En lisant les billets doux (AU1998-1071-008)

En lisant les billets doux (AU1998-1071-008)

Excerpt from interview of Alberta Gagné (TC1998-1071-008) by Martha Pellerin. Part of a project (VFC1998-0007) on Franco-American song in New England funded by the Vermont Folklife Center and undertaken by Pellerin. Interview is one in a series of six conducted between 1995-01-09 and 1995-12-06 as an effort to document the French language song repertoire of Gagné.

“En lisant les billets doux” (‘While reading the love letters”) is a French-language setting by Roméo Beaudry of the 1922 American hit song “Why Should I Cry Over You,” with words and music by composer-publisher Chester Conn (born Master Chester Cohn, 1894-1973) and British-born co-writer Ned Miller. The song was published in April 1922 and first recorded in June of that year by American tenor Billy Jones, under the alias of Victor Robert, on the Victor label (issue # 18922, side B).

In the 1920s, Montreal songwriter, composer, pianist, and recording studio owner/producer Roméo Beaudry (1882-1932 was busily turning out French-language translations and re-workings of popular American hit songs. Beaudry was, along with his friend Herbert Berliner, the most important producer of Canadian artists in the first half of the 20th century. During the 1920s, Beaudry’s Montreal-based Starr studio produced 693 francophone records, featuring almost every great name in Quebec lyric, folk and variety song with equal success. Shortly after the publication of “Why Should I Cry Over You,” Beaudry set to work creating a French-language transliteration titled “Je ne veux plus pleurer pour toi.” Beaudry self-published the song in sheet music form that same year and baritone J. Hervey Germain recorded Beaudry’s setting on the Starr label in August 1922 (issue # 12051, side B).

VFC1998-0007 Martha Pellerin Collection. TC1998-1071 interview with Alberta Gagné. Vermont Folklife Center Archive, Vermont Folklife Center, Middlebury, Vermont, United States of America.

Copyright (c) Vermont Folklife Center

Full Interview: vfc1998-0005_tc1998-1071

fra

vfc1998-0007_tc1998-1071-001a-009

vfc1998-0007_tc1998-1071-001b-001

En lisant les billets doux (first line)

Je ne veux plus pleurer pour toi

En lisant les billets doux que tu m'avais eorit

(Singing a few words)

AG:       that's not a ... that's not too...

 

(BEGIN SINGING)

En lisant les billets doux,

Que tu m'avais écrit,

Et je voudrais me voir à tes genoux,

Bien que tout soit fini.

           

            [Refrain] :

C'est bien en vain que je pleure pour toi,i

Et que tu ris de mon amour.

Je voudrais t'oublier, mais malgré moi.

Je pense à toi toujours.

Chaque heure porte un nouveau tourment,

Je n'ose plus croire à tes vains serments.

Cruel, tu m'as trompé trop souvent,

Je ne veux plus pleurer pour toi.

 

Billets et fleurs, j'ai tout gardé,

Ceux qui venaient de toi.

Mignons objets qui m'ont fait pleurer,

Et lorsque d’une--

 

[cassette side runs out; Martha turns it to the next side and Alberta and Laurianne Gagné recommence the second verse]

 

Billets et fleurs, j'ai tout gardé,
Ceux qui venaient de toi.
Mignons objets qui m'ont fait pleurer,

Et lorsque d’une fois.

            Refrain [last line repeated]

 (END SINGING)

sound cassette (analog)