“These texts carry a musicality within them”

Every day, a personality invites itself into the world of Élodie Suigo. Thursday June 20, 2024: the singers and guitarists, Anne and Jacinthe, of the duo Les Frangines. They are releasing a new album, “Poèmes”, and they will be touring throughout France.

The Frangines are Anne and Jacinthe, a duo of friends who met on the way to school, on a train. They were 11 years old. A relationship was formed, which very quickly made them want to create something. It is through music that they will find a way to have fun. One learned the flute, the other the guitar, thanks to tutorials on the internet. Writing with four hands was at the center of what would strengthen their friendship.

Today, The Frangines are releasing a new album, Poems, either 13 poems that they chose to revisit in song. They will be on tour throughout France, with a visit to the Trianon in Paris on November 1st.

franceinfo: After Notesyou go out Poems. We have the feeling that after Victor Hugo, it was a logical continuation. Is this how you experienced the creation of this album?

Hyacinth: Exactly. I think that’s really it.

Anna: Yes. I think we had this idea in mind for a few years. We knew we were going to do it, but we hadn’t found the moment yet. It turns out that the time was perfect to release this album.

“This album is a way of paying tribute to these authors who shaped us, who made us want to write our own texts.”

Hyacinth from the group Les Frangines

at franceinfo

This album is special because it is aimed at the whole family, children and adults, parents and grandparents. Particularly for teachers, because we realized that when we learn by singing, for children, it is much simpler. Does this album also have this vocation?

Hyacinth: It’s funny because we have just met Chantal Thomas, who is a writer and who told us that she had discovered Apollinaire through Léo Ferré. It’s super interesting since our goal is to make poetry accessible. But we know lots of poetry because we sing it.

Anna: We know it by heart, which wouldn’t be the case at all if we didn’t sing.

The starting point was Victor Hugo. Why him ?

Anna: When we started music, putting a poem into song seemed quite natural to us, because we wanted to write and compose. Sometimes you don’t always have the inspiration for the words and the poems carry a musicality in them. It was easier for us, at the beginning, to compose on texts already written, beautifully written. And Tomorrow, at down…, I think it’s because it was the one we thought of straight away, having learned it at school, and we remembered it. It’s crazy ! Victor Hugo is really strong because he uses very simple words. It’s not at all complicated and yet it’s sublime. The strength of this author is that frankly, the text is very simple but arranged in such a way that it is just magnificent.

Freedom is also at the heart of this album with Paul Éluard.

Hyacinth: What is very interesting about this poem is that it talks about the power of words. How, through words and through language, we can access freedom.

Does freedom then exist? That’s the real question.

Hyacinth: I hope. We must pursue it. In any case, you have to look for it. He says it. We made the refrain, “And through the power of words, I start my life again“.

Anna: “I was born to know you and to seek you“. I hope that until the end, we will maintain this permanent astonishment and this perpetual questioning, to always seek the truth, to seek our freedom, to cultivate this curiosity which is essential to reflection. I believe that it There is a phrase from Plato or Socrates who said that the basis of philosophy is astonishment and therefore we must always be astonished.

“I believe that all our lives, we must always seek, always be curious, surprised and never tell ourselves that we have reached the truth, that it is good, that we know everything.”

Anne from the group Les Frangines

at franceinfo

How do you view the time that has passed? You met at 11 years old and today you have become a mother, what do you remember from all these years that have already passed?

Anna: I believe that like poets, we are a little nostalgic for the passing of time. It goes by very quickly.

Hyacinth: I don’t know if we keep or if we continue to try to be in this same disposition. It ties in with the idea, at least for me, for our duo, of always looking for how to move forward better together and how to perhaps progress. What drives me is progression.

Anna: Yes and I would perhaps remember something that I like about our friendship, which is that we like to laugh, we like to transmit a little joy and I really hope with all my heart that we will keep that.

Isn’t this album the one that suits you the most, with lyrics that aren’t yours, ultimately?

Hyacinth: Oh that’s funny!

Anna: Yes and no, because we like to write. It’s really important to us to make our own songs, but it’s true that we got there through poetry and I think we are touched by this idea of ​​transmission. It’s important to respect our ancestors a little.

Hyacinth: We’re going back to the origins of what we were doing, that’s for sure, we’re clearly reconnecting. There is our taste for letters, for the French language and our love of words, that’s for sure. And it’s true that in the values ​​that are transmitted in the poems, this album really corresponds to us and it gives us the opportunity to talk about lots of things and transmit lots of things.

Watch this interview on video: