Etienne

From: News Views Magazine
How many students do you think would willingly attend rock concerts that focused on French and Spanish grammar and vocabulary? On Friday October 6th... students did just that and the performances were far from boring! Steven Langlois (aka Etienne) is a teacher from Ontario who is regarded in Canada as the "Eminem of Children's music." His loud and energetic shows use compelling beats and various musical genres to repeat and reinforce grammatical structures...
It's no wonder he was honored with Canada's Artist of the year.
Many world language teachers have used his CDs and videos in their classrooms. The audience (grades 7-12) was easily engaged with both Etienne's music and charismatic styles. Within minutes the students were jumping around yelling out and singing. The only reported downside to the concerts came from those who had Etienne's songs stuck in their heads days after the concert.

From: Anchorage Daily News
More than 1,400 students adn teachers in Anchorage School District French and Spanish language programs attended a concert by Etienne on Oct. 6th, 2006. Etienne is the stage name of Steven Langlois, a teacher from LaSalle, Ontario (Kennedy Collegiate Institute, Greater Essex County District School Board) who has been performing all around the world since 1993. He's received numberous awards including 2003 and 2004 "Canadian Artist of the Year." - News Views Magazine / Anchorage Daily News

"Étienne was wowing Winnipeg school kids at Pantages Playhouse Theatre today... His music is unique because while students are being entertained they are also learning literacy and language skills." - CKY, CTV Winnipeg

Over 1,000 students from the Pittsburgh area were on their feet, dancing, clapping and singing in French... Concepts that many students find difficult to grasp with traditional teaching methods are more easily learned through Etienne’s music. - The Reporter, Pittsburgh

Charismatic... unbelievable.... students are actually excited about learning grammar.
- The Hamilton Spectator

He is dubbed the Eminem of Children’s Music because his unique blend of music wins over audiences. - The Windsor Star

“Parents are impressed and grateful to see their children enhance their language skills, but have fun doing it.” - Shoreline Weekly

Local students converged on the Bowes Family Crystal Gardens yesterday for what was being called a once-in-a-lifetime event.
Grande Prairie played host to Frenchstock, a French concert providing students with an opportunity to experience francophone language and culture. Shows on the current Frenchstock tour are geared toward core French students in Grades 4-8, and French immersion students from Grades 1-6.
The event was headlined by Étienne and Beebo, two well-known children’s artists. Étienne, who is also a teacher, has twice been voted Canada’s favourite children’s artist of the year at the Canadian Music Week awards.
Beebo has produced nine albums and performs regularly for kids and families at concerts, festivals, schools and private engagements.
Also appearing with Frenchstock are Jacquot, Zoleo, Poutine and magician Marc Tardif.
Étienne has done a lot of shows throughout Alberta, but this was his first visit to Grande Prairie.
“We’re really excited to be here,” he said.
‘REALLY BLESSED’
“We’re really blessed. No matter where we go, all over the world, we get the same reaction, so it’s really cool.
More than 2,200 students showed up for two shows yesterday, a staggering number that Lesley Doell, the French language consultant at the French Language Resource Centre, was very pleased with.
“That’s just fabulous,” she said. “Two different shows and it gets them enthused for learning French as a second language and shows them it can be fun and educational at the same time.”
Schools from four different school divisions – and one school from B.C. – bused students to the event to get a taste of French culture and entertainment.
“Not every child can go to Quebec or New Brunswick or go to France, but what we can do is bring the culture here and let them know that it’s really enriching to learn a second language,” Doell said. “It gives you so much. I’ve never heard anyone who says ‘I regret being bilingual.’ ”
Étienne sang songs like ‘Pourquoi Take French,’ a rap song about a man meeting a French girl who asked him if he spoke French. Not knowing what to say in return, the man went and learned the language. The singer also did a song about verbs, something Doell found very beneficial.
“He teaches in French, but who does a song about verbs?” she said.
“He can do it and actually make it fun, and he’s got them moving and they need that. They need that tactile, kinesthetic stuff at the same time to get really enthused.”
It’s important that kids learn, but that they’re also able to have fun at the same time, said Étienne.
“Kids, ultimately it doesn’t matter who they are, they just want to have fun, so that’s what we give,” the performer said. “We give them a really good time and what they sometimes don’t realize is that they’re learning a lot.”
A lot of students said they weren’t sure what to expect, or that they expected something boring. At the end of the show, they were all raving about the performance and Étienne said that means a lot.
“We get that comment a lot, that students expect probably an older gentleman with a guitar, sitting on a stool and telling stories and singing folk songs,” he said. “And then they come here, and I’m labelled in the press as the Eminem of children’s music, and they come here and find out why. I’m loud and that’s what they like, so they get really excited.”
Scott Power, a Grade 7 student from St. Clement Catholic school, said the show was awesome. “I was expecting little kid stuff but it was pretty cool,” he said. “The best part was going up on stage and him choosing people.”
Power’s schoolmate, Ryan Cloutier, also in Grade 7, said he had a lot of fun and liked watching his friend go up on stage. “I liked going up (at the end) and doing that song, and watching Ryan go up on stage and do the Macarena.”
Garret Skarberg, a Grade 5 student from Robert W. Zahara public school, was one of those students with lower expectations.
“I was expecting someone playing a guitar, maybe a really big song that lasted 15 minutes, but there were plenty of small songs. It was amazing,” he said. “I liked when the clown came out and the last part where we started singing about directions.”
Doell said federal funding really helped and that it is important to have money to spend on cultural events for the students.
“It’s very important for them to come up here. It’s just taken off more than we ever thought it would,” she said. “The cultural side is so important. When you’re learning a language you also learn the culture and you’ve got to be able to bring the two together.”
Doell said it was clear a lot of students had done so and that it really added to the experience.
“It creates more of a passion and enthusiasm for learning French and actually for learning any second language,” she said. “It’s important that they see the benefit of it and they see also that they’re part of a much larger group. They’re not the only ones learning French here in the Grande Prairie area.”
Ultimately, the goal is that the students take the energy that was created at the event back to their classrooms, said Étienne.
“Hopefully they will ask their teachers to sing, ‘can we do that song or that song,’ and that can be infectious,” he said. “They’ll start to learn more and feel more comfortable with the language of French.
For more information, check out www.frenchstock.ca
cmills@bowesnet.com Article ID# 1543632
- Grande Prairie Herald-Tribune

All the Fairview homies, the Albion, the Highland Park, the Garibaldi and the Maple Ridge homies, they were all down with Etienne. And they don't play around.

If you stink, they'll tell you. If your rhymes are wack, they'll let you know.

Etienne, which translates into Steven in French, gyrated his hips and maneuvered his lips in a way that made all the girls scream. Even the boys let loose.

"I love your towel," yelled several different girls.

The pink, purple and turquoise beach towel played the role of handkerchief at the beginning of the show and graduated into a bath robe of sorts by the time Etienne finished.

There are very few performers who sweat as much as Etienne but it goes with the territory when your game is keeping young kids interested. It's gotta be high energy when you're an edu-rocker.

Keeping them interested all the way through an hour-long performance is tough. Who wouldn't be skeptical if their teacher told them they'd be listening to a French rapper from Windsor Ontario?

He's even been dubbed by media as the children's version of Eminem, but only because of his skin colour.

Although it's nothing but a nice floury lie to think that these students Etienne - aka Steven Langlois - is performing for aren't familiar with the violent, over-the-top lyrics of mainstream rappers, they all seem to appreciate what he's about.

"Kids like the fact that I have that edge," said Langlois. "They come to the show expecting some guy sitting on a stool."

After one of his shows in West Philadelphia, Langlois was told by a teacher that the kids were blown away his show.

"To them you're as cool as Snoop Dogg and Notorious BIG, and these kids know their rap," said the teacher.

An Etienne show is all about interacting with the audience. Mostly it's high-fiving the kids or getting the crowd to jump around but sometimes he throws in a little something for the teachers.

On Tuesday he performed in Burnaby and as usual he did a tribute to the Backstreet Boys, a sappy, French love song that at a normal show would make even the most romantic woman hurl.

Only this time he was invited onto the lap of a teacher who decided that she was going to be the one making the moves. He played along for a few seconds of awkward intimacy but then cut the act and went back to the show.

That must have been kind of nice, right?

"Personally, no," said Langlois. "But I would never tell her that."

Langlois is a happily married man with two kids who has taken a sabbatical from his teaching job at Herman Secondary in Windsor to embark on a world tour as Etienne.

The tour started in the beginning of February and will end in August with stops in New Zealand and Australia.

Although he's sold tens of thousands of CDs in three languages - English, French and Spanish - and admits he could have left his teaching job two years into it (financially speaking), he's been able to balance both the music and the classroom work.

After all, the two go hand-in-hand.

The 34-year-old Langlois, is a trained vocalist (Royal Conservatory) who has been singing for most of his life. He started using his music as a teaching tool back in teacher's college and now that he's taught for 12 years he still uses music to educate his students.

Grammar, verb conjunction, prefixes, suffixes, adjectives, vowels, he teaches it all through music. But not all the time.

"Contrary to what people may believe, I don't use music all the time," said Langlois.

His music has been recognized by the Canadian Music Week Indies Awards - he won favorite children's artist last year and won children's album of the year in 2003.

And apparently he's also changed a few lives, or so he's been told. Although he uses the comments on his promotional kit, he laughs after pondering the thought.

"God can change your life," said Langlois. "I don't know about some French educational rapper."

We'll just say he's good at what he does.

- Maple Ridge News

Twelve years ago Steven Langlois was a teacher in Ontario, Canada.

Today he is an award-winning hard rock/rap artist, named Etienne.

Never heard of him?

It’s probably because he performs in French, using music as a motivational tool to help spread the language.

Etienne took to the stage in Dunedin yesterday in front of an audience of 350 high school French pupils, punctuating his performance with cries of “come on” and “you guys are great”.

The mostly female audience, lapped up his antics as he postured, rapped and howled around the Bayfield Auditorium. Some screamed, some gave him high fives and others simply waved placards towards the stage.

Etienne said in North America they call him the children’s Eminem but there were no swear words, no dwarfs and no drug-taking at this show.

“I’m loud and obnoxious but that’s where it ends,” he said.

An educator rather than an aggravator, 12 years ago the languages teacher wrote songs for his pupils, in an effort to help them understand verbs.

“A teacher found out about these songs and encouraged me to record them. I released an album, sold tens of thousands of copies and got concert requests from all around the world.

“I’m pretty blessed.”

He has won two Canadian MTV awards for his music but manages to stay grounded during his globetrotting lifestyle.

Backstage debauchery is out.

“I’ve brought my wife and kids with me this time – and I go back to being a teacher when I return to Canada. I’m lucky the school board is so supportive.” Using music appealing to today’s youth goes a long way to helping them remember French, he said.

“You go to most education shows and there’s a guy sitting there on a stool with an acoustic guitar.

“That’s not me. I like loud, in-your-face stuff. I grew up listening to metal and that’s what I like.

“They seem to like it too. It sticks in their head.”
- Otago Daily Times (New Zealand)

Teenagers have the uncanny ability to sniff out a phony, especially one who uses a hip and stylish package to push education on them.

Teenagers are a sly bunch and they know when they're being had. So, Windsor singer/songwriter Steven Langlois knows he has to be straight with teens if he wants them to keep turning up to his educational music concerts.

"I can't explain it," said Langlois, 34, who goes by the stage name Etienne. "I'm honest with who I am, so maybe that's why the kids respect me."

An award-winning musician, Etienne brings his blend of hip-hop and rock music rife with educational lyrics to the Living Arts Centre for a concert this Monday. Tickets to the Hammerson Hall show cost $6. Call 905-306-6000. Show time is 1 p.m.

A high school French teacher, Etienne began using music as a way to get through to some of his more reluctant students 12 years ago. Claiming he's no Weird Al Yankovic, Etienne writes all his music and lyrics that teach grammar skills in English, French and Spanish.

"I knew music was a heavy motivation for teens," said Etienne, who said he has been described as the 'Eminem of children's music.' "

The kids go absolutely nuts at the shows. It's the craziest thing. But the music does have an edge and it's in your face."

A staple at the Canadian Music Week's The Indies Awards, Langlois was nominated for Favourite Children's Artist this year (which he lost) but won in the same category in 2004. In 2003, he took home the trophy for Children's Album of the Year.

For more information, visit www.educorock.com
- The Mississauga News