From Corrèze to the World

Mark Sampson chats to the dynamic French vocal sextet San Salvador during a brief moment at home in south-west France following a whirlwind 18 months of international touring.

From the tiny hamlet in which this group of childhood friends rehearse, you look across verdant, rolling pastures to the Monédière hills on the horizon. This is San Salvador’s territory: a part of the Corrèze, the ‘green country’ of La France Profonde, that’s virtually unknown to tourists. On my way here, I take a detour to look at the village of Saint-Salvadour, where the six members of the exciting polyphonic vocal group grew up together. By minor road from there to the rehearsal space they built together behind the house of Gabriel Durif, the group’s lead voice, you pass nothing but a few sombre looking farms and an occasional timber lorry….

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