Cocanha are an Occitan duo (ft. Lila Fraysse & Caroline Dufau – although there have been other members including Maud Herrera – who features on their latest release – and Lolita Delmonteil-Ayral) who perform polyphonic songs accompanied by stringed tambourines, feet and hands. They sing in Occitan, a beautifully poetic endangered language spoken by about 1.5 million people across Europe. It’s spoken in areas of Southern France, Monaco, Italy’s Occitan Valleys, and Catalonia’s Val d’Aran (these regions are sometimes referred to as Occitania).
Although most Occitan speakers are based in Southern France, it has no official status there. In a recent interview, Caro Dufau of Cocanha told Bandcamp – “Choosing to sing, or even to speak, Occitan on a day-to-day basis, is a political act, and not an anodyne one,” she also condemned the “downright centralism” of the French state. “They don’t leave any space for other languages.” Despite these strong words, they are also cautious of their musical traditions being co-opted by nativist and nationalist movements. Despite drawing on traditional songs, they reject the idea of “rigid traditions.” Lila Fraysse of Cocanha says, “Reinterpreting traditional music also means updating it,” she emphasises that there’s no place for old-fashioned attitudes in their repertoire. “There are songs whose lyrics we don’t like, so we change them, and tell other stories.”
There are six major dialects (there are variants within these) of the language, and there is no single written standard known as ‘Occitan. According to the UNESCO Red Book of Endangered Languages, four of those dialects are severely endangered.
The language has a fascinating history, with the oldest written fragments of the language dating back to 960. It has strong connections to medieval troubadours who used the language as a vehicle for their poetry. At that time, the language was understood and celebrated throughout most of educated Europe. It was the maternal language of the English queen Eleanor of Aquitaine and kings Richard I of England (who wrote troubadour poetry) and John, respectively. It began to decline in status from the 14th century on.
Cocanha hail from Toulouse, the historic capital of Occitania. In Toulouse, you can also find bilingual French-Occitan schools where language has undergone a revival since the 80s.
Cocanha have, according to their bio, been together for ten years. Their music has subtly changed in that time, with their 2015 EP 5 cants polifonics a dançar being their most traditional sounding. From: https://klofmag.com/2021/12/an-introduction-to-cocanha-drawing-from-the-occitan-tradition/
