How Paris Recruited Clochette's Pal Mickey
Most people know that EuroDisney is in the greater Paris area. But did you ever wonder WHY la fée Clochette's pal Mickey Mouse built it there, rather than elsewhere on the continent?
Paris had a secret instrument for catching the mouse! This was explained nearly a half-century ago (1961) by an American named Bill Ramsey, whose German polka of that year, performed in the video below, identifies it: Pigalle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pigalle)!
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For the very many of you who do not understand German, I created the following "licentious" English translation:<blockquote><i>Pigalle, Pigalle,
that is the great big mouseytrapper right there in Paree.
Pigalle, Pigalle,
the bacon in this mouseytrapper tastes so sugar-sweet.
There you'll see Turks, the Persians, "Injuns" and the Chinese,
And of the others in this world, you'll surely find these,
Pigalle, Pigalle,
they call that great big mouseytrapper right there in Paree.
Oh la la, I am there
In the splendid city on the Seine.
Oh I find gay Paree far from plain
But tonight I've seen what drives me insane!
Pigalle, Pigalle,
that is the great big mouseytrapper right there in Paree.
Pigalle, Pigalle,
the bacon in this mouseytrapper tastes so sugar-sweet.
There you'll see Germans, Swedish, Danes, and of the Swiss some.
Then regale all your life long on your "foreign mission"
Pigalle, Pigalle
they call that great big mouseytrapper right there in Paree.
(Instrumental)
Visitors holler, holler, holler in Pigalle
and in that mouseytrapper get a gulp down "swaller"
(Instrumental)
Oh lala, I was there,
Gladly I think back to that great day
If you wonder what I thought so gay
I'll disclose what's what, discreetly I'd say
Pigalle, Pigalle,
that is the great big mouseytrapper right there in Paree.
Pigalle, Pigalle,
the bacon in this mouseytrapper tastes so sugar-sweet.
You will see people there of all the foreign nations,
tossing their currencies in all denominations
Pigalle, Pigalle,
they call that great big mouseytrapper right there in Paree.</i></blockquote>If his accent hadn't hinted that the song's author/singer was American, you might have anyway surmised that he was anglophone from the English pun he makes of the quarter's name, Pigalle, framing it as a bit of bacon, which pig meat constitutes the bait of the mousetrap.
While an ignorant anglophone ethnocentric might imagine it was the rude behavior of some tourists which could give rise to a name which looks like "Pig alley" in English, in fact the district name honors by replication that of an 18th century French sculptor. And as the song above makes manifest, the name is properly pronounced as an English speaker would say "pee gala." But while the district is home to the <i>Musée de l'érotisme</i>, as far as I know, it holds no special penchant for what is euphemistically called "water sports" - and I don't mean the type of which Alizée was fond back home in Ajaccio.
The geography of Pigalle is of interest to Alizée fans because it forms part of the Montmartre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monmartre) district of Paris in which one finds Alizée's current professional home of Institubes.
<table align="center" width="655"><tr><td>http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/o/docdtv/Alizee/PigalleMap.jpg<br>
The pink balloon shows the location of Institubes, while the Pigalle Metro station is boxed in pink. Other landmarks include the Sacré-Coeur Basilica and the Moulin Rogue.</td></tr></table>
The history of Montmartre begins rather ghoulishly. This tallest hill near Paris, which overlooks what became the city's heart on the River Seine to the south, originally was called Mons Martis ("Mount of Mars"), honoring the bloody Roman god of war. Its name was conveniently Christianized by the church into its current form, meaning "mount of the martyr," based on the following legend.
In the early Christian era, the authorities thought of the first bishop of Paris, Denis (later canonized and made the patron saint of France) as Dennis The Menace (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_the_Menace_(U.S). They resolved their issues by decapitating the living bishop at the summit of what is now Montmartre. (Aside: This first recorded instance of someone getting head in Montmartre would not prove to be the last!)
Talk about having a "bad hair" day! The good news is that, being miraculous, St. Denis picked his head up and carried it several miles north to his current resting place, preaching the gospel the entire way. I imagine this has made him an inspiration to the innumerable noted artists who have called Montmartre home over the many decades, because he demonstrated that just because you are having a really bad day doesn't mean that your career is over!
Ill-founded traditional history says that the older (indeed very ancient) church on the hill of Montmartre, église Saint-Pierre de Montmartre, is connected with St. Denis. It is much more certain that this church is where vows were taken leading to the foundation of the Society of Jesus (i.e. the Jesuits). The fact that this church is so close to Institubes is of no interest to Alizée fans - unless of course you are amused by the observations made near the bottom of the post here (http://alizeeamerica.com/forums/showpost.php?p=150366&postcount=10).
To close the ancient history of Montmartre, a wag might state that in light of many of the activities for which parts of it would gain fame in recent centuries, it is a pity that the mount was originally named for Mars, rather than his sometime wife Venus (from which union came Eros), as the name Mons Veneris would suit it as well today as then, LOL! Indeed, what better "mousetrap" is there in nature than a pussy?
The Bill Ramsey song we examined above debuted in 1961, the year construction of the Berlin Wall began, and two years before the US President Kennedy made a famous speech about it. Notwithstanding the arguments made (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ich_bin_ein_Berliner#Jam_doughnut_urban_legend) by the Wikipedia, my German mother-tongue relations in Europe opined that it was unfortunate the President had claimed he was a dough-nut - but I suppose that was better than telling the Kremlin he was a cream puff!
The United States is one of many New World polities which serve as "melting pots" of Old World nationalities. About one in six Americans report they are of dominantly German ancestry, more than any other foreign nationality, including English, and almost four times as many as report they are of dominantly French ancestry. Yet more Americans speak French at home than German. This is an artifact of the wars in the first half of the previous century and the xenophobia which arose out of them, even trampling on politically innocent linguistics. At least German-Americans were not imprisoned without trial en masse as were Japanese-Americans during World War II. This was probably due to the relative visibility of race, the ancient tenure of most German families in the United States and their vast fraction of the American populous. Surely it would have been a hell of a bother if a supreme Allied commander in Europe surnamed Eisenhower ("Eisenhauer") had been forced to run things from a prison camp in North America!
There were many Germans in America even before it became independent of Britain; Benjamin Franklin estimated - to his dismay - that one-third of the people in Pennsylvania were German. The term "Pennsylvania Dutch" is really a corruption of the term "Pennsylvania Deutsch," i.e. Germans. A vast flood of Germans, disappointed by the failed revolution of 1848, quickly poured thereafter into the United States, and without their help, it is easy to believe that the US Civil War would have ended very differently. But note that the United States is also home to a famous German pacifist community (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOfZLb33uCg).
During the Cold War, among the many US soldiers stationed in West Germany were those of German descent. - like songwriter Bill Ramsey - who were able to re-animate their German identity after decades during which doing so had been taboo.
Now, Germans and German-Americans are not the only nationalities which have celebrated glorious Pigalle in song, as we shall see below. But to finally address the opening "tease" of this post, it would indeed seem that the "mousetrap" called Pigalle succeeded in getting Mickey Mouse's crew to build EuroDisney in greater Paris. However, since Pigalle itself was already so full of what one might call "horizontal" entertainments, the Disney people wisely decided to put their child-friendly "vertical" fun in a park built elsewhere in greater Paris. As counter-factual history, you might like to review a 1967 artist's conception of the Disney scout party making their site visit to Pigalle, here (http://www.illegal-art.org/print/popups/orgy.html).
Pigalle has been a popular subject for songs, and in so many languages as well. For example, the year, 1961, in which Ramsey's German song debuted, also saw a new Finnish song from Reino Helismaa called Pigalle ja Montmartti, performed in the video below. I dedicate it to the talented Ronny Martin Junnilainen, better known as <i>RMJ</i>, who has for many years shared his wonderful <a href="http://www.3rdw.net/alizee/wallpapers.php">Alizée art</a> with us via the Web.
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Here is a quick and dirty automatic translation of the <a href="http://lirama.net/song/284967">original lyrics</a> to English, largely courtesy of <i>Google Translate</i>.<blockquote><i>I decided to visit Paris,
city on the shores of the Seine.
The old culture
intrigued me strangely.
I do not have the free,
us, although how much
went, but I got only
was an immediate help:
Pigalle and Montmartre,
it is my Paris.
Others explore the monuments,
museums and parchments.
Ah, and oh, it's craziest,
innoissansa hihkuivat.
I pulled the Pigalle,
what a pretty Annabelle
fire, striking the eye
immediate front of whiskeys.
Pigalle and Montmartre,
it is my Paris.
Eiffel Tower, some hinkui.
Lifts nous and the wind squeaked.
I jäinkin surface of the land,
I went to a better place.
I'd point Montmarte
funnier man.
Was once again the mind sees;
I spoke French: "Finland, cool!"
Pigalle and Montmartre,
it is my Paris.
Sisu few allright,
when they are one of Mona Liisa
went to the Louvre to look at.
I'm not gone, however.
Dusk the night when the streets covered,
me started on a familiar route:
Mulan was the Ruus,
this boy again Huus'
"Pigalle and Montmartre,
it is my Paris. "
Went for some Elysées,
nice five o'clock tea.
I drank tea, I do not
Pigallen saloons.
I threw the blazes throughout the Champs
lampsin and Montmarte.
All cried out: "Silvuplee!"
I wonder what it labeled?
Pigalle and Montmartre,
it is my Paris.
I guess others slept at night.
This boy as it sings,
until the moment of departure was
quite appropriately, I guess.
Annabelle yes grows up,
while the money accrues to me.
But museums are not,
me to wait in vain.
Pigalle and Montmartre,
(Ai-ai-ai)
it is my Paris.</i></blockquote>But, not surprisingly, the grand-daddy of songs about Pigalle first appeared in French - albeit written by a naturalized Frenchman who had been born a Dane and grew up in Spain, named Georges Ulmer. (Do you think this Dane in Spain stayed mainly in the plain (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHnIclQZR68&feature=fvst), LOL?) Written with partners in 1944, Ulmer's creation, a waltz-beat work simply called Pigalle, is a melody famous the world over. Its main theme, which follows an often-omitted prelude, is something of a leitmotif for Paris as a whole. (For the full effect, you must play it using an accordion!)
The song lyrics (http://en.lyrics-copy.com/georges-ulmer/pigalle.htm) provide a picturesque description of the people, sights and activities of the quarter. (Admittedly, the line warning <i>Gitan's aux yeux malins</i> probably makes any Corsican girl a little nervous, LOL.) The only American song to whose spirit I might even vaguely compare it is the far more frenetic, menacing and highly terpsichorean 42nd Street (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuqJJMSK15U). Listen to Ulmer himself perform Pigalle in the video below.
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Later, markedly less erotic English lyrics (http://lyricsplayground.com/alpha/songs/p/pigalle.shtml) were created to appeal to the more puritanical American sensibilities of those times, and Bing Crosby sang them in 1961. You can hear a 30-second sample of his effort here (http://www.musicme.com/Bing-Crosby/albums/Bing-Crosby-Vol.19-(Original-Recordings)-0724352281527.html).
Thanks to YouTube, our Polski pals Criss_pl, Azhiri and <a href="http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Zlotowski">Rebecca Zlotowski</a> can even join us in listening to Marek Ravski's Polish version, below.
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Today, professional life is probably hard enough as it is for French singers trying to earn a living without Italian politicians educated at the Sorbonne giving free concerts in French. Mamma mia! Alas, this cross must also be borne, as we see in the video below.
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So visit Paris - and enjoy the only metropolis with BOTH Las Vegas and Disneyland styles of entertainment on a grand scale! Perhaps the best proof that Alizée truly is magic is that she somehow manages to be at home in both those worlds at the same (http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/o/docdtv/Alizee/SexSymbolism/) time.
To get you in the mood for your journey, the final video below serves up an instrumental performance of Ulmer's Pigalle featuring the traditional accordion, backed up by some light percussion. By the way, that giant, um, erection you'll see shaped like the letter "A" stands for Alizée, naturellement!
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