Lycée d’enseignement général et technologique
Docteur Koeberlé, Sélestat [FRANCE]

Music in Alsace: e-mails from the Première ES1 (Ms Clad's pupils) to Anagni Pupils (Ms Affinati's class)

Dear friends,

Hello, we are three pupils, Elodie, Alexandre and Valentin of Koeberlé High School. We are going to tell to you about Alsatian folklore, in particular costumes, traditions, bands and dances.

Alsace has always been a welcoming place and a rich region. It adopted ways of dancing which came from all over Europe (such as Polka, Scottish, Mazurka and later Waltz) and the musical genres going with them.
Our dances represent the way of life very well and the joyful mentality of Alsatian people. They often evoke daily preoccupations and reproduce, in a funny way, everyday life. These dances used to take centre stage during fairs and feasts and everybody, from all ages, used to dance.
Alsatian groups try to maintain this tradition by having children's groups, and are convinced that dancing is a good way to keep fit!


The traditional costume.

The male costume.

This party costume is particularly characteristic. It has got 70 golden buttons according to the wealth of its owner.
The costume is composed of:
- a black hat with wide edges
- black trousers with 5 golden buttons
- a black jacket with golden buttons
- a red double-breasted vest
- a white shirt

The female costume.

This costume is more complex. Indeed, it's composed of :
- a white shirt in English embroidery
- a red skirt
- an embroidered deck
- white pantyhose

To finish, the woman has a headdress composed of a black bonnet and a fabric band of 3.60 meters. Then, we make it into a lumpy shape and we embroider in the bonnet.


The tradition.

A folkloric show is more than entertaining. It's a reconstitution of rural dances and scenes. Folklore enables us to protect regional customs.
To save and continue traditions, memories, customs, songs and dances, and the culture in general, is the goal of folklore.


The bands.

Loyala Kapall.

The orchestra was created in 1945 by the Colmarian Henri Spenlé. It was led by the composer Willy Dorsel. This orchestra was composed of 9 instrumentalists, who was assured the musical event of the first wine fair of Colmar in 1948.

Holatrio Hop'sasa.

Claudius Bannwarth decided in 1988 to promote the Alsatian folklore. That's how the musical and folk group was born. Within a year, the group participates in 280 folklores and 150 Alsatian parties.

The group of the Haut Koenigsbourg.
 
The Haut Koenigsbourg is a castle from the Middle Ages which is well-known in the region. The band of the castle is an institution in the Alsatian culture. It's always with great pleasure that they present tunes and dances.

The band of Hoenheim.

The group was founded in 1986 by people who didn't want the traditional dress to disappear and the costumes were most made by members of the group. They have 60 members and their aim is to defend and to carry on with the old Alsatian traditions.


The dances.

Dances represent scenes of everyday life. Here are some examples, after the hard work of the harvest, there is nothing more comforting than a dance accompanied by friends' musicians. At one time, before leaving for military service, they had a party and girls invited the young men to dance.

The dances are done with 6 or 8 pairs, each in a predefined order. Before each performance, our heads dancer carefully prepares his couples; they try to share the number of dances for us. Several criteria are selected; the smallest dancers are placed before the harmony of colours of dresses, each of affinities, and so on. ...

The steps jumped with the Dance of Hochfelden under the air Dream of love, comes from a village in Alsace which gave its name.

The mazurka is a Polish dance. From 1600, the "Mazur" became a dance of Poland. It was stylized and became the "mazurka". For example, we have the mazurka that we dance to the tune of Augustine and the mazurka waltz in the air of the Ami Fritz.

The waltz is a dance in three stages, where couples keep turning in circles as they move.
The most experienced dancing it in the other direction.

The polka is a polka version enriched of "quilted" like "heel edge" replacement one of two polka steps.

The march that everyone knows.

We can hear Alsatian folklore when there is a celebration in a village.


About our personal tastes, they are various. Valentin listens to French and US rap, but a little pop too. Elodie prefers R&B and French rap too. Alexandre listens to R&B, hip-hop, funk and British pop music (Oasis and U2).
We look forward to hearing from you and meeting you in the near future.

We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!


Dear friends,

We are Eve, Karen and Elodie. We are pupils in Koeberlé High School situated in Sélestat, a town of Alsace. We are 16 years old.

Alsace is a region which has a very rich culture, which is why we want to present our region to you. We have chosen to talk about festivals; more precisely, music festivals, since there are many and are wide-ranging, from traditional ones to younger ones.

If you went there with your familly, we would have told you to go to the "Jazz d'or" festival. You would enjoy yourself in an atmosphere which promotes the very best jazz with musicians coming from all over Europe and even from America and China. It takes place on the 8th to the 23rd of November each year in Strasbourg. Unfortunatly, it isn't free but costs about 10 Euros per person.

But, as you come here with young people, you can go to a Reggae festival like "Festival roots" which takes place on both the 20th and 21st of October in Kingersheim.

Another interesting festival is "Les Artefacts". It occurs from the 18th to the 26th April each year in Strasbourg. It deals with lots of different music like … Sure you'll enjoy it!

The last one is a rock festival, which is from the 11th to the 13rd of July. It is called "Decibulles". This name is the mix between "decibels" and "bulles". It means that there will be at the same time sound and alcohol. Of course it's ideal for young people like us…



Personally speaking, we are fond of rock'n'roll, especially punk. We like American bands such as Sum41 or Simple Plan. What's more, Elodie likes metal music and Eve and Karen enjoy listening to British music, like the Hoosiers or the Kooks.


Dear friends,

Hello, we are three pupils, Simon, David and Emmanuel of Koeberlé High School. We are 16 years old and we are going to talk about traditional Alsatian music, especially about orchestras, village harmonies, bands and music schools which are very popular.

Alsatian music is primarily orchestral. Naturally turned towards the East, it is close to German, Austrian, Swiss and Czech music. As in many other areas, after a near disappearance after World War Two, because of rarefaction of the military formations, there is a renewed interest for this type of folk demonstration.  
Alsace has from its history bilingual characteristics, having been sometimes French, sometimes German. Consequently, it is Alsatian, a Germanic dialect, which it is expressed in its music, which is undoubtedly related to folk dances.       
The typical music, played at the time of country festivities, is called Bloosmusik or Blôsmusik, which means music "to blow", which also means that it is produced by an orchestra of wind instruments, near to a brass band, with fifteen to thirty musicians (primarily brass, wood, accordions and percussions). A recent tendency also integrates instruments such as the synthesizer or the Alpine Horn In fact, the village brass bands and harmonies took over, often accompanying the Alsatian dances. The musicians are generally wearing red waistcoats, typical white blouses and black trousers; very popular, interpretations are often intersected with dialectal sketches.

In our country we have a very famous music school, which is the conservatory of Strasbourg. The conservatory was created with the money which was given by Louis Apfel to the city of Strasbourg in 1833. He was fond of music and of art and the music school opened in 1855.                                                 
In the first year there were only 44 pupils who were studying in this school but today there are about 1700 students. In this school we can today study a lot of subjects, for example you can take singing lessons but also dance and theatre lessons. The conservatory is a private school which is why the school regalement is very strict. Today, there are more than 50 nationalities represented in the school because Strasbourg is the capital of Europe. The conservatory also belongs to the ERASMUS program and has got partners all over the world.
During World War Two the conservatory became "landesmusicschule", which means the national school of music, because Strasbourg and all Alsace belonged to Germany during this time. After the war, the school became French .Since1980, it was situated in the Place de la République and two years ago a new building was inaugurated. In fact, since 2006 the conservatory is situated in a new contemporary building at Place Dauphine. The building has been designed by a well known French architect, and is six storeys high. The building, which is very large, has got a hundred classrooms and a big show hall. Indeed, the school also organises a lots of shows during the school year which is very interesting to view.
Today the conservatory of Strasbourg is 153 years old and its history is not finished.  

We hope that you have enjoyed our letter. Our favourite kind of music (Simon and David) is American Rap and Funk, for example: 2Pac, Notorious B.I.G, Ice Cube, Dr Dre, Eminem, Cypress Hill, N.W.A, T.I., The Game, Kurupt, Nate Dogg, Snoop Dogg and lots of others for the rap and Ohio Players, Rick James, George Clinton The Gap Band… for the funk, and my favourite kind of music is rock ( Emmanuel ) and my favourite band is Green Day. What about you? What kind of music do you prefer? To conclude, we wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Goodbye.


Dear friends,

We are Lucie, Mélanie and Perrine, three pupils from Lycée Koeberlé in Sélestat. We are all 16 years old and we are in première. We study economics and sociology. We are going to introduce to you several Alsatian rock bands. Some of them are not really popular but a lot of people know them in our region.

First of all, we are going to tell you about Alain Bashung, who was born in Paris but grew up in Alsace. He is nationally, even internationally, known. He was mostly famous during our parents' generation in the 80s. He is a singer-songwriter and he has just released a new album entitled « Bleu pétrole ». One of his most famous songs is « Osez  Joséphine ». This is the refrain :

"Osez osez Joséphine
Osez osez Joséphine
Plus rien n's'oppose à la nuit
Rien ne justifie"

Then, another Alsatian band is the Sparkling Bombs, who are especially known in Alsace and not really in the rest of France. Their music is rated highly by a lot of teenagers. Personally, our favourite is « Prettie Boy ».

To finish, we are going to present to you the last rock-band. Their name is "Fatal Flammkuch", which is a speciality of Alsace. This band is composed by 3 members and they play the guitar.

What's more, we have chosen this band since the stork is symbolic of our region.

To conclude, we're going to tell you about our musical tastes, even if they aren't exactly the same for each of us. Lucie likes to listen especially to rock, hard-rock, punk-rock, and this kind of music. Concerning Perrine, she rather likes listening to sad and melancholic songs, and Mélanie mostly listens to reggae-ragga.

We're looking forward to hearing from you. We wish you and your family a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Mélanie, Perrine & Lucie.


Dear friends,

We are Marion, Camille and Justine from Lycée Koeberlé High School in Sélestat. We are going to tell you about our musical practices.

Hello, my name is Marion, I am 18 years old. I've sung for 6 years. First, from 12 to 14 years old, I sang in a choir in Strasbourg, which is the European capital. As I was in this choir, I gave a concert in a church every Christmas. Now, I take singing lessons once a week in Strasbourg. When, I sing I feel free, relaxed and in another world. It's my favourite time of the week. I don't want to make it my job but it is a real passion.
As for my musical tastes, I like pop, techno and house music. I'm fond of Martin Solveig, Katy Perry, David Guetta, Coldplay and James Blunt. Indeed, I was at his concert and at Raphael's concert too.

I'm Camille, I'm 16 years old and I've played the flute for 8 years. I take music lessons once a week with a teacher for one hour in Marckolsheim, a big village in Alsace near the Rhine. Once a year in June I have an audition with other musicians from the music school like violinists and pianists. What's more, I've played the flute in an orchestra for four years since I've upgraded my music skills. We are around 30 musicians and we play in Marckolsheim once a week too. We give a Christmas concert and a gala concert in April. We play different kinds of music like jazz, classic and Latino-American.
As for my musical tastes, I like pop-rock and reggae music. I really like Da Silva, MGMT, Coldplay, Amy MacDonald and Bob Marley and Saez, who I saw in concert and I will go to Tryo's concert soon.

My name Justine, I'm 16 years old and I've played the oboe for 9 years. I take music lessons once a week with my teacher for 30 minutes in Sélestat, a little city in the centre of Alsace. Once a year in June I have to take an exam to see if I'm able to move up to the next class with the other oboists. Then, I've played the oboe in two orchestras for five years, one in Sélestat and the other in Ebersmunster, a little village with a beautiful church. In Ebersmunster, we play traditional music and in Sélestat we play classic and jazz. We give two concerts each year : one in January and one in April.
As for my musical tastes, I like pop/rock and rock music. I'm crazy about U2, La Rocca, Damien Rice, Jason Mraz and Coldplay, who I saw in concert.

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