Frère Jacques Lyrics

If you are an adult and are learning French for the first time or if you’re a child and are just starting your studies then learning French songs really is the way to go! Ever since I can remember I have loved the song Frère Jacques. If you’re just starting to get into French vocabulary this should be a good starting point as you should already be familiar with the tune and English words of the song.

Lyrics:

Frère Jacques, frère Jacques,
Dormez-vous? Dormez-vous?
Sonnez les matines! Sonnez les matines!
Din, dan, don. Din, dan, don.

English Lyrics:

Are you sleeping? Are you sleeping?
Brother John, Brother John,
Morning bells are ringing! Morning bells are ringing!
Ding, dang, dong. Ding, dang, dong. (Source: Wikipedia)

Here are my notes: Firstly, I’ve always like the name, Jacques, as that was my host father’s name in France and he’s a great guy and fantastic French teacher! On line two you’ll see: Dormez-vous? That’s the verb, dormir (to sleep) in the vous (you plural or formal) form. When you invert vous dormez (you are sleeping) to dormez-vous you get the question: “Are you sleeping?”. On the next line you’ll read: “Sonnez les matines”. Sonner is a verb and it means to ring. Les matines is a word that is not used much in modern french but it means bells. Normally, for bells you’d say “les cloches (f, pl).

If you’d like to practice French a bit then you can go ahead and sing along with the song in the video here!

More French Lessons:

1. Alouette Lyrics
2. En Train De – In The Middle Of
3. Petit Papa Noel

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