The romans were initially sung by the French speaking settlers and traders who got nostalgic of France, Réunion or Mauritius and who, in most cases, would have left loved ones behind and started missing them. It did not take long for it to be embraced by the Seychellois at large, irrespective whether they could speak French or not.
In passing, it is worth noting that, in the early days of settlement a large proportion of the settlers into Seychelles came from Réunion Island which had a large French population.
Most romans originate from Traditional Popular French Songs
Very few romans, however, were written by the French settlers. In fact, most were already popular French songs that were taken over to the islands and some were adapted to the Seychelles environment, whereas some stayed true to the original composition. For most of them we have no record of the author.
La délaissée, for example, is a romans that is a typical example of a traditional French song that dates back to around 1894, that was introduced to the Seychelles and that underwent some modifications along the way. In fact, there are at least, ten versions of the song. A few versions can be found here.
Romans was orally transmitted.
This oral tradition was imported to Seychelles and, given the insularity of Seychellois society, many romans that disappeared in other colonies were preserved in the collective memory of the Seychellois.
However, because the romans were orally transmitted, they got modified during the transmission process and this is why we currently have various versions of some of the romans. This means that there is not one correct version!
The Romans were learnt by Heart
Although, in the early years of settlement, many Seychellois were illiterate in French language, they learnt the songs by heart as they were transmitted and sung in French. The repertoire of these songs used to be alive in people’s memories. Unfortunately, despite the fact that they have now been accepted as part of our musical tradition and mainly sang at weddings and special events, they are dying with the elderly generation. The main reason is that there is limited transmission to the present generation. The aim of this page is my attempt to record them, so that they can be accessed by current and future generations.
The Main Characteristics of Romans
In the eighteenth century, the early style of French songs took on the name ‘romance’, especially those that were sad and sentimental. It was simple in its construction and resembled set of strophic poems that dealt with love and gallantry. Strophic poems or songs, also called verse-repeating or chorus form, is the term that is applied to songs in which all verses of the text are sung to the same music. Read a simple definition of ‘romance’ here.
The main essential characteristics of the romans is its naturalness, simplicity, and naivety. Jean-Jacques Rousseau gave the following definition in his Dictionnaire de Musique 1767:
“Air to which a short poem is sung of the same name, divided into verses, its subject usually some love tale which is often tragic. As the romance is required to be written in a simple, moving style and with a certain mediaevel inspiration, the air should respond to the character of the words; there should be no ornaments, nothing mannered, but a sweet, natural rural melody, producing its own effect, regardless of how it is sung.”
How Romans was written?
The romans is a song that contains a few verses and is divided into couplets. The couplet is a pair of successive lines of verse that typically rhyme and of the same length. The word “couplet” comes from the French word meaning “two pieces of iron riveted or hinged together.”
Lyrically, the verse contains the details of the song: the story, the events, images and emotions that the writer wishes to express. Each verse forms a section of a song and usually employs the same melodies, possibly with some slight modifications, while the lyrics usually change for each verse.
Verses are typically divided by a ‘refrain’ or chorus, which can be one or a few lines and usually consists of a melodic and lyrical phrase that repeats at least once both musically and lyrically. It is almost always of greater musical and emotional intensity than the verse. A few romances also have no ‘refrain’ and some have a repeat of the last couplet in the verse.
How do we sing the Romans?
Most romans in Seychelles were sung without musical instruments. It was sung ‘a capella’, an Italian word for “in the manner of the chapel”, which means in a slow tempo without instrument. They were sung mainly by women, although some were sung by men, especially the songs of the sailors and the sea.
In the next post we will discuss the various themes of the Romans
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