Thread: German vs. French

I speak French and I love it! It's such a rich, romantic language... I get automatically butterflies in the stomach when I hear French songs. Fauré mélodies, Mon coeur s'ouvre à ta voix etc... But perhaps that is also because I know a handsome French man who sang Fauré so beautifully

So... I voted for French but I like German as well (thanks to schubert's winterreise!)
I'm learning German

German, because I prefer their literature.

Originally Posted by Lenfer

Languages I speak in order of preference:

French, Italian, Spanish, English, Dutch, Flemish, German and lastly Romansh.

I also know a little Yiddish but don't ask me to say anything please. I also did Latin at school but I don't claim to remember it.

I still struggle to just speak English.

Originally Posted by presto

I still struggle to just speak English.

My family are pretty "European". They're all over the place and growing up where I did help.

French is still in the lead I see.

As you can see I'm not bias in anyway.

Europe is nothing but the French/German dynamic, so there can't be one without the other; we necessarily need both. I have the greatest respect for the French but my heart beats in German; the heart wins.

Oh, we were talking about languages, not nation-souls? Well, that's the higher reality that the languages reflect, so my point stays.

I am still undecided... I like German, but French sounds nicer I think. Meh, I'll go with German.

Originally Posted by MaestroViolinist

I am still undecided... I like German, but French sounds nicer I think. Meh, I'll go with German.

For me, the spirit of it works more on me than the sound. French is dripping thought-wise with love, with pastoral thought, and with it's own fair share of other ideas and French culture and history, but German is so heroic, familial, pastoral, jovial, passionate, masculine, harsh, all kinds of other things distinctly German. I'd much rather say "father" or "humor" in German than I'd like to say the same things in French. But I am too biased towards German. Their roots have been laid bare much more by me. Surely the Galts and their neighbors are worth my time, very interesting people, but I'm not there yet. Who in history wasn't interesting? Is there a group that just sat around and didn't think or do anything interesting? But who's to appreciate them all? Maybe time will change this for me, my preference towards German.

Of course, part of it is how damned crazy the ancient Germans were, throwing people into rivers in inane sounding tests of guilt. But the Germans still wanted to know the answer. They had these quirky ideas about what made up a person, what made up the world around us (really, we ought to strike up something about this kind of stuff some time). And then they took whatever was quirky that they liked from Rome, really mainly the quirky stuff. I just love that. They had their heads just screwed on upside down or something. Even Eastern European gypsies weren't as weird as these conquerors of Rome. And their language still reflects that, although a lot of the references are dead. German people today don't know how much sick, hilarious, and sickly hilarious stuff they reference all the time. And the funny expressions they use. Not to mention that it's hard to beat the word schadenfreude. That's an achievement of a word right there.

I'm suddenly reminded of a Blackadder quote: "the Teutonic reputation for brutality is well-founded: their operas last three or four days; and they have no word for "fluffy".... "

Originally Posted by Art Rock

I'm suddenly reminded of a Blackadder quote: "the Teutonic reputation for brutality is well-founded: their operas last three or four days; and they have no word for "fluffy".... "

Das Wort ist "flauschig."

I voted for Schumann.

Originally Posted by Lenfer

Languages I speak in order of preference:

French, Italian, Spanish, English, Dutch, Flemish, German and lastly Romansh.

I also know a little Yiddish but don't ask me to say anything please. I also did Latin at school but I don't claim to remember it.

You speak all the languages I ever wanted to learn and more.

Originally Posted by Xaltotun

Europe is nothing but the French/German dynamic, so there can't be one without the other; we necessarily need both. I have the greatest respect for the French but my heart beats in German; the heart wins.

Oh, we were talking about languages, not nation-souls? Well, that's the higher reality that the languages reflect, so my point stays.

We can do without either.

Yeah - I prefer Latin - definitely more texture for Palestrina Masses and Allegri/Lassus etc.

French next. Then Polish. And then German.

I can speak all of them, except Polish. I do however have a good 'Allo Allo accent in Polish

I don't have a preference for either loanguage . But each language is perfectly suited to the vocal music of whatever composer . Wagner sounds decidedly odd in French or Italian , and there are a number of (mostly) old recordings of famous French and Italian opera singers of the past singing excerpts from Wagner in their native languages , and a number of complete recordings of Italian and French opera sung in Germany by German opera companies in the past . For example, an EMI Nozze di Figaro sung in German conducted by the late Otmar Suitner from Dresden and a live Salzburg one conducted by Furtwangler,also on EMI .
Nowadays, opera cxompanies almost always perform using the original languages, because casting has become very internationalized . It's totally unrealistic to expect Italain singers to learn roles they have performed often in German when they perform in Germany .
The operas of Massenet are perfectly adopted for the French language, those of Verdi and Puccini and Rossini perfectly adopted for th e Italian language etc.
German can sound unpleasant at times, but a lot depends on the individual speaker . For example, Austrian German is much softer and more lilting than the way say, north Germans speak the language .
Nobody could call Austrian German harsh sounding !
Czech is rather weird in that it has some impossible consonant clusters which make it very difficult to pronounce . There's tongue twister in the language which goes like this : Strch prst skrz krk !
This means "stick younger finger down your throat ". No vowels ! The ch is pronounced like the German Bach .
I'm something of an amateur linguist and like to study exotic languages like Turkish, Hungarian, Finnish, Georgian etc .