Sète en chansons - Traditions chansonnières des ports du quartier maritime de Sète

Sète en chansons - Traditions chansonnières des ports du quartier maritime de Sète
(Song traditions of the ports of the maritime district of Sète)

110 songs from Sète and the Thau basin. Balaruc-les-Bains - Balaruc-le-Vieux - Bouzigues - Frontignan - Loupian - Marseillan - Mèze.

Since the creation of the port in 1666, in Sète, each collective celebration has always been accompanied by songs, whether at the barraqueta, at the jousts, in the streets of the Quartier Haut, during ceremonial parades, on the banks of the canals or at family meals.

This collection offers you a meeting with the tribe of Sétois irreducibles who are today at the heart of this popular singing practice - where oboes and drums are never far away - and who have had great pleasure in sharing their vast repertoire.
Here is an anthology of anonymous songs and song creations from Sète and the Thau Basin reflecting the daily life of the "singular island", with its coopers, fishermen, pasta sellers and colorful characters, but also the diversity of its cultures: songs in French, Occitan, "Sétois", Neapolitan...

Singers, musicians and collectors of the Languedoc oral tradition, Jean-Michel Lhubac and Marie-José Fages have selected 110 songs, most of which will be performed between 2019 and 2021 by some thirty singer-singers. The collection provides the words and music of each song and allows us to hear - and often see! - the passers-by of memory interpret them themselves thanks to QR codes or references in the digital databases.


Why do I sing?" confides one of the die-hard Sétois interviewed in the book, "because in the meals of jouteurs, we sing more than we speak! This practice of singing is the object of perpetual creations on the part of the inhabitants, creations which are gathered in this collection.

Prefaced by Frank Tenaille, a specialist in oral cultures and a native of Sète, the book also includes numerous explanations and a rich iconography covering 150 years of life around the Bassin de Thau.


Collection "Patrimoine des gens de mer" of the OPCI (Office pour le Patrimoine Culturel Immatériel).
Co-publication OPCI - Domens - Eurotambfi, co-produced by the CIRDOC (Centre Occitan de cultura).


Each volume of the collection "Patrimoine des gens de mer" (Seafarers' Heritage) is part of a vast project to promote the popular culture of a port (Fécamp, Le Havre, Douarnenez, Le Golfe du Morbihan, Les Sables-d'Olonne...).

Video presentation:

Some extracts of the 120 songs from the book (video by Jean-Michel Lhubac, Eurotambfi).