If you had any doubts about Montparnasse being stuck in the past, you would have changed your mind last night during the Fete de la Musique with a mere 10,000 gathered at Place Denfert Rochereau for a free concert with Stuck in the Sound.
I’ll be perfectly honest here - big crowds are not my thing - no matter how much I like the music. For me, just hiking over to the stuckinthesound website is much nicer than being jammed elbow to elbow, thigh to thigh, been there done that.
Jammed in the Metro is enough to get the full picture. Nevertheless, I’m glad that Stuck in the Sound chose Denfert Rochereau for their venue. If you missed them this time in Paris, you’ll get a second chance in July for ‘Solidays’ (July 6,7, 
(You can check out their site for the details)http://www.solidays.org/#infos
In the aftermath of the Fete de la Musique, the morning Metro traffic was at the lowest levels that I’ve EVER seen (even on the #1 line where the usual foot traffic was close to non- existent) Even the gypsies were strolling in late for their work day on the popular Metro route.
Some people were still singing today. A woman stopped to sing to one of the local panhandlers. The panhandler looked slightly disgusted. Guess the Fete de la Musique is officially over.
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Hi,
What a hectic life participating to the “Fête de la Musique” ! Mark was very interested to do that, but I felt that at our age it seems to be too much ! Regret not to be as young as you.
The Fete de la Musique has music for all ages and all taste in music - it takes a little time to find out what is going on - and where - or you can just walk around and listen to the street musicians - as we did.
Does anyone know the string quartet or quintet that was playing the Denfert-Rochereau subway? This was back in 2001.
Ronin, I don’t know the name of that particular group, but I’d suggest taking a look at the YouTube Metro musicians. Maybe the group you saw were in the video’Classical Metro Music’? I’ll be posting more about You Tube Metro music this week.
Thanks for the YouTube idea. I had no idea Paris Metro music was so common. People don’t believe me when I tell them my favorite concert was in a subway station. I was fortunate to hear a good quartet that day. They actually made me, and the guy standing next to me, start crying. I was speaking English. He was speaking French. We both understood. I hope to re-live that moment one day.
I was surprised too by the variety of music. Note my Metro alert today regarding taking the Metro on Sunday nights in August.
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