in France as in any other country, and nowhere is a clear and correct pronunciation of the words more strictly exacted of singers. Indeed, from the fact that the syllables which are mute in speaking are pronounced in singing, the French language would be barely intelligible when sung, unless distinctly articulated.

In Paris and the other large cities of France the popular songs of the hour are only favourite tunes from Comic Operas, or which have been heard at a Café-Chantant. But in the provinces hundreds of national airs still exist, and their distinct attributes are generally determined by the locality to which they belong. The airs of Southern France are distinguishable by exuberant gaiety, deep poetic sentiment, and a religious accent. Many of them are said to resemble the graceful old Troubadour melodies. The following modern Provencal air, quoted by Ambros,^[1] bears a strong resemblance to an old dance-song anterior in date even to the 13th century:—

The songs of Auvergne are chiefly bourrées; and Burgundy is rich in Noëls and drinking-songs. The Béarnois airs are pathetic and melodious, and their words are mostly of love; while, on the other hand, the subjects of the songs of Normandy are generally supplied by the ordinary pursuits and occupations of life. Mill-songs are especially common in Normandy, and have a character of their own. Their 'couplets' are wont to consist of two lines with a refrain; and the refrain is the principal part of the song. It covers a multitude of failings in the rhyme, or even sense, and allows the singer ample scope to execute fantastic and complicated variations. These mill-songs, which often breathe a strong religious feeling, are curious and unique in their way; and when sung by the Norman peasants themselves on summer evenings they produce an effect, which is wholly wanting when sung in a drawing-room with a modern pianoforte accompaniment. In this respect they do not differ from all other national airs of Northern France. The songs of Brittany, for instance, equally defy description and translation into modern French.^[2] Rousseau says of them:—'Les airs ne sont pas piquants, mais ils ont je ne sais quoi d'antique et de doux qui touche a la longue. Ils sont simples, naïfs, souvent tristes,—ils plaisent pourtant.' And another author has likened their grave beauty to the scenery of their native districts, to the chequered landscapes of cloud and sunshine, of wild moorland and gray sea, which are familiar to the traveller on the coast of Brittany.

The works on which the foregoing account of the Song in France has been based are—

'Chants et Chansons populaires de la France'; Du Mersan. (3 vols.)
'Des Chansons populaires'; Nisard.
'Essai sur la Musique'; Delaborde. (4 vols.)
'La Clé du Caveau'; P. Capelle.
'Echos du Temps passe'; J. Wekerlin. (3 vols.) 'La Lyre Française'; G. Masson.
'Critique et Litterature Musicales'; Scudo.
'Clément Marot et le Psautier Huguenot'; O. Douen. (2 vols.)
'Histoire de la Notation Musicale'; Ernest David et Mathis Lussy.
'History of Music' (3 vols.): Burney.
'Les Chants de la Patrie'; Lacombe.

'Geschichte der Musik'; Ambros. (4 vols.)

1. See 'Geschichte der Musik,' vol. ii. p. 242.
2. With good reason therefore Villemarqué, in his admirable collection, gives the songs in their own dialect besides the translation. (See 'Barzas Brelz. chants populaires de la Bretagne. par H. de la Villemarqué.')