Montéhus

Gaston Mardochée Brunschwig (born July 9, 1872 in Paris ; † December 1952 there ; pseudonym Montéhus or Monthéus ) was a French author and singer of populist songs and workers' songs .

He wrote over 100 songs, the most famous of which include Gloire au 17e , La Grève des Mères , La Butte rouge and L'Internationale Anticlericale .

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Montéhus was born Gaston Mardochée Brunschwig on July 9, 1872 in Paris as one of 22 children in a Jewish family belonging to the bourgeoisie . In 1884 he appeared in public for the first time as a 12-year-old. Under the influence of the Dreyfus affair , which he experienced as a drum machine during his military service from 1892 to 1896 , he became a strict anti-militarist . He published his first song, Au camerade du 153ème , in 1897. After the military, he first moved to Chalon-sur-Saône shortly , where he lost an election. It was followed there by soldiers who distributed anti-Semitic leaflets against it. In 1902 he finally moved back to Paris, where he probably changed his stage name Montéhus under the influence of previous events.

His first chanson in Paris, Du pain ou du plomp , appeared in 1904. In 1905 he wrote the chanson La grève de mères , an anti-war song that urged mothers and fertility not to give birth to more sons. As a result, the French judiciary sentenced Montéhus to two months in prison for inciting abortion. The sentence is later converted into a fine and the public performance of the song is prohibited.

In 1907 he composed the song Gloire au 17e , in which he paid homage to the 17th regiments that refused to give orders to shoot at a demonstration by winegrowers in Bèziers . In 1911 he played at the first conference held by Lenin in exile in Paris. In 1914 he called in the song Lettre d'un socialo contradicting his actual position to support the war. For his patriotic songs during the war, Montéhus was awarded the Croix de guerre in 1918 .

After the First World War, Montéhus wrote his anti-war song La butte rouge , based on the music of Georges Krier , probably his best-known piece. However, his fame declined again in the 1920s, although the self-proclaimed "singer of the people" returned to his old strength, the workers' songs.

In the early 1930s, he approached the Section française de l'Internationale ouvrière (SFIO) and wrote a song dedicated to Léon Blum with Vas-y-Léon . During the occupation of France by Nazi Germany, Montéhus had to wear a yellow Star of David , but was not deported. However, since SACEM no longer paid him for the rights to his pieces of music, Montéhus also had financial difficulties during this time. After the liberation he composed the two songs Le chant des gaullistes and L'évadé de Buchenwald .

The Montéhus tombstone

War Minister Paul Ramadier accepted Montéhus into the Legion of Honor in 1947 . He died on December 31, 1952. After his cremation he found his final resting place in the columbarium within the Père-Lachaise cemetery .

Varia

• The song La Butte rouge (sung by Pierre Carré) is part of the soundtrack of the Hollywood film The Truth About Charlie .

Web links

• La Butte rouge lyrics

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Frederic Cepede: Montéhus . In: Laurent Villate (ed.): Socialistes à Paris: 1905-2005 . creaphis editions, 2005, p. 45 (French, Socialistes à Paris: 1905-2005 in the Google book search [accessed August 31, 2017]).
2. ↑ Bernard Richard: The Marseillaise, war song, song in freedom. In: Chemins de mémoire. Retrieved on August 31, 2017 (Chapter VII- The First World War between Marseillaise and Madelon). 
3. ↑ Mortimer Winterthorpe: Montéhus - Le chanteur engagé de 1900. June 18, 2014, accessed on August 31, 2017 (French). 
4. ↑ MONTEHUS Gaston (1872-1952). Amis et Passionnés du Père-Lachaise, February 24, 2006, accessed on August 31, 2017 (French). 
5. ↑ Montéhus. Retrieved August 31, 2017 (French).