Traditional Occitan Songs & Dances

Bonjour tout le monde —

It’s PL Kyle, coming at ya from the beautiful city of Toulouse!

Here we are starting our second week here in La Ville Rose.. I would say its safe to say that all of us had a great weekend celebrating La Bastille with our friends and host families as PL Bridgette shared with us in her previous post.. I know some of us were on the struggle bus when it came to being on time this morning, not to mention any names :)

We gathered at the Institut Catholique at 9:00am and a half our later we were off to our destination. C’est parti!! Today, we went to explore traditional Occitan music and dance. Upon arrival at the COMDT, we broke ourselves up into two smaller groups. One group started off with some singing and dancing in Occitan and the other half started off upstairs with a little history lesson.

I was part of the first group who sang and danced first. The two Occitain songs that we learned were called “Le rondeau” and “La scottish.”

Be sure to ask your kids to show you the song & dance when they return aux États-Unis!

Checkout the pictures below!

 

 

During our history lesson our guide shared with us some information about traditional musical instruments that were/are used to play Occitan music. Just to give you a better idea of how this music sounds, I’ll give you guys a quick rundown of some of the instruments that were mentioned:

 

La boah — This is a bagpipe instrument that is traditionally made from goat. The students seemed to be a bit surprised when our guide passed around a goat fur and asked which animal it came from. Our guide even gave us a sample of how this instrument sounds.

L’aboès — This instrument is the traditional oboe, but it varies from our classic oboe that we have today in orchestras. As our guide said, this instrument is usually played outside because of its “bruit fort.” It took us all by surprise when she played it for us. This instrument is also used to signal the start of a festival or a fête.
L’accordéon diatonique: Last but not least, we have the accordion. This is what some us immediately thing of when we think if an instrument that's played in France. We see/hear them everywhere!

What an interesting morning we had at the Occitan dance and music workshop. To conclude our visit, all 40 of us gathered just before heading out to lunch, to sing and dance ensemble.
Check out the photos below!

Et une petite vidéo :)

À la prochaine,
PL Kyle