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Bilingual Bedtime/French songs
ComptineCounting rhyme

Pomme de reinette et pomme d'api.

Pommes de reinette, et pommes d'api

The melody of Pomme de reinette et pomme d'api on a staff, as engraved in the book
L'air du refrain · The tune of the refrain
Download the tune

The melody as written on the staff, so you can learn the tune before you sing.

Verse 1

  1. Je suis fruitière,zhuh swee frwee-tyehr,I am a fruit seller,
  2. Bon éventaire,bo-nay-vahn-tehr,with a fine stall,
  3. Ma mère, en mourant,mah mehr, ahn moo-rahn,My mother, while dying,
  4. M'a laissé cent francs.mah leh-say sahn frahn.left me a hundred francs.
  5. C'est à la halle,seh-tah lah ahl,It's at the market hall
  6. Que je m'installe,kuh zhuh mehn-stahl,that I set up,

Verse 2

  1. C'est à Paris,seh-tah pah-ree,It's in Paris
  2. Que j'vends mes fruits.kuh zhvahn may frwee.that I sell my fruits.

Verse 3

  1. Pommes de reinette, et pommes d'api.pom duh reh-net, ay pom dah-pee.Pippin apples and lady apples.
  2. D'api, d'api rouges,dah-pee, dah-pee roo-zhuh,Lady apples, red lady apples,
  3. Pommes de reinette et pommes d'api,pom duh reh-net ay pom dah-pee,Pippin apples and lady apples,
  4. D'api, d'api gris !dah-pee, dah-pee gree!Lady apples, grey lady apples!

About this song

A comptine in the voice of a young fruit seller crying her wares at the old Paris market halls. The opening lines are her patter, chanted; the tune printed here is the one everybody sings, the apple refrain that closes it. Reinette and api are real old apple varieties, and api is still the lady apple in English.

Where it comes from

The words: Adolphe Orain, De la vie à la mort : folk-lore de l'Ille-et-Vilaine, Tome 1 (Maisonneuve, 1897).

The tune: Mama Lisa's World, 'Pomme de reinette et pomme d'api' (France): the page's own score image (G major, 2/4, 27 notes, 'Pomm' de reinette_et' as five notes) and its MIDI file, decoded note for note; cross-checked against Bernard Loffet's ABC transcription on abcnotation.com (C major, 2/2, accordion tablature), whose melody row agrees throughout once the bass row is stripped. Neither fr.wikipedia (no score block) nor Weckerlin 1870 (song absent) carries a tune. Engraved at the source's key; the printed refrain couplet only

From the book

Bilingual Bedtime

Thirty-Five French Songs for Children

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Une poule sur un murAll 35 songsUn, deux, trois, nous irons au bois
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