English title "Brother John" Language French | Writer(s) Unknown | |
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Similar Alouette (song), Au clair de la lune, Two Tigers (nursery rhyme) | ||
Frère Jacques (/ˌfrɛrə ˈʒɑːkə/, [fʁɛʁ ʒɑk], in the nursery rhyme and in song more generally [fʁɛʁə ʒɑkə]; English: "Brother John"; Dutch: "Vader Jacob" (Netherlands) or "Broeder Jacob" (Flanders), German: "Bruder Jakob", Italian: "Fra' Martino", Polish: "Panie Janie", Danish: "Mester Jakob"), is a nursery rhyme of French origin. The rhyme is traditionally sung in a round.
Contents
The song is about a friar who has overslept and is urged to wake up and sound the bell for the matins, the midnight or very early morning prayers for which a monk would be expected to wake.
Lyrics
The original French version of the song is as follows:
The song is traditionally translated into English as:
This translation preserves the musicality but greatly distorts the meaning: the whole point is that the bells are not ringing, because brother John, who is supposed to ring them, is sleeping.
A very literal translation of the French lyrics would be:
The song concerns a monk's duty to ring the bell for matines. Frère Jacques has apparently overslept, it is time to ring the bell for matines, and someone wakes him up with this song.
In English, the word Friar is derived from the French word frère ("brother" in English), as French was still widely used in official circles in England during the 13th century when the four great orders of Friars started. The French word frère in turn comes from the Latin word frater (which also means "brother").
Theories of origin
A possible connection between Frère Jacques and the 17th century lithotomist Frère Jacques Beaulieu (also known as Frère Jacques Baulot), as claimed by Irvine Loudon and many others, was explored by J. P. Ganem and C. C. Carson without finding any evidence for a connection.
Francesca Draughon and Raymond Knapp argue that Frère Jacques originally was a song to taunt Jews or Protestants or Martin Luther (see Frère Jacques in popular culture).
Martine David and A. Marie Delrieu suggest that Frère Jacques might have been created to mock the Dominican monks, known in France as the Jacobin order, for their sloth and comfortable lifestyles.
In a review of a book about Kozma Prutkov, Richard Gregg notes it has been claimed that Frère Jacques Frère Jacques was derived from a Russian seminary song about a "Father Theofil".
First publication
Allmusic states that the earliest printed version of the melody is on a French manuscript circa 1780 (manuscript 300 in the manuscript collection of the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris). The manuscript is titled "Recueil de Timbres de Vaudevilles", and the Bibliothèque Nationale estimates that it was printed between 1775 and 1785. The Frère Jacques melody is labelled "Frère Blaise" in this manuscript.
Sheet music collector James Fuld (1916–2008) states that the tune was first published in 1811, and that the words and music were published together in Paris in 1869. An earlier publication in 1825 included the words together with a description of the melody in solfège, but not in musical notation. The words and music appear together in Recreations de l'enfance: Recueil de Rondes avec Jeux et de Petites Chansons pour Faire Jouer, Danser et Chanter les Enfants avec un Accompagnement de Piano Très-Facile by Charles Lebouc, which was first published in 1860 by Rouart, Lerolle & C. in Paris. This book was very popular and it was republished several times, so many editions exist.
French musicologist Sylvie Bouissou has found some evidence that composer Jean-Philippe Rameau had written the music. A manuscript at the French National Library contains Frère Jacques among 86 canons, with Rameau listed as author.
Comparison with Fra Jacopino
Frère Jacques bears resemblance to the piece Toccate d'intavolatura, No.14, Capriccio Fra Jacopino sopra L'Aria Di Ruggiero composed by Girolamo Frescobaldi, which was first published around 1615 - "Fra Jacopino" is one potential Italian translation for "Frère Jacques". Edward Kilenyi pointed out that Fra Jacopino shares the same Frère Jacques-like melody as Chanson de Lambert, a French song dating from 1650, and a Hungarian folk tune.
The Frère Jacques tune is one of the most basic repeating canons along with the melody of Three Blind Mice. It is also simple enough to have spread easily from place to place. For example, Barbara Mittler in a conference abstract points out that the melody of Frère Jacques is so thoroughly assimilated into Chinese culture that it might be widely regarded as a Chinese folksong in China.
In popular culture
The song Frère Jacques often appears in popular culture. Frère Jacques is one of the most widely known songs in the world, and it can be found in many places.