Tag Archives: rock-n-roll

Music Wafting Into The Night in France

You don’t normally associate living in a French town with Pre-Roman origins, a town that is still laid out along its medieval footprint, with the sounds of loud rock music echoing up the stone alleyways and streets.

The groups on the stage for the All Rock Festival in St. Girons were set up a mere few blocks from here in the gardens of the old chateau of the Palais des Vicomtes and they played until after 2 AM on Friday night, after 4 AM on Saturday night, and they stopped on the dot at 2 AM on Sunday night. We came home with aching legs and sore feet on Saturday — but we clapped and stomped and sang along — and we danced.

The musicians on Saturday night included Mick Taylor, formerly a guitarist for the Rolling Stones from the late 1960s into the 1970s. For a cluster of men ‘of a certain age,’ they gave a VERY lively and well-received performance.
 

Former Rolling Stone Mick Taylor in concert in St. Girons, France


 
When the break came between sets and the ‘roadies’ (Ooops! The stage technicians!) came out to set up the instruments and lighting for the next act, I walked over the bridge to the other part of St. Girons. In yesterday’s post you saw it in its sleepy daytime version, but here is what the night-time version looked like when the carnival came alive!
 

Lining up for food at a night carnival in St. Girons, France


 

Carnival stall in St. Girons, France


 

Children enjoying candy floss (cotton candy) at a night carnival in St. Girons, France


 

A line of carnival booths in St. Girons, France


 
The bumper cars ride at a night carnival in St. Girons, Midi-Pyrenees, France
 
At midnight, the next featured act came out and we loved every minute of the following two hours. It was music and lyrics that we knew by heart from a film that we had both loved 20 years ago — The Commitments. The wonderfully raspy-voiced Irish singer Andrew Strong stood on the stage in front of us and had the crowd enthralled as he sang song after song from the soundtrack of The Commitments.
 

Andrew Strong of the Commitments on stage in St. Girons, France


 
Having just flown into France three days earlier and working with a band of French jazz-rock musicians from Paris that he had just met, Strong had a happy audience who cheered and clapped and remembered their youth as they danced in a variety of styles all around us.
 

Andrew Strong of the Commitments on stage in St. Girons, France


 

Andrew Strong of the Commitments on stage in St. Girons, France


 
We knew when we moved here a month ago that there was a festival season in St. Girons during the summer and autumn months, but I don’t think we fully realised just how much fun it would be to walk down the stairs, out the front door, down the street, and find such fun and entertainment on our doorstep!

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