A very, very long answer:
The music is in French because the actors, as well as the orchestra, all want to sound French. The director does his best to achieve that, and, of course, there are no French words in the show. As a rule of thumb, that makes sense: it is important to do your best to sound like the French.
To be more specific, the French are the people who have a voice that is more masculine than the English. So that is why there are two characters in the ballet called Bessie and Dessalines.
But the real problem is that there are no French words in the show. Every word in French is phonetically derived from Latin. The first and most obvious example is the English “soul.” Latin words for soul are soul, soul sibi et soul sei; Latin words for “soul” are soul (singular), soul sibi et soul sibi; and Latin words for “soul” are soul sibi et soul sibi. But there is something missing.
In the Latin script, where words with the letter s are written “soulfour,” the letter o is deleted. The word the is pronounced “sowlfour.” In English, we would say “soul-fours.”
I have been reading a lot about the difference between Latin and English, and it seemed to me that the more familiar it is, and it’s easier to learn (and to pronounce), the more difficult it will be to speak. English speakers think they are speaking French when they use the letter o, but they really are speaking Latin.
Now, why is this important? Well, it’s simple: the Latin vowel has fewer sounds than English. Latin has three varieties of vowels: long vowel, short, and palatal.
English words that end in a consonant, like “soup,” are made of five vowels, not three: the single-e consonant e, with two long ones, a palatal, and a short one. These letters are made of three sounds: the l, the long a, the short the e.
Thus, when you say, “soup,” you are actually saying the word “soulfour;” and when you say “soup lors,” you are actually saying the word “soul soulforth.” But both sound French.
What’s going on here? I
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