Fabulous Trobadors are a band from Toulouse, France, founded in 1987. They have developed their own distinctive style based on Occitan folk music and the rhythms of northeastern Brazil.
Claude Sicre writes the lyrics and raps, while Ange B (real name Jean-Marc Enjalbert) raps and acts as a human beatbox, producing a wide range of sounds (beats, scratches, trumpet, guitar etc.) solely with his mouth.
Their first album, Èra pas de faire (In English, We shouldn't have done it), was released on Massilia Sound System's Roker Promocion label. Originally the lyrics to their songs were in the Occitan language, but they have since reached a wider audience with French-language lyrics.
They are noted for their political engagement, denouncing politicians such as Toulouse mayor Dominique Baudis, and particularly for their humour, wordplay, and constant puns. A major feature of their concerts is improvisation in the form of rap battles, verbal duels between the two rappers with each trying to outdo the other. These joutes verbales or duels de tchaches, as the band calls them, are inspired by the "tenson" of Occitan troubadours. The auditorium also forms part of the show, with numerous folk dances taking place.
The Fabulous Trobadors engage in their songs with the defence of cultural (notably Occitan) identity, decentralisation, and the fight against economic neoliberalism. Together with other artists they have promoted the idea of the Linha Imaginòt, an imaginary line linking like-minded people, towns and villages, "a symbol of a movement towards greater cultural democracy".
Celtic music is a broad grouping of music genres that evolved out of the folk music traditions of the Celtic people of Western Europe. It refers to both orally-transmitted traditional music and recorded music and the styles vary considerably to include everything from "trad" (traditional) music to a wide range of hybrids.
Occitan, also known as lenga d'òc by its native speakers, is a Romance language spoken in Southern France, Monaco, Italy's Occitan Valleys, as well as Spain's Val d'Aran; collectively, these regions are sometimes referred to as Occitania. It is also spoken in Southern Italy (Calabria) in a linguistic enclave of Cosenza area. Some include Catalan in Occitan, as the distance between this language and some Occitan dialects is similar to the distance among different Occitan dialects. Catalan was considered a dialect of Occitan until the end of the 19th century and still today remains its closest relative.
A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetition and variation of sections.
A troubadour was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages (1100–1350). Since the word troubadour is etymologically masculine, a female troubadour is usually called a trobairitz.
A singer-songwriter is a musician who writes, composes, and performs their own musical material, including lyrics and melodies. In the United States, the category is built on the folk-acoustic tradition, although this role has transmuted through different eras of popular music. Singer-songwriters often provide the sole accompaniment to an entire composition or song, typically using a guitar or piano. In the early 21st century, digital production tools such as GarageBand began to be used by singer-songwriters to compose their music.
The music of the United States reflects the country's pluri-ethnic population through a diverse array of styles. It is a mixture of music influenced by the music of the United Kingdom, West Africa, Ireland, Latin America, and mainland Europe, among other places. The country's most internationally renowned genres are jazz, blues, country, bluegrass, rock, rock and roll, R&B, pop, hip hop, soul, funk, gospel, disco, house, techno, ragtime, doo-wop, folk music, americana, boogaloo, tejano, reggaeton, surf, and salsa. American music is heard around the world. Since the beginning of the 20th century, some forms of American popular music have gained a near global audience.
Much has been learned about early music in Norway from physical artifacts found during archaeological digs. These include instruments such as the lur. Viking and medieval sagas also describe musical activity, as do the accounts of priests and pilgrims from all over Europe coming to visit St Olaf's grave in Trondheim.
The music of France reflects a diverse array of styles. In the field of classical music, France has produced several prominent romantic composers, while folk and popular music have seen the rise of the chanson and cabaret style. The earliest known sound recording device in the world, the phonautograph, was patented in France by Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville in 1857. France is also the 5th largest market by value in the world, and its music industry has produced many internationally renowned artists, especially in the nouvelle chanson and electronic music.
Zebda is a French music group from Toulouse, France, known for its political activism and its wide variety of musical styles. The group, which was formed in 1985, consisted of seven musicians of diverse nationalities, and the themes of much of their music involved political and social justice, the status of immigrants and minorities in France, and the inhabitants of the French banlieues, or suburbs. Zebda earned widespread recognition, as well as several awards, for its 1998 single "Tomber la chemise". In 2001, the band spearheaded an independent political party that won over 12% of the first-round vote in Toulouse's municipal elections. The group disbanded in 2003 but reformed in 2011.
Occitania is the historical region in Western and Southern Europe where Occitan was historically the main language spoken, and where it is sometimes still used, often as a second language. This cultural area roughly encompasses the southern third of France, as well as part of Spain, Monaco, and smaller parts of Italy. Occitania has been recognized as a linguistic and cultural concept since the Middle Ages, but has never been a legal nor a political entity under this name. However, the territory was united in Roman times as the Seven Provinces and in the Early Middle Ages.
Massilia Sound System is a reggae band formed in Marseille, France, in 1984. They developed a Provençal hybrid version of reggae, rub-a-dub and raggamuffin with lyrics in the French and Occitan languages, sometimes referred to as trobamuffin, though they have also performed in Portuguese and Italian. They incorporate many rhythms, beats and samples from the local tradition or other musical colleagues, and their lyrics indicate a profound parochialism for Marseille and the south of France in general.
Music of Kosovo is part of the European culture and refers to the music of the Kosovan people, dominated by the music of Kosovo Albanians which constitute the majority of population, and to a lesser extent the inactive music of small minority groups within the Republic of Kosovo.
Yé-yé was a style of pop music that emerged in Western-Southern Europe in the early 1960s. The French term "yé-yé" was derived from the English "yeah! yeah!", popularized by British beat music bands such as the Beatles. The style expanded worldwide as the result of the success of figures such as French singer-songwriters Sylvie Vartan, Serge Gainsbourg and Françoise Hardy. Yé-yé was a particular form of counterculture that derived most of its inspiration from British and American rock and roll. Additional stylistic elements of yé-yé song composition include baroque, exotica, pop, jazz and the French chanson.
Celtic fusion is an umbrella term for any modern music which incorporates influences considered "Celtic", or Celtic music which incorporates modern music. It is a syncretic musical tradition which borrows freely from the perceived "Celtic" musical traditions of all the Celtic nations, as well as from all styles of popular music, it is thus sometimes associated with the Pan-Celtic movement. Celtic fusion may or may not include authentic traditional music from any one tradition under the Celtic umbrella, but its common characteristic is the inspiration by Celtic identity.
Se Canta is an anthem associated with Occitania. It is also a very old popular song, known all over Occitania. According to legend, it was written by Gaston III Fébus (1331–1391), Count of Foix and Béarn.
Peire d'Alvernhe or d'Alvernha was an Auvergnat troubadour with twenty-one or twenty-four surviving works. He composed in an "esoteric" and "formally complex" style known as the trobar clus. He stands out as the earliest troubadour mentioned by name in Dante's Divine Comedy.
The Consistori del Gay Saber was a poetic academy founded at Toulouse in 1323 to revive and perpetuate the lyric poetry of the troubadours.
Bouyon soca is a fusion-genre of bouyon music originating from Dominica and soca music originating from Trinidad & Tobago and the other English speaking Caribbean islands. Bouyon soca typically blends old bouyon music rhythms from the 90s' and soca music creating a unique style soca sound. The style of music was made more popular to the Caribbean region by the likes of the producer Dada and artists ASA from Dominica with collaborations from Trinidadian and St.Vincent artist such as Skinny Fabulous, Bunji Garlin, Iwer George and Machel Montano. Noticeable hits includes Famalay and Conch Shell. With noticeable Bouyon flavored rhythms and sounds with the essence of Soca tempo and lyrical attributes.
Samoëla Rasolofoniaina, better known as Samoëla, is a Malagasy vocalist and composer of contemporary folk fusion and roots music that draws upon musical traditions throughout the island of Madagascar. He typically sings and plays acoustic guitar, accompanied by an ensemble including bass guitar, Western and traditional percussion, and backup singers. He is distinguished by his use of hainteny traditional poetry and its metaphorical language, as well as youth slang and culturally subversive direct language to critique and address sensitive social and political topics.
"Fabulous Trobadors". Radio France Internationale. August 2006. Archived from the original on 2008-12-02. Retrieved 2008-07-18.