Various people have expressed interest in attending Le Grand Bal de l'Europe,
a.k.a. Gennetines.
While I'm happy to talk about the event at great length,
it seems like a quick web page might provide an easy way to get across some of the basics.
If you want to know more about the music and dances,
check out the page I put together about Bal Folk music and dances.
For 2025, the event will run Friday, 25 July to Friday 8 August.
The theatrical trailer for a movie
filmed at the festival in the summer of 2016
may give you some idea what the event looks like and the energy level of the dances.
On the event web site,
they have some videos
and photos, and
links to the bands and performers.
You can also view the
preliminary 2024 program.
The Gennetines
Grand Bal de l'Europe YouTube channel
has over 150 videos uploaded. They include "ambiance" videos
(with short snippets from various workshops and dances throughout the event)
and others that focus on sessions by individual bands.
You can also check out the Grand Bal de l'Euope Facebook group,
with over 20,000 members.
Perhaps 60 bands, 3500 attendees, 100-200 dance workshops, and maybe only 10-15 Americans. You'll be totally immersed in French Bal Folk music and dancing. Attendees from England, Ireland, Germany, and Scandinavia typically speak English, some dancers from elsewhere might, but don't count on it.
Register on-line,
starting May 1 and by June 30,
with on-line payment (an innovation since I last attended).
2023 prices: €239 for the full 15 days at full price,
€174 for ages 18-24 or €119 for ages 10-17, free for under 10.
€21/day (half price for ages 10-17, reduced for 18-24).
€20 late fee if registering after 15 July (if there's room!)
Historically, folks without accounts in Euros could
register in advance, and pay in cash
upon arrival.
On-line registration and payment
seems likely to make registration much simpler.
Note that registration requires an additional €25 fee for membership
in the association that runs the event.
My impression is that by running the event as a "private event"
"for members only"
that the organizers are able to finesse some national regulations.
Attendees can purchase tickets for meals and drinks
at the main check-in booth for
Euro cash or checks, but NOT credit or debit cards.
(This is the only place where Gennetines deals with cash,
though musicians can sell their materials for cash.)
€10 for a meal ticket (lunch or dinner), €1.50 for a drink ticket.
Breakfast costs two drink tickets, but typically consists of only
coffee, tea, or instant cocoa, hunks of baguette, butter, and applesauce.
At lunch and dinner time, you can buy
soft drinks, cider, wine, cookies, or ice cream bars/cups,
priced in drink tickets.
At about midnight, you can also buy simple soup or sandwiches from the drinks counter.
Lunch and dinner are served "cafeteria style",
with a long line of people entering,
and choices about which items you want.
Main dishes can be meat-heavy, like a big slab of pork,
but there are always sufficient choices for vegetarians.
Choices typically show some number of "points,"
and diners need to have fewer total points that the limit.
Basically, that means you can't get two main dishes,
but you shouldn't worry that you'll go hungry after a meal.
For folks camping out on-site,
grocers visit the camping areas 2-3 times each day.
It's possible to roll out of your tent,
splash some water on your face,
buy a croissant, pan chocolat, or petit quiche,
then walk over to the morning workshops.
Typically, one of the grocers sells organic ("bio") products,
another fairly plain baked goods (baguettes & boules),
and third sells croissants, quiches, and specialty baked goods.
The June newsletter says (after translation by Google):
Waste reduction, responsible consumption, sustainable management
We are consolidating the changes made last year:
- We have eliminated disposable tableware, plastic cups, paper napkins and plastic water bottles.
- We purchased, in the north of France, crockery and glasses that our team of organizers wash with the stainless steel cutlery that we have used for several years.
- Bring one or two cloth napkins, a cup or tumbler, a water bottle (Gennetines water is drinkable) and possibly your own cutlery.
- We are continuing our effort to offer more quality, organic products.
Here's a
link to the full preliminary program for Gennetines 2024.
Every day, you'll find three workshops
lasting two hours on each of the dance floors,
plus a scattering of "dance express" sessions.
Some of the latter seem designed in part
to keep everyone from getting into line for meals at the exact same time.
Most of the workshops are taught exclusively in French.
Typical exceptions are workshops on English ceilidh, Irish sets,
Scandinavian couples dances, German Zwiefachers, American contra dances,
and likely dances from countries without widespread worldwide speaker communities,
like Lithuania.
The workshops typically include many demos; they aren't lectures,
but someone who doesn't understand French (like me)
will miss out on subleties,
and certainly any jokes that the leaders include.
After a few days, you may get some ideas about some instructors you enjoy or wish to avoid.
Almost all workshops feature live music from the excellent participating bands.
Workshops typically carry star ratings:
* - one star or no stars — accessible for all, including newcomers.
** - two star
*** - three star — best for folks with significant dance experience.
Some workshops are clearly marked for new dancers ("Initiation bal folk")
or perhaps
for newcomers ("pour debutantes") --
though those latter ones could be for dance leaders
wanting new material to take home to their communities.
All of the evening dances feature live music.
They take place in a set of tents, erected for the purpose.
All have "decent" wooden dance floors,
but the floors are NOT perfect and polished.
I have danced there in regular street shoes,
and have even in my bicycling shoes.
Usually you'll find at least one floor with a band playing
music of "central France" at any given time
(though this may not be immediately obvious from the program).
The majority of tunes played by such bands will work for dancing
one of four couple dances:
bourrée,
schottische ("Scottish" in French),
waltz, or
mazurka,
or one of exactly two big circle mixers
(Circle Circassien or
Chapelloise).
Bands playing Breton music usually have very accessible dances
like An Dro and
Hanter Dro.
You need not commit to one dance floor or another,
and can freely walk from one tent to another at any time,
checking out the music and dancing to find what suits you best.
I am not a musician, so can't speak to the ability to join jam sessions, or to play music with performers during their down time. I can say that the festival typically has one small tent set up for jamming, and that musicians seem to play occasionally around the lunch tables and in their own campsites.
Do not expect to find an ATM on site.
Get any cash you may need (for meal/drink tickets or CDs)
before you arrive.
Do not expect cell phone coverage.
The French phone service does not provide enough infrastructure
to allow all the cell phones at the event to connect.
(There are probably 100 times as many phones as the network can support.)
You MAY be able to send or receive text messages,
as they require much less of the telephone network,
but even those may encounter substantial delays.
You can find the complete list of camping information on the event web site.
The vast majority of participants camp out on-site.
Space for camping is included with the cost of registration.
The camping areas are plain farmer's fields,
but the event provides bath houses with sinks, flush toilets,
and showers with warm-ish water.
You will not find specific demarked camping spaces;
tents are located fairly close to each other.
Some folks have camper vans, but most use tents.
The camping area is not set up for folks
commuting in and out with their campers,
but for folks who arrive, set up, and remain for the duration of their stay.
Some small fraction of attendees stay off-site and drive in every day.
Sleeping in a car in the parking area is not permitted.
The last time I attended the festival (in 2016),
I went to a French big-box outdoor equipment store
a few days before the festival and bought an inexpensive tent
(€40?), sleeping bag, and pad.
They worked well for me at the festival, and I liked the tent well enough not to just give it away,
but to bring everything home, and have used the tent several times since.
The festival takes place on a family cattle farm
located about
10 km outside the town of Moulins (sur Allier) in the Burgundy region of France.
The town has good connections on the excellent French rail system,
though no TGV service.
You can book tickets in advance through
the official site of the French rail system.
As an example,
I just checked, and see eleven connections between Lyon and Moulins
on a date chosen arbitrarily.
Note that the system has limits on advance bookings.
It appears that you can book trains only about four months in advance.
(Ah, I found a message that says
"Tickets go on sale 2 to 9 months in advance,
so all those who love to plan ahead can save more money.")
It may be possible to book seats using transportation apps
like TrainLine or Omio.
It's possible to get a taxi from the train station out to the festival.
Often you'll see a number of other dancers arriving on your train,
and can share a cab with them to split the cost.
Taxis change different rates at different times of day.
Returning to the grounds after a nice dinner in town will be more expensive
than returing after a daytime shopping trip.
Bicycling is a good option for covering the 10 km distance to town.
These days, Uber or Lyft might be a viable option,
but one I have not explored.
I only speak "tourist French." I can go into a hotel and ask for a room, and in a post office get a box with postage for mailing a package back to the USA, but I can't even come close to having a conversation in French. Even with that substantial limitation, I've been to Gennetines six times, and have enjoyed every trip. I don't get any of the subtleties from the French instructors, and a few of them really expect everyone to understand French, but generally, I can get the gist from the demonstrations. I'm certain that I'd have a very different experience if I could converse with folks in a language other than English.
Weather can be an issue. Typically, it's quite nice, warm by day, but can get chilly by night. Occasionally, a freak heat wave may hit France, driving temperatures way up by day (perhaps 100 F or higher), but the temperatures drop to comfortable ones for sleeping by night. One year, I saw lots of folks attending with big rubber mud boots. Evidently two years previously, there had been huge rainstorms that turned the grounds into sticky mud, and folks were still bringing galoshes two years later. I haven't seen more than light rain in the six years I've attended.