Breton Musical Instruments

Note: This article is rewritten from an original I wrote for Wikipedia years ago (which I see has since been somewhat  messed up - look for us to attempt to repair it to match this article). I am a talabarder, a bombard player.  ~ Fañch

Perhaps no other musical instrument is as emblematic of Breton music as is the bombard. The bombard (in Breton: bombard, talabard, in French: bombarde) is a contemporary conical-bore double-reed family of instruments widely used to play traditional Breton music. A bombard player is known as a talabarder after talabard, the older Breton name for the instrument. 

Bombards in their most traditional setting are accompanied by a bagpipe called a biniou kozh (“old bagpipe"), which plays an octave above the bombard. The bombard calls, and the biniou responds. The bombard’s relatively stiff reed requires enough lip and breath support that a talabarder cannot play a lengthy, sustained melody line. The biniou plays the melody continuously, while the bombard takes breaks, establishing a call-and-response pattern. Call-and-response remains a central aspect of Breton music regardless of the instruments used. 

Prior to World War I, a given pair of Soners (musicians) would typically cover all of the weddings, funerals, and other social occasions within a given territory, which would be jealously guarded from other performers. This territorial aspect might very well extend to locale-specific repertoire, dances, and even to unique tuning of the instruments. This duet of bombard and bagpipe, sometimes accompanied by a drummer in past centuries, has been practiced for at least 500 years in Brittany in an unbroken tradition.

In the first part of the twentieth century, the number of players of bombards and biniou kozh decreased significantly. In some parts of Brittany from the beginning of the 20th century onwards into the revival period of the 1970s, the most popular sonneurs de couple were the paired treujenn gaol clarinet and accompanying button accordion. In the late 1940s, the creation of the Bagad, a specifically Breton orchestra of bagpipes, bombards and drums, by figures such as Polig Monjarret and the organization Bodadeg ar Sonerion (Brotherhood of Musicians), offered a new role to the instrument. 

Most towns in Brittany now have one or several Bagadoù (plural in Breton for "Bagad"), and they continually compete with each other in a series of annual tournaments and festivals. As the Bagad was originally a Breton take on the Scottish pipe band concept, the music initially performed was typically more martial in character. In the current day the Bagadoù almost exclusively play Breton dance music. The large number of bombard players in the Bagadoù has been a key factor in the successful popularization of the instrument over the decades. Another factor has been the revitalization of the traditional pairing of the bombard and biniou in the 1970s with the Breton cultural revival, thanks to the success of Alan Stivell and the increasing popularity of both Fest Noz dances and traditional music competitions.

Bombards are woodwind instruments, and broadly considered are members of the oboe family. While it has a powerful sound, vaguely resembling a trumpet, it is not a shawm. The revered bombard player and teacher Christophe Caron wrote on the jacket of his bombard-and-piano duet recording Gwenrann (2000), with pianist Christian Metayer, “The quality of traditional musicians proves it: it is impossible today to consider the Bombard just a simple,  thunderously loud instrument with only approximate intonation. My wish is to show other sounds and the concert reality of this ancient oboe. In this sense, the piano gives its full measure to assist in exploring this potential.” In the 2012 ethnomusicological exhibition “Sonnez Bombardes, Résonnez Binious !” held at Chateau Kerjean, the detailed tri-lingual (Breton, French, and English) large-format placard descriptions of the bombard make it absolutely clear that “The bombard is descended from the Renaissance oboe and its design reflects the accumulated musical expertise from over the centuries.“

Like other oboes, the bombard uses a brass staple as the basis for its double reed. A conical or cylindrical, depending on the model, outer layer of cork around the bottom section of the  staple, similar to the staple of the conservatoire oboe, enables the reed to be easily and predictably placed with an airtight seal into the reed-socket at the top of the instrument. It is played as the oboe is played, with the reed placed between the lips, allowing for dynamic expression. The second octave is 'over-blown'; achieved via increased lip and air pressure, or through the use of an octave key. Also like other oboes, the body of the instrument is made in sections which are assembled together at the joints in order to play. In smaller instruments the bell and body are separate, while larger instruments will additionally have a two-part body with a joint located between the left and right hand playing positions, as with many other contemporary woodwinds.

Historical and simpler instruments are diatonic, with a typical range of about an octave and a half. Bombards range from large bass models approaching an english horn to tiny instruments playing a high C diatonic scale. Typically the smaller the instrument, the more penetrating the tone. The most common keys are intermediate in size. Bb instruments are used with the large Bagad bagpipe bands, while instruments in A and G are popular for use in bombard-biniou duos and also with Fest Noz bands using mixed instrumentation such as guitars, accordions, and violins. 

In recent decades the bombard has been in constant evolution. Contemporary bombards may have sophisticated keywork, resulting in fully chromatic instruments. Milder versions tending to a romantic-era oboe sound such as Youenn Le Bihan's "piston”, a baroque oboe/bombard hybrid, have been developed for use in mixed ensembles, resulting in completely new sounds and realms of expression. 

The Bagadoù have created a substantial market for quality instruments and associated supplies, and the resulting large number of players exploring various realms of activity has resulted in ongoing development and refinement of every aspect of the instrument. Bombard activities support a class of professional musicians, professional instrument makers, and even professional reed makers manufacturing large quantities of standardized reeds. Publishers market numerous tutorial books, videos, and recordings.  

Today, the bombard is played in combination with a wide variety of instruments (biniou, veuze, Scottish Highland pipes, saxophone, piano, organ, clarinet/treujenn gaol, violin, flute, guitar, bass, percussion… ) in Fest Noz groups as well as in ensembles of many other styles - from classical to folk, rock, pop, punk, metal - in arrangements of traditional Breton dance tunes or in new compositions.

The above text comes from an exhibit on the history of Breton music at the Chateau Kerjean.

The Chromatic button accordion used in Brittany is the ‘C system’ accordion commonly used in western Europe, typically with four or five rows of buttons on the right (melody) side. The buttons on the melody side are distinctive in that if the next button to the right is played the sounded note will be a minor third higher, and moving to the right diagonally inward the note played will be a half-step higher, and diagonally right outward will play a note a whole step higher. 

This style of accordion is one of two commonly used in Breton music, the other being the extremely popular Diatonic Button Accordion.  The piano accordion is not generally used in Breton music and can be considered a novelty instrument in this context. One difference between the C system and piano instruments is the powerful immediacy of the response to individual melody notes in the C system, which makes a quite noticeable difference in playing strong melody lines with trills and various other articulations.

The most traditional  setup for Breton chromatic accordion is a ‘wet’ tuned instrument, where the paired metal reeds that play with every melody note are tuned a few cents off from each other (as opposed to ‘dry’ tuning in which they are tuned as closely as possible to each other) resulting in a complex, perhaps more diffuse or even dissonant tonality.  The majority of Breton players brace their right thumb against the side of the keyboard rather than using it to play, as a classical musician would. The typical Breton style places an emphasis on playing towards the higher range of the instrument, although there is no ‘rule’ to do so.

Yves Menez known as "Pier Min" (1905-1983) and his protegés such as Jean Coateval typify the instrument’s sound and repertoire in the early and mid twentieth century. Menez, for example, as perhaps the most famous player of the era, had a genius for interesting melodies coupled with fairly simple chordal accompaniment with the left hand. The traditional repertoire featured a very strong emphasis on gavottes, particularly the ‘gavottes montagne’ as Menez was associated with the Monts d'Arrée, or Menezioù Are area. Menez was known as the creator and king of the « accordéon gavotte » and played countless wedding gigs in central Brittany before and after the second world war. In the 1930s and 1940s he exercised his talents as a solo performer,  or as part of a duo, or accordion trio, or within his ballroom orchestra l’Idéal Jazz. If his most famous compositions were perpetuated by his students (Jean Coatéval and Yves Le Gac in particular), others would have fallen into oblivion without their notation in the 1940s by Polig Monjarret. 

In 2020 Dastum released Idéal Jazz – Yves Menez, a large-ensemble recording that faithfully recreated the Menez sound.  Four noted chromatic accordionists, accompanied by brass, violin, banjo and drums, created a sound reconstruction of 22 titles, supported by numerous documents (recordings, scores, and notes) presented in an attached PDF booklet.

Although  musicians such as Patrick Lefebvre (Swing Noz, Lemou & Lefebvre) and Yann Le Corre (Karma, n’diaz) have certainly left their mark, perhaps no other musician really signifies the high-point of chromatic accordion in Breton music today better than Régis Huiban. Huiban, as a player and composer, has produced gorgeous, groundbreaking music with Kof A Kof with Roland Becker, several classic recordings with the group Wipidoup, and then went on to revitalize the aging  but iconic group Skolvan. All the while he released several jazz outings and the traditional Danses Du Pays Pourlet and Mille boutons, featuring an approach completely faithful to the original style but performed at a vastly higher level of technical proficiency.  The description of Mille boutons from the Bemol VPC record company website: “Solo on the chromatic accordion or accordina, here are some dances from Lower Brittany, from the traditional repertoire. With the exception of laridés, all these tunes were once played by accordionists who marked the history of Breton music such as Yves Menez, Jean Coatéval, Yves Richard, André Le Maguet and Yves Gac…”. More recently, the group Birinig Express, perhaps building on the earlier group Joa, has an extremely intriguing lineup and seems poised to deliver some inspired material.

Besides Huiban, the best-known Breton chromatic accordionists today are probably Jean Le Floc’h, Yann Le Corre, Patrick Lefebvre, and Alain  Pennec. The bands Wipidoup, n’diaz, Kafe Koefet,  and Imperial Gavotte Club are just a few that feature the akordeoñ kromatek. 

The Imperial Gavotte Club

The  following is a light re-write of an article that I originally wrote for Wikipedia  ~ Fañch

Treujenn Gaol (Breton: cabbage stalk) is the Breton term for an older-style clarinet with Albert or Mueller system keywork as used in Breton music. The term 'treujenn gaol' was originally a pejorative term invented by bombard players who found the newer instrument encroaching on their livelihood. Their use is concentrated in central western Brittany - Bro Fañch and Plinn and Bro Fisel. Similar to the bombard/biniou pairing, clarinets are frequently associated with the accordion in call-and-response pairings, although pairs of clarinets are also common. 

The clarinet arrived in Brittany in the 19th century. The most traditional Breton clarinet is an older type of instrument with 13 or even fewer keys, in contrast to the modern 'Boehm' instrument commonly used in most contemporary music. These instruments typically employ some variation of the Müller keywork system. Classical musicians in the 19th century discarded older instruments in favor of  the Boehm system, replacing the formerly ubiquitous 13-key clarinet in the 19th century. These discarded instruments eventually found their way into the hands of folk musicians and the 'treujenn gaol' was born.

After a decline in use in traditional music in the early 20th century, the instrument was revived in the 1970s for use in pairs of instruments (much like the bombard and biniou) and in the music of the bagad. In the current day, modern Boehm-system clarinets are widely used, but tend to be referred to as clarinettes.

The treujenn gaol style is mostly concentrated in the clarion register and will play within an octave range.  Earlier players would sometimes remove the register key, limiting the range of the instrument to the clarion range and above. The organization Paotred an Dreujenn Gaol has been particularly active in promoting research, documentation, and performance of this instrument.

A few well-known Breton clarinetists: Christian Duro, Dominique Jouve, Emilien Robic, Jil Lehart, and Erik Marchand. The bands Termajik, Fleuves, Darhaou,  and Imperial Gavotte Club are just a few that feature the clarinet.