Chansons gaillardes

Composition of the cycle#

The titles of the eight pieces, of which the tempi alternate quick and slow movements, are as follow: # “La Maîtresse volage” – Rondement # “Chanson à boire” – Adagio # “Madrigal” – Très décidé # “Invocation aux Parques” – Grave # “Couplets bachiques” – Très animé # “L’Offrande” – Modéré # ‘La Belle Jeunesse" – Très animé # “Sérénade” – Modéré

Analysis#

Just out of the surrealist experience of , Poulenc dared to bring the bawdy songs into the concert halls. On the one hand, the text of Les Chansons gaillardes comes from anonymous texts of the seventeenth century, written in a tone of celebration and alcohol: “texts rather scabrous”, according to Francis Poulenc himself. On the other hand, in the Journal de mes mélodies, Poulenc explains about them: “I hold this collection dear where I tried to demonstrate that obscenity can accommodate music. I hate ribaldry.” Most texts imply a particular play on words, a lightness in the form of code. For example, in the “Chanson à boire” (a different setting and a different text to Chanson à boire, 1922), the words celebrate “the kings of Egypt and Syria” because they “wanted their body to be embalmed, to last longer, dead”, and conclude, (Let’s therefore drink according to our desire! … Let us embalm!")

Further reading#

• 1926: Chansons gaillardes, score published by Heugel & Cie, (ISMN M047-29356-5)
• 1964: Francis Poulenc, Journal de mes mélodies, éditions Grasset ; Reissued in 1993, a full text prepared and annotated by Renaud Machart, éditions Cicéro and Éditions Durand-Salabert-Eschig, Paris, 1993 ;
• 2011: Francis Poulenc, J’écris ce qui me chante, Texts and interviews presented and annotated by Nicolas Southon, 2011, , 982 p. ;

External links#

• Texts of the songs at the LiederNet Archive
• , (bass-baritone), Pascal Rogé (piano)
• Bilingual texts on Melodie Treasury
• Chansons gaillardes, FP42 on Hyperion
• Chansons gaillardes on data.bnf.fr