Jacques Brel

"Jacques Brel"
French A2 writing exercise

Gaston is a big fan of the Belgian singer-songwriter.

To learn more about Jacques Brel, click here.

Pay attention to the hints!

Some vocabulary you may want to look up before or during this exercise: "exceptional", "Belgium", "to sing", "the public", "to keep on [doing]", "later", "sensitivity", "lyrics", "a song", "moving (adj. - emotional)".

Written by qualified French expert Céline Pickard PGCE, BA
Last updated: 2023-01-05

I’ll give you some sentences to translate into French

  • I’ll show you where you make mistakes
  • I’ll keep track of what you need to practise
  • Change my choices if you want
Start the exercise
How the test works
You’ll practise: Le Passé Composé (Indicatif), L'Imparfait (Indicatif), Pronom d'objet direct

Here's a preview of the text for the writing challenge, when you're ready click the start button above:

Jacques Brel was exceptional! He was born in Belgium in 1929. When he started to sing in 1950, he was very nervous and the public didn't like him. But he kept on working, and a few years later, he finally became very famous. I love Brel's sensitivity. He wrote beautiful lyrics. His songs are always very moving, I can listen to them for hours!

Clever stuff happening!