France - Hauts-de-France & Normandie

Typical half timbered houses in Rouen, Normandy

The first sight most travellers from Britain arriving by boat in France is the port city of Calais in the Hauts-de-France region, which until recently was the site of the infamous Calais Jungle refugee camp, where many refugees waited for their chance, legally or illegally, to hop over the channel for a better life or to be reunited with family members.  At its height the jungle accommodated over 8000 people in squalid conditions, before it was dismantled in October 2016.  In September 2015 a group of international musicians travelled over from Britain to find musicians inside the camp to collaborate with resulting in the recording of The Calais Sessions which featured musicians from Syria, Afghanistan, Romania, Mexico, Kuwait, Kurdistan, Ethiopia, Eritrea and other places.  Proceeds from the sale of the album go to help the refugees, so you can buy it on their bandcamp page for maximum effect.  Here's a track called Kandahar from the album:

Going onto something a bit more traditional, many people may not realise that this part of France was historically part of Flanders, and Flemish is still spoken by some there.  Hence also names like Dunkirk, which sounds odd in French, but means church in the dunes in Flemish.  This is where traditional folk duo Raymond Declerck and André Rouzet, known as Bart en Klerktje come from.  I don't know much about them, except that they recorded a couple of albums in the 1980's, including a live album recorded in Bruges, Belgium in 1981, which includes this little drinking song called Drinke Liedje:

Folk and Dance band Zlabya started off in 2007 in Lille taking influences from Klezmer, Irish and Romani music and blending them into some Jazz fusion. In 2017 they released a live album to celebrate their 10th anniversary and this tune is taken from it called La Pégreuse:

Normandy doesn't seem to treasure its traditional music in the same way as some other parts of France for some reason.  The only thing I could unearth was a collection of traditional songs from Normandy by singer/songwriter and hurdy gurdy player Jean-François Dutertre, who was born in Paris, but to Norman parents.  Apart from other albums of traditional material from various parts of France, he released the album Chansons Traditionelles de Normandie in 2001 as part of a series called Musique Du Monde.  I've scoured the internet to find a copy of the album, but without success.  Here's a song called Le Passage du Bois:

 This is it for today.  As usual you can follow my virtual trip on my tripline map.  Next up will be some Celtic stuff from Brittany.