Sometimes one thinks one knows a song well, one that has been heard hundreds of times and then, suddenly the words stop you in your tracks and you realise you really never had a clue what it was about.

This happened to me this morning with Charles Trenet’s La Mer.

I had always , vaguely, assumed that this was Trenet’s anthem to “The Sea”, the sort of whole liquid universal mass of it.
This notion was certainly strengthened by Bobby Darin’s anodyne version of the song in the 50’s; “Somewhere over the Sea” I mean take lyrics like “If I could fly like birds on high then straight to your arms I’d be sailing” I mean, honestly, is he a bird or a boat ?

It was the sudden realisation that Trenet’s verses were totally site specific which suddenly brought me up short this morning.

I had better give you a bit of a geography/history lesson here.

Trenet was born in Narbonne (about 30 klms from us) went to school in Beziers (9 klms) and then Perpignan(100klms) and spent his declining years in a house in the hills over Ceret (120 klms).
He was in other words a local lad and his sea is my sea, that stretch of the Mediterranean between Beziers and the Spanish border the sea which is called The Gulf of Lions, which Trenet makes reference to in the song: “des golfes clairs”
Then this shore line is unique for some more things.
It is hollowed out several times by sea lakes called Etangs, from the tiny Pissevaches (which means Cowpiss) through the very much larger Etang de Bages, Etang des Salses and the Etang de Canet at Perpignan.
“Voyez Près des étangs” he sings.
These shallow inland seas are the natural hosts of reeds;
“Ces grands roseaux mouillés” another reference of Trenets.

Last clue is the reference to”Ces Maisons Rouilles” the rusty roofed houses, so typical of this part of the Languedoc.

Legend has it that Trenet wrote the song on the train on the way from Languedoc to Paris.
The train from Perpignan to Paris goes east all along the coast before it turns away from the sea after Agde and heads north to Paris.
On that costal route he would have passed the reeded Etangs, the gulf and the houses he wrote about.

I will have to leave you with the lyrics of the song so you can judge for yourselves but I am convinced that Trenet’s song is really as specific to this portion of the Med as “The Banks of my own Lovely Lee” was to my old home town: Cork.

It deserves a decent translation into English.
I just may have to give it a bash…..

La Mer

La mer
Qu´on voit danser le long des golfes clairs
A des reflets d´argent
La mer
Des reflets changeants
Sous la pluie

La mer
Au ciel d´été confond
Ses blancs moutons
Avec les anges si purs
La mer bergère d´azur
Infinie

Voyez
Près des étangs
Ces grands roseaux mouillés
Voyez
Ces oiseaux blancs
Et ces maisons rouillées

La mer
Les a bercés
Le long des golfes clairs
Et d´une chanson d´amour
La mer
A bercé mon cœur pour la vie

Listen to the man himself sing the definitive version here
www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXQh9jTwwoA