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La Belle Epoque is forever the era when artists of every milieu – painters, poets, writers, and singers – came together in Paris to celebrate life and culture, and in doing so, inadvertently captured the attention of all Europe, and the rest of the world, too.
It was in the first decades of the 20th century that the spirit of the Parisian Boheme took hold, and Montmartre became the liberal center of all its creativity. Art and politics mingled freely in the cafés, cabarets, and cinémas of this northern hill district, a part of town which had an identity altogether separate from the rest of Paris.
During this time, the café-concert was introduced. Offering its patrons a full program of performance along with plenty of drinks, the best cafés-concerts boasted a wide range of singing styles, from the smooth and light to the classically trained, and even a few comedic singers.
The traveling musicians of the French middle-ages, the troubadours, who wandered the southern part of the country singing and performing to whomever would listen, are perhaps the first popular singers of France. But for the modern French Chansonnier, much history can be found in the popular songs from the Boheme decades of Montmartre.
Singers at the café-concerts tended toward lyrics reflecting the life of the bourgeois, the main audience of these concerts. Still, some moved away from this conformist lyrical style in favor of themes of concern to the lower and working class – politics, hardships, and family. Many of these met with success, most notably Aristide Bruant, who sang at the famous Chat Noir.
Most popular of singers, however, were those who drew their lyrics from famous French poets and authors. Wit, energy, and charisma went a long way, too. Early singers of the 21st century, Maurice Chevallier and African-American expatriate Josephine Baker both made names for themselves in the Montmartre.
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The next great epoch for French music came in the period following World War II, when the ideal combination of a revitalized social spirit and fresh outside inspiration lifted the French music scene to the forefront once again. Taking center stage was a generation that spurned conformism and the lifestyle of the bourgeois, choosing instead to celebrate the misfits and the working class.
During these post-war years, the French sound began to diversify as music artists became increasingly experimental. The elegant, the humorous, and the politicized singer of the times all shared the spotlight of fame in front of French audiences.
Art house musicians, Edith Piaf and Georges Brassens, perhaps more than all others defined the attitude of the age. Brassens’ subversive anti-authoritarian lyrics deal with none other than the simple pleasures and pains of life, and yet are poetic, thought-provoking, and radical for their time. Piaf, on the other hand, was a showman in the grand style, and her long career was punctuated by melodramatic, yet powerful, ballads. But though she always delivered her songs in an uplifting, carnival-like style, there was nothing light about her all too realistic takes on life’s hardships, on love lost, death, and despair.
In recent decades, influences from the various popular genres, rock and roll, reggae, pop, new wave, disco, and even hip hop, found their equivalent in the French music. Over a career spanning nearly three decades, singer-songwriter and jazz musician, Serge Gainsborg, somehow managed to incorporate all of these genres, at one point or another, into his music.
Worldwide trends for psychedelic, and later, progressive rock turned out a number of innovative musicians in 70s France as well. These included bands like Les Maledictus Sound, Aphrodite’s Child, and Magma.
Today, the French hip hop scene is a lively and important part of the country’s music industry, and one that emerged nearly simultaneously with the New York City genre introduced in the early 80s. Either immigrants or descended from immigrants to France from North and West Africa, Many if not all French rappers and hip hop artists are come from the poor suburbs and housing projects of Paris, Marseille, Lyon, and Toulouse.
Two wide-ranging styles, the mellow and the aggressive, exist side by side on the French scene. MC Solaar, DJ Dee Nasty, and Alliance Ethnik are a few pioneers of the low-key groove, while Supreme NTM and Assassin have gained a following with harder-edged rhymes. Some other of the scene’s most influential performers have included the New African Poets, Sinik, Kool Shen, Akhenaton, Ärsenik, IAM, Khéops, the Fonky Family, Booba, and Diam.
Since the early part of the 20st century, North African musicians, particular those from Algeria and Morocco, have formed a unique part of the French music scene. During the 30s, Algerian Rai, Al-Andalous, and the Egyptian popular classical singing style were fused to form the style known as wahrani, and the sound was listened to in North Africa and in France alongside jazz and cabaret. Popular wahrani musicians from this time and through the 50s included Djelloul Bendaoud, Mohammed Belarbi, and later, Ahmed Saber and Houari.
During the 60s, Rai was revived and gaining popularity in Algeria, and it was at this time that singer Cheb Khaled began his career. The 80s and 90s were big decades for Rai musicians, as other talented singers gained prominence in North Africa and a number of these had successes in France as well. A few of Rai’s more popular performers include Cheb Mami, Cheb Hasni, Faudel, and Rachid Taha. In France, Faudel is affectionately referred to as Le Petit Prince du Rai.
In France, music is celebrated throughout the year at the many festivals which take place throughout the country. The Banlieues Bleues is a series of jazz shows and festivals held across France from February to April each year. Annual jazz festival, Pôle Sud, happens in Strasbourg, in the region of Alsace. And each June through July, the town of Vienne hosts the music celebration, Jazz à Vienne. In 2006, the Vienne event saw such acclaimed jazz musicians as George Benson, Sonny Rollins, Carla Bley, Gilberto Gil, Joe Zawinul, Dianne Reeves and Wynton Marsalis.
The French enjoy rock as much as the rest of the world, and each April in Paris the Printemps de Bourges introduces to the scene many new and cutting-edge rock, funk, punk, house, and techno groups. Open-air rock concert, Les Eurockéennes de Belfort is held over a three-day weekend every July near Belfort, France. 2006 marked the 17th year anniversary of the event, and brought out nearly 100,000 festival-goers.
Classical music, also well represented in France, is celebrated by The French Federation of Music Festivals. The organization hosts dozens of classical music, symphony, and opera events year round. These take place throughout the French countryside and in metropolitan areas as well. And then, there is the Toulouse International Organ Festival, held in the Midi-Pyrénées region at the end of each September through mid-October. The festival celebrates the sounds of the organ in a region known for both its superior instruments and musicians.
Of the many classical music festival held in France, an all around favorite would have to be the Festival d'Automne à Paris. Running from September through December in Paris, the celebration boasts a great many theatrical and dance acts as well as live band performances. In the past, the program has included contemporary and progressive show-groups like STOMP, in addition to opera, symphony, and folk music.
