Si vous la baisez, comptez quinze (Pierre Passereau)

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(Posted 2020-10-25) CPDL #61022:

Editor: Christopher Shaw (submitted 2020-10-25). Score information: A4, 4 pages, 168 kB Copyright: Personal

Edition notes: Please click on the link for preview/playback/PDF download. Edition offered at original pitch for SATB or transposed down a fourth for ATTB. Modern French underlay.

(Posted 2009-03-26) CPDL #19115: (Finale 2002)

Editor: Benoît Huwart (submitted 2009-03-26). Score information: A4, 3 pages, 63 kB Copyright: Public Domain

Edition notes:

General Information

Title: Si vous la baisez, comptez quinze
Composer: Pierre Passereau

Number of voices: 4vv Voicings: SATB or ATTB
Genre: Secular, Chanson

Language: French
Instruments: A cappella

First published: 1545 in Livre 16: 29 chansons a 4 (Pierre Attaingnant), no. 5
2nd published: 1554 in Premier recueil de chansons (Le Roy & Ballard), no. 8
Description: The rules of Real Tennis explained. The game, particularly popular under Francois I (France) and Henry VIII (England), involved rules for scoring partly dependent upon in which part of the court a given shot had been placed. c.f. reaching bases in Baseball. This conceit was copied by Du Tertre.

External websites:

Original text and translations

French text

Si vous la baisez comptez quinze,
Si vous touchez le tétin, trente.
Si vous avez la motte prise,
Quarante cinq lors se présente.
Mais si vous mettez en la fente,
C'est de quoy la dame à mestier :
Vous gagnez le jeu tout entier.

English translation

Translation by Edward Tambling
If you kiss her, count fifteen,
If you touch her nipple, thirty.
If you have mounted her,
Forty-five becomes the score.
But if you put it in her slot,
This is what the lady does for a living:
You win the entire game.

English translation

(alt. trans. Timmi O'Danaos & Donna Ferrentes)
If you kiss her score fifteen;
Touch a tit, thirty;
Capture the mound [military (siege) metaphor],
you get forty-five.
But if you put what the lady fusses over
into the slot,
Kerching! You win game, set and match.