« Il jouait du piano debout » is a song by French singer France Gall (as an aside it’s a great song with a nice soothing melody, plus you can use it to learn some vocabulary). Looking at the title, it might be surprising to see ‘du’ where in English we would just have ‘the’. Il jouait du piano debout means ‘He played the piano standing/upright’ and reveals a difference in the way playing musical instruments is expressed in French. We use the syntax ‘jouer de + instrument’, e.g. jouer de + le piano = jouer du piano’ (for feminine nouns/instruments it will be de la). So, you can say ‘jouer de la guitare, de la batterie (drums), du violon’, etc.

Why is this the case? In French logic, an instrument is a whole, and you can only play some of it (similar to the usage of the partitive with quantities, e.g. Il mange du gateau implies he is eating some cake).

Sports display a similar difference; we say ‘jouer à un sport’ instead of simply ‘play a sport’. E.g. ‘Je joue au tennis le week-end’ – I play tennis on the weekend. If the sport is feminine then ‘à la’ would be employed in place of ‘au’ (this rarely happens as most sports are masculine).

Learn who your real French friends are

Today’s faux ami is the word déception, which on first impression looks to be the word for ‘deception’. This is a great example of the way etymology (word origins) works and how similar-looking words can have completely different origins and meanings. Déception is the nominal (noun) form of the verb décevoir (as evident from its ending, it is a feminine noun). Décevoir means ‘to disappoint’, while déception means ‘disappointment’. How to say deception? Use the word tromperie (also a feminine noun, from the verb tromper which means to deceive or cheat [on] someone).