Béatrice Martin, a.k.a Coeur de Pirate and other French music

Lisnaholic · 06-07-2015, 06:23 PM

Good to see you posting in this forum again, VEGANGELICA.

That first song is really nice; soothing voice and beautiful piano with nothing else to clutter it up. Yes, "I carry you around like a belt of explosives or a baby kangaroo" is certainly an unusual take on romance.

I'm curious as to why a song in French has been titled "Mayday". As I understand it, this otherwise inexplicable distress call is an Anglicization of the French original, "M' aidez", meaning "Help me", which is a far more logical thing to say when you are lost at sea. Has Émile P-C's song title been changed in the same way, I wonder?

VEGANGELICA · 06-08-2015, 09:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lisnaholic

Good to see you posting in this forum again, VEGANGELICA. [...]

I'm curious as to why a song in French has been titled "Mayday". As I understand it, this otherwise inexplicable distress call is an Anglicization of the French original, "M' aidez", meaning "Help me", which is a far more logical thing to say when you are lost at sea. Has Émile P-C's song title been changed in the same way, I wonder?

Thanks, Lisnaholic.

I checked on Émile Proulx-Cloutier's French websites to see if his song "Mayday" was originally titled "M'aidez," which certainly would make sense! However, it always appears as "Mayday," one of only two of his songs given English titles.

If ever there were a time, as a French speaker, to title a song using a French word, one would think it would be for "Mayday," since that distress call was created simply because it sounds like "M'aidez," like you said!

I looked up the origin of the "Mayday, Mayday, Mayday" call and learned this:

Quote:

The Mayday procedure word originated in 1923 by Frederick Stanley Mockford (1897–1962). A senior radio officer at Croydon Airport in London, Mockford was asked to think of a word that would indicate distress and would easily be understood by all pilots and ground staff in an emergency. Since much of the traffic at the time was between Croydon and Le Bourget Airport in Paris, he proposed the word "Mayday" from the French "m’aidez" (Translates to: "help me!"). Mayday - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

06-07-2015, 06:23 PM	#1 (permalink)
Lisnaholic ...here to hear... Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: He lives on Love Street Posts: 4,444	Good to see you posting in this forum again, VEGANGELICA. That first song is really nice; soothing voice and beautiful piano with nothing else to clutter it up. Yes, "I carry you around like a belt of explosives or a baby kangaroo" is certainly an unusual take on romance. I'm curious as to why a song in French has been titled "Mayday". As I understand it, this otherwise inexplicable distress call is an Anglicization of the French original, "M' aidez", meaning "Help me", which is a far more logical thing to say when you are lost at sea. Has Émile P-C's song title been changed in the same way, I wonder? __________________ "Am I enjoying this moment? I know of it and perhaps that is enough." - Sybille Bedford, 1953