Auvergne
—  Region of France  —
Flag Official logo of Auvergne Logo
Country	France
Prefecture	Clermont-Ferrand
Departments	4 Allier Cantal Haute-Loire Puy-de-Dôme
Government
• President	René Souchon (PS)
Area
• Total	26,013 km2 (10,044 sq mi)
Population (2008-01-01)
• Total	1,341,000
• Density	52/km2 (130/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
GDP/ Nominal	€ 32 billion (2006)[1]
GDP per capita	€ 23,800 (2006)[1]
NUTS Region	FR7
Website	auvergne.org

Auvergne (French pronunciation: [ovɛʁɲ]; Occitan: Auvèrnhe / Auvèrnha) is one of the 27 administrative regions of France. It comprises the 4 departments of Allier, Puy de Dome, Cantal and Haute Loire.

The current administrative region of Auvergne is larger than the historical province of Auvergne, and includes provinces and areas that historically were not part of Auvergne. The Auvergne region is composed of the following old provinces:

• Auvergne: departments of Puy-de-Dôme, Cantal, north-west of Haute-Loire, and extreme south of Allier. The province of Auvergne is entirely contained inside the Auvergne region.
• Bourbonnais: department of Allier. A small part of Bourbonnais is also contained inside the Centre region (south of the department of Cher).
• Velay: centre and southeast of department of Haute-Loire. Velay is entirely contained inside the Auvergne region.
• a small part of Gévaudan: extreme southwest of Haute-Loire. Gévaudan is essentially inside the Languedoc-Roussillon region.
• a small part of Vivarais: extreme southeast of Haute-Loire. Vivarais is essentially inside the Rhône-Alpes region.
• a small part of Forez: extreme northeast of Haute-Loire. Forez is essentially inside the Rhône-Alpes region.

Velay, Gévaudan, and Vivarais are often considered to be sub-provinces of the old Languedoc province. Forez is also often considered to be a sub-province of Lyonnais province. Therefore, the modern region of Auvergne is composed of the provinces of Auvergne, major part of Bourbonnais, and parts of Languedoc and Lyonnais.

The 2002 award-winning film, To Be and to Have (Être et avoir), documents one year in the life of a one-teacher school in rural Saint-Étienne-sur-Usson, Puy-de-Dôme, Auvergne.^[2]

The region contains many volcanoes, although the last confirmed eruption was around 6,000 years ago. They began forming some 70,000 years ago, and most have eroded away leaving plugs of unerupted hardened magma that form rounded hilltops known as puys.^[3]

Geography[link]

In the region surrounding Clermont-Ferrand, the highest mountain is 1,885m (6,180 ft). From north to south, with a small ascent around the Plateau de Millevaches (978m/3,200 ft) the terrain becomes flatter and rockier. The Auvergne is 25 per cent woodland, 45 per cent grassland, 20 per cent arable land and 10 per cent other uses (including urban areas).

Climate[link]

The average annual temperature is 12C, and the region receives 510 to 1,020 mm of rainfall annually.

Demographics[link]

Auvergne is one of the least populated regions in Europe, let alone France. The département of Cantal would be almost completely depopulated if it weren't for the town of Aurillac. Major communities in the region include the capital Clermont-Ferrand, Montluçon, Aurillac and Vichy.

Major communities[link]

The "Chaîne des Puys" in Puy-de-Dôme

• Aurillac
• Chamalières
• Clermont-Ferrand
• Cournon-d'Auvergne
• Issoire
• Le Puy-en-Velay
• Montluçon
• Moulins, Allier
• Riom
• Vichy

Economy[link]

The region is predominantly agricultural with tourism slowly becoming more important. Cows are much in evidence and are used both for meat and for milk, which is made into a number of well known cheeses: Bleu d'Auvergne, Cantal, Fourme d'Ambert and Saint-Nectaire.

Despite its small local market, the Auvergne region has developed many national and international companies, such as Michelin, Limagrain (seed), the group Centre France-La Montagne (regional daily press), Volvic mineral water (group Danone) and numerous dynamic SMEs around the two universities and large schools (engineers, doctors and business school) of its capital, Clermont-Ferrand.

Most of these companies are exporting more than 75% of their production in the world.

While agriculture is important, Auvergne is a relatively industrial region as well, as the share of the working population in industry is 22% (110,000 jobs), versus the national average of 18%.

The main industry in Auvergne is the tire industry, represented by Michelin, with headquarters and history is located in Clermont-Ferrand, and Dunlop, based in Montlucon.

A diverse range of small industries also exists: metallurgical (Aubert and Duval), mechanical, pharmaceutical (Merck-Chibret), food (cereals, meat (Salers, Limousin), cheese (Saint-Nectaire, goat, blue d'Auvergne), mineral, etc..) exists in the region, particularly in the Puy-de-Dôme and the Haute-Loire.

These include the Thiers cutlery, metal Issoire, lace in Le Puy, and livestock as well as food in the Cantal.

The Auvergne is also one of the premier research areas in France with >8,000 researchers in the fields of chemistry, tire, steel, medical and pharmaceutical sciences in agricultural research (INRA's laboratories and Limagrain's laboratories), in biotechnology, seismology, meteorology, etc.

The food industry, with its branches mineral water, dairy products, meat products, forestry, honey, jams and candied fruit, employs over 12,000 people.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Auvergne regional council website (French)
• Auvergne at the Open Directory Project (English)
• Auvergne Web Tourist and general information about the Auvergne region. (English) and (French)
• Regordane Info Independent portal for the Regordane Way or St Gilles Trail. The Regordane Way starts in Auvergne (English) and (French)
• Auvergne-tourism (French)

Coordinates: 45°20′N 3°00′E / 45.333°N 3°E / 45.333; 3

Joseph Canteloube

Marie-Joseph Canteloube de Malaret (French pronunciation: [ma.ʁi ʒɔ.zɛf kɑ̃t.lub də ma.la.ʁɛ]) (21 October 1879 – 4 November 1957) was a French composer, musicologist, and author best known for his collections of orchestrated folksongs from the Auvergne region.

Biography[link]

Canteloube was born in Annonay, Ardèche, into a family with deep roots in the Auvergne region of France. He studied piano from the age of four with Amélie Daetzer, a friend of Frédéric Chopin. After earning his baccalauréat, he worked at a bank in Bordeaux. He returned to his family home in Malaret (Annonay) due to an illness, but when his health was restored, he decided to make a career in music in Paris. He entered the Schola Cantorum in 1901 and was a student of Vincent d'Indy and Charles Bordes, soon becoming friends with Déodat de Séverac, Isaac Albéniz, and Albert Roussel.

In 1907, he wrote a suite entitled Dans la montagne for piano and violin in four movements that was played at the Société Nationale. Other significant works followed, including Colloque sentimental for voice and string quartet (1908); Eglogue d'Automne for orchestra (1910); Vers la Princesse lointaine, a symphonic poem (1912); Au Printemps for voice and orchestra; and L'Arada (The Earth), a song cycle of six mélodies (1922).

Canteloube composed his first opera, Le mas ("farmstead" in Occitan language), to his own libretto from 1910 to 1913. The three act work won the Prix Heugel in 1925, and was awarded the one hundred thousand francs prize. However, the reaction to this composition by the leaders of the Opéra-Comique in Paris were far less enthusiastic than the jury. After pressure from the publisher, it finally premiered on 3 April 1929, but it was never revived. Vercingétorix, his second opera, in four acts, was inspired by a libretto by Étienne Clémentel, mayor of Riom (Puy-de-Dôme) and Hervé Louwyck on the Gauls’ defeat by Julius Caesar. The Paris Opéra gave the first performance on 22 June 1933, but it was accused of lacking theatricality.

In 1925, Canteloube founded a group called La Bourrée with several young Auvergnats in Paris who were eager to publicize the folklore and the beauty of their home region. Canteloube himself believed that "peasant songs often rise to the level of purest art in terms of feeling and expression, if not in form" ("les chants paysans s’élèvent bien souvent au niveau de l’art le plus pur, par le sentiment et l’expression, sinon par la forme"). He composed several song collections, which include Chants de Haute-Auvergne, albums of songs of Rouergue, Limousin, and Quercy, regional religious songs (Chants religieux d'Auvergne), and L'Hymne des Gaules based on a poem by Philius Lebesque. He also participated in the creation of the Bardic College of Gaul.

In 1941, he joined the government in Vichy France during the Nazi occupation, and wrote in the monarchist newspaper Action Française. He participated in numerous radio broadcasts of French folklore with his "Songs of France" with the tenor Christian Selva. The radio was an ideal vehicle for disseminating regional popular music.

Alongside his career as a composer, Canteloube worked as a musicologist, collecting traditional French folksongs, which were published by Didier and Heugel. He also wrote biographies of Vincent d'Indy (1949) and of his friend Déodat de Séverac (1950).

Canteloube took more than thirty years (1924 to 1955) to complete the compilation of his most admired and famous collection of songs, Chants d'Auvergne. Passionate, sometimes to excess, the songs reflect the landscapes of the Auvergne in lush orchestral colors and have enabled French folklore and rustic melodies to become better known.

He died in Grigny, Essonne, in 1957, aged 78.

Bibliography[link]

• Sadie, Stanley (Ed.) [1992] (1994). The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, Vol. 1, A-D, chpt: "Canteloube (de Malaret), (Marie) Joseph" by Richard Langham Smith, New York: MacMillan. ISBN 0-935859-92-6.
• L.G. Boursiac, Canteloube (Toulouse, 1941)
• Françoise Cougniaud-Raginel, Joseph Canteloube : chantre de la terre 1879-1957 (Béziers, 1988)

External links[link]

• Free scores by Joseph Canteloube at the International Music Score Library Project

Véronique Gens (born April 19, 1966, Orléans, France) is a French soprano. She has spent much of her career recording and performing Baroque music.

Gens studied at the Conservatoire de Paris and won first prize of the school.^[1] Her debut in 1986 was with William Christie and his Les Arts Florissants. She has since worked with Marc Minkowski, René Jacobs, Christophe Rousset, Philippe Herreweghe, and Jean-Claude Malgoire.

While she started out as a Baroque specialist, Gens has also come into demand for roles in Mozart operas, and as an interpreter of songs by Berlioz, Debussy (see also Beau Soir), Fauré and others. Her numerous recordings include many works by Mozart and Purcell, as well as Joseph Canteloube's Chants d'Auvergne and Berlioz's Nuits d'Été.

See also[link]

• Patricia Petibon
• Mireille Delunsch
• Gaëlle Méchaly
• Sandrine Piau
• Natalie Dessay
• Isabelle Poulenard
• Guillemette Laurens
• Noémi Rime

References[link]

External links[link]

• Véronique Gens Discography
• An interview with Véronique Gens on MusicalCriticism.com September
• Véronique Gens at the Internet Movie Database

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