Alan Stivell
Bard of Breizh, Bard of Brittany
by Steve Winick

For many people in Europe and throughout the world, Alan Stivell is the quintessential performer from Brittany. One of the first and most important players in the Breton folk revival of the 1960s, he acted as a detonator for Brittany's folk boom in the 1970s. He has assimilated techniques and styles from rock and roll, jazz, and, more recently, Afropop and hip hop. In turn, he has influenced players on the French folk scene, guitar heroes in rock and roll, and musicians in all branches of Celtic music. Most importantly, he has done more than anyone in his generation to bring the culture of Brittany, the Celtic region in the west of France, to the attention of the world.

Alan Cochevelou, who would later take the stage name Stivell, was born in the Auvergnat town of Riom. The son of Bretons living outside their home region, he spent much of his youth in Paris. He discovered music early, beginning piano lessons at the age of five, and soon after took up the Celtic harp. The harp was an unusual instrument in Brittany during Stivell's youth; it had been common during the middle ages, but had died out in Breton tradition prior to the 20th century. Some harps were being imported from Britain and Ireland, however, and a movement was starting whose aim was to re-create an older style of Breton harp. One of the people experimenting was Stivell's father, Jord Cochevelou. In the 1950s, Cochevelou used the medieval Irish Brian Boru harp as a model from which to construct a new Breton harp. The very first concert on the brand-new instrument was played by the young Alan Cochevelou.

"It was 1953," Stivell remembered in a June 2000 interview. "I was nine years old. It was the first time the Breton harp was played, in fact, for centuries. It was the beginning of a revival in Brittany. But at the same time it didn't come from totally traditional music. Even the harp itself was not traditional, or was no longer traditional. So it was fusion already, first with classical music." Stivell's whole career in Breton music has been about fusion: fusion with rock and jazz and classical music, but also fusion among the different Celtic music traditions.

Soon after his harping debut, and in keeping with his pan-Celtic ideology, the young Alan Cochevelou took up the Scottish bagpipe, joining a bagad, or pipe band. A 20th-century invention that includes Scottish pipes and drums alongside Breton bombardes (a shawm or rustic oboe), the bagad creates a strong, resonant, and martial music for marching as well as for dancing. Stivell's band was the Paris area's Bagad Bleimor. "In '54 I was in the Bleimor [Boy] Scouts, which was also a pipe band, a bagad," he remembered. "It was only when I got a little older that we decided to no more be boy scouts but just musicians. Bleimor was a part of the Paris Breton associations, so there were many festivals, so we were of course meeting other Bretons and other Breton musicians." Stivell spent a total of about 15 years with the bagad, which he only left after his solo career had taken off in the 1970s. By 1966, Stivell was the band's pipe major, leading Bleimor to the prestigious championship of Brittany.

In the same year, the young Breton decided to try something new: singing. "I took a stage name, Stivell, which was not my family name, and began to sing in different places in Brittany, in France, and already in London. Then, after '68, I left my studies just to play and sing," he explained. Stivell's gentle singing and his brisk, crisp harp playing captivated audiences, and success was fairly immediate. "It was quick enough," he quipped. "I began to sing in '66. In '67 I signed my contract with Phillips." By 1968 he was opening for the Moody Blues in London.

This is an excerpt from issue #91.