The french word librairie in modern french means "bookshop" (although in ancient french it meant library) and nowadays a library is a bibliothèqe (f). Modern libraries often lend out more than just books; they lend CDs, DVDs and so on, and so the library in Evron is known as the médiathèque.
They hold breakfast meetings there once a month, (with free coffee and pastries), when they give a themed presentation on their new acquisitions. Our flute quartet was invited to come and play some american music as part of a presentation of new material of american origin. The audience numbered about 30, and covered all ages.
I'm embarrassed to say that I hadn't been in the médiathèque before, and it's really rather good. They have a broad selection of books, CDs and DVDs, and I noticed a few that I would be very interested to read or play. The discovery of the day was the jazz flutist Elena Pinderhughes who appears on a CD called Stretch Music, with trumpetist Christian Scott and others. I also learned that there is new (to me) CD of that peerless singer Eva Cassidy, called Night Bird, to which I shall certainly devote an intense listening, as soon as I can.
I joined the library, it cost 12 euros and I can borrow up to 12 items from each of four different libraries in the area. As can Anita too. Plenty.
2 comments:
Whewn I first moved to France the local town had a bibliotheque which over the years converted itself to a mediatheque: it was well used, ran events - and was cheap to join! Gradually the villages acquired their own lending libraries to supplement the bibliobus which did monthly visits.
Great fears for funding given the amalgamation into a new region - and given the gaping hole in the finances of the old Poitou Charente...
It sounds like you have found a rich source of music to explore :-)
Eva Cassidy was an Angel that fell too soon, her music speaks to the soul. I will look out for the CD that you mention.
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