La Cuisinière
Encyclopedia
La Cuisinière is a song written by Mary Bolduc and released by the Starr Record Company on her fourth record, alongside Johnny Monfarleau. Although it was her fourth release, this was her first record to achieve any commercial success. La Cuisinière was very successful, selling twelve thousand copies in Quebec
, which was unprecedented sales for a record at the time. The success of the song made Bolduc a household name in Quebec.
The song tells of the encounters of a domestic servant with various suitors. The overall tone is humorous. This follows a long tradition of French comedic folk songs dealing with rejected suitors. The lyrics are set in five versus, each of four lines. Each verse ends with the phrase: Hourra pour la cuisinière. The general rhyming scheme is rhyming couplets, with the first two and second two lines of each verse rhyming. The last two lines do not rhyme, however.
The melody
follows an AABC pattern, where A, B and C are musical phrases that last four bars. Canadian folk songs of the time often employed 16 bar phrases such as this, and it would have been a common pattern in the Gaspé
logging camps where Bolduc first performed publicly. The melody itself comes from a folk tune in Acadia
. The pitch range is a ninth, common for such folk songs.
The song shows some influence from broadside ballads, a traditional Irish
song type. It has a very regular pattern that both the music and the lyrics follow. It also opens with the phrase Je vais vous dire quelques mots which is very similar to the traditional opening of broadside ballads, O come ye listen to my story. The influence of French folk music can be seen in the use of enumeration
and assonance
.
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
, which was unprecedented sales for a record at the time. The success of the song made Bolduc a household name in Quebec.
The song tells of the encounters of a domestic servant with various suitors. The overall tone is humorous. This follows a long tradition of French comedic folk songs dealing with rejected suitors. The lyrics are set in five versus, each of four lines. Each verse ends with the phrase: Hourra pour la cuisinière. The general rhyming scheme is rhyming couplets, with the first two and second two lines of each verse rhyming. The last two lines do not rhyme, however.
The melody
Melody
A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...
follows an AABC pattern, where A, B and C are musical phrases that last four bars. Canadian folk songs of the time often employed 16 bar phrases such as this, and it would have been a common pattern in the Gaspé
Gaspé Peninsula
The Gaspésie , or Gaspé Peninsula or the Gaspé, is a peninsula along the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Quebec, Canada, extending into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence...
logging camps where Bolduc first performed publicly. The melody itself comes from a folk tune in Acadia
Acadia
Acadia was the name given to lands in a portion of the French colonial empire of New France, in northeastern North America that included parts of eastern Quebec, the Maritime provinces, and modern-day Maine. At the end of the 16th century, France claimed territory stretching as far south as...
. The pitch range is a ninth, common for such folk songs.
The song shows some influence from broadside ballads, a traditional Irish
Music of Ireland
Irish Music is the generic term for music that has been created in various genres on the island of Ireland.The indigenous music of the island is termed Irish traditional music. It has remained vibrant through the 20th, and into the 21st century, despite globalizing cultural forces...
song type. It has a very regular pattern that both the music and the lyrics follow. It also opens with the phrase Je vais vous dire quelques mots which is very similar to the traditional opening of broadside ballads, O come ye listen to my story. The influence of French folk music can be seen in the use of enumeration
Enumeration
In mathematics and theoretical computer science, the broadest and most abstract definition of an enumeration of a set is an exact listing of all of its elements . The restrictions imposed on the type of list used depend on the branch of mathematics and the context in which one is working...
and assonance
Assonance
Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds to create internal rhyming within phrases or sentences, and together with alliteration and consonance serves as one of the building blocks of verse. For example, in the phrase "Do you like blue?", the is repeated within the sentence and is...
.