Let's talk about what chanson is

Chanson is a musical direction known to everyone. However, practically no one can give an accurate and correct answer to the question of what chanson is. Where did this musical direction come from, what kind of music can be attributed to it?

Two definitions

There are two definitions of such a musical direction as chanson:

1. From French, the word "chanson" is translated as "song". In the era of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance chanson called a multi-voiced song in French. Such vocals were a whole genre. Later chanson became a French pop song, performed in the style of a cabaret.
2. In Russia, just like in France, the concept of "chanson" means a collection of different genres and directions of Russian music. Most often it is associated with a bardic song and a city romance. Also to this musical direction in Russia often include some emigrant, Russian folk and even pop songs.

Emergence in Russia

At the beginning of the twentieth century, a new musical trend appears in Russia, it immediately begins to enjoy special popularity. What is chanson, what purpose is pursued by its representatives - questions that excite the thoughts of all music lovers who drew attention to this genre. Very many define chanson only as music of thieves and prisoners. And few people know that the works about the hard fate, betrayal of a friend, unhappy love are the brightest representatives of the new direction for music in Russia . Songs of the chanson were performed by such well-known personalities as Leonid Utesov and the inimitable Vladimir Vysotsky, our contemporaries Vika Tsyganova, Stas Mikhailov, Lubov Uspenskaya, Alexander Rosenbaum and, of course, Mikhail Krug. Chanson in Russia is always a song and music from the heart, from the very depths of the human soul.

Music of this style

No one can tell what chanson is, better than the song itself. The real hymn of all the chansonnier was the work "The Chanson Museum" performed by Konstantin Kuklin. Nothing will tell about the chanson better than the lines from this song written by N. Rassadin:

There it is good, there are the right people,
There is what was, what is and will be.
There is no falsehood, and everything is as in the palm of your hand,
So, however, and it is necessary in the chanson.

And the following lines perfectly describe what and for whom this ancient musical genre exists : "He absorbed everything in himself: war and the zone, love and pain from north to south, the enemy to death and to the death of a friend ..." And these words are also from the famous "Shanson Museum."

Sensual and beautiful

In order to find the answer to the question about what chanson is, you need to move away from stereotypes. To forget about "thieves 'and thieves' songs, to study this musical direction a little and listen to works of this kind. Only then can you understand and feel the pain, love, despair and other strong emotions that permeate every work through and through. After all, if these songs were only about prisons, thieves and criminals, it's unlikely that Yuri Nikulin would sing "Take care of clowns", Love Uspenskaya - "Cabriolet", and Alexander Rosenbaum gave us his magical "Waltz-Boston". And modern performers (for example, Grigory Leps) are not even perceived as representatives of this style, and after all their songs are nothing more than a real Russian chanson about real feelings.