France Travel Journal. Day 14 (Mon, June 13) - Aix-en-Province

A day exploring the city.  There were no destination sites, but we spend a pleasant day strolling the medival streets of the 'centre'.  It's a prosperous city, with a small square and fountain at every turn.  Kate liked it very much, and it's certainly rival to Toulouse.

Two things we did see were:

the Cathedrale Saint Sauveur -- which was multilayered historically, with visible elements from a Roman forum in the bapistry, a Merovigian segment, a Mediterian romanesque nave, and a gothic entrance.  It also had a unique cloister -- unique because it was never associated with a monastary.

the Musee de Beaux Arts --which contained as many Picasso pieces as I've ever seen in one place.  On the other hand, the Cezanne collection was disappointing: 9 paintings, but none in most mature and recognizable style.

Today's music.

Django Reinhart defined a unique voice for French jazz, but development was interrupted by WWII, and then dominated by the hard bebop Americans (Coltrane, Coleman, etc.).  There was extensive interchange between the two countries, but French jazz didn't seem to develop its own voice until the late sixities.

That voice was based on two things: Classical training,and by association, use of the violin.

Here's an obvious though not very subtle example:

Jacques Loussier playing Bach: