Though of little musical value, a fictitious interest has been long attached to the Ranz des Vaches owing to the surroundings in which they are generally heard.
This note is very characteristic of the Ranz des Vaches passages like the following being repeated and varied almost ad infinitum. It is a curious fact that they are seldom strictly in tune, more particularly when played on the Alpine horn, an instrument in which, like the Bagpipe, the note represented by F is really an extra note between F and F♯.
They are extremely irregular in character, full of long cadences and abrupt changes of tempo. The Ranz des Vaches are very numerous, and differ both in music and words in the different cantons. Ranz has been translated by the English 'rant,' and the French 'rondeau,' and has been derived from the Keltic root 'renk' or 'rank,' which may also be the derivation of reihen, in which case both words would mean the 'procession, or march, of the cows.' Stalder ('Schweizerisches Idiotikon') thinks that reihen means 'to reach,' or 'fetch,' while other authorities say that the word is the same as reigen (a dance accompanied by singing), and derive ranz from the Swiss patois 'ranner,' to rejoice. Several derivations have been suggested for the words ranz and reihen or reigen. RANZ DES VACHES, ( Kuhreihen, Kuhreiqen Appenzell patois Chücreiha), a strain of an irregular description, which in some parts of Switzerland is sung or blown on the Alpine horn in June, to call the cattle from the valleys to the higher pastures.