01 February 2019

Sous les ponts de Paris

Sous les ponts de Paris is a very famous French song. From what I read on the web, the lyrics were written by Patachou, a woman who ran a famous cabaret in the Montmartre neighborhood in the 1950s. I didn't know she wrote songs. I thought she was just a performer. I can't tell you how many times I've listened to her sing this song and many others. On CDs, of course, not in person.




Patachou was a stage name adopted by Henriette Ragon. She helped introduce France to Jacques Brel and Georges Brassens by inviting them to perform at her club. Edith Piaf, Charles Aznavour, and Claude Nougarou also performed there. Patachou had her own recording career and appeared in many well received films. She died in 2015 at the age of 96.





So here are some photos of les ponts de Paris that I took in June 1998, when Walt and I were on vacation in Paris. I had been laid off by Apple Computer in January that year, and Walt had a job with the city of San Francisco that provided him with generous amounts of vacation time.








These aren't just pictures of bridges, but also of things you see on and near bridges. According to Wikipedia, there are 37 bridges over the Seine within the limits of the city of Paris. I wonder if I've crossed over all of them in my lifetime.





One piece of trivia about those bridges: the one called "the new bridge" — Le Pont Neuf — is actually the oldest bridge in the city. It was built in the late 1500s and early 1600s. I've walked across it and even drive across it hundreds, if not thousands, of times. I have photos of it, but none taken with the old camera I used to take these. There are several in this post from 2007.

This last bridge is the Pont de la Tournelle, linking the Île Saint-Louis to the Left Bank. The first bridge on this site was a wooden structure built in 1620. It washed away twice before a stone bridge was built to replace the wooden one in 1654. After the great flood of 1910, the bridge had to be torn down. It was replaced by the current bridge in 1928.

11 comments:

  1. Merci pour ces superbes photos ! Saviez-vous que Patachou, dans son cabaret/restaurant de Montmartre, coupait les cravates de ses clients?

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    1. Oui, je me souviens d'avoir entendu parler des cravates coupées par Mme Patachou. J'aime beaucoup écouter ces versions de "French standards" comme Les Feuilles Mortes, Les Amants de Paris, Parlez-moi d'amour, et tant d'autres. En imitant sa façon de prononcer les mots et les phrases, on améliore forcément son français parlé.

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  2. I'm sure you get the play on words of Patachou's name (pâte à choux...like for éclairs).
    I'm loving these photos!

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    1. Yes. Here cabaret was a former bakery and she named the cabaret something like chez Patachou. Then it became her stage name. I remember seeing her on television back in the early 1970s. I bought some of her CDs in Paris in the '90s and have enjoyed listening to them ever since. She does some really nice versions of Brassens songs, along with classics like Domino, Le Bricoleur, and Plus bleu que tes yeux.

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  3. It's interesting riding in a boat along the Seine, and getting to go under each of these bridges, because it gives you a different visual perspective.

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    1. Somewhere I have a photo of myself riding on such a boat in 2001. I wish I could find it.

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  4. The " obelisk" on the pont de la Tournelle is in fact a statue of Saint Geneviève the patroness of the city of Paris. The world famous restaurant La Tour d'Argent is close by on the Left Bank of the river.

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    1. Yes. And the restaurant that used to be called La Rôtisserie Beaujolaise is right across the street from the Tour d'Argent. Walt and I had dinner there once, and we had lunch there with Jeanine and Henri in 1999. It's now called La Rôtisserie d'Argent. Chez René is also close by. I remember a lunch with friends chez René in the early 1980s, before I came to DC, and Walt and I have had several memorable meals there over the years.

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    2. And we had diner with Cheryl at L'Atlas, à un jet de pierre from Chez René and Tour d'Argent. Memories!

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  5. There is a book about all the bridges with wonderful photos that I enjoyed reading - I got it at my library.

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