Barking Dog: July 7, 2022
This Week’s Theme: Non-English Songs
A couple of weeks ago on Twitter, we asked listeners to suggest themes they’d like to hear us cover on the show. If you have any suggestions of your own, head over to @barkingdogckuw on Twitter and let me know! This week’s theme is “non-English songs”, meaning that every song you hear on the show today will be in a language other than English. Sam Doucet, former program director at CKUW suggested that theme. Thanks Sam!
Edwin Lobato, Alfred Campos - Cuatro Caminos
This is from a 1952 album of Spanish and Mexican folk music collected in New Mexico
It was recorded in February of 1951 in Albuquerque, and it’s a cancion, or introspective song
It is said to have been composed by J Alfonso Jiminez
Wade Hemsworth - Envoyons d’l’Avant
A respected Canadian folksinger from Brantford, Ontario
Only wrote about 20 songs during his career, though many of them are so ingrained in Canadian culture that people consider them traditional Canadian folk songs at this point
This is an old lumberjack song from the French settlers who farmed along the St Lawrence River
Wu Fei, Abigail Washburn - Who Says Women Aren’t as Good as Men
Washburn a well-known contemporary banjo player from Illinois
Wu Fei a composer and musician from Beijing who now lives in the US
They met in 2006 and started playing together in the trio The Wu Force in 2011
They released their first album together last year, which combines American and Chinese folk music
This is an excerpt of a famous Henan opera, or yuju, that was performed in 1951 by Chang Xiangyu, a yuju master
Pedro Rocha, Lupe Martinez - Corrido Pensylvanio
From an album of some of the first Mexican-American border music recordings
They were the most popular duo to record in San Antonio in the 20s and 30s
This was recorded in Chicago in 1929, and it’s a farewell love song
Old Man Luedecke - Le Ciel est Noir
From Chester, NS
Off his 2019 album, Easy Money
This is the French version of Bob Dylan’s A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall
Florent Vollant - Kevin Nuna
He’s an Innu musician from Quebec who was part of the popular folk duo Kashtin
This song is off his 2015 album Puamuna
It’s named after Kevin Nuna, a pioneering Innu recording artist from Labrador who was the guitarist in the band Meshikamau
Dan J Morrison - Gaol An T-Seoladair (The Sailor’s Sweetheart)
Off a 1955 album of Songs from Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, which has historically been populated by Scottish Gaelic-speaking communities
The performers on this album were members of the last generation of Scots in Canada to hear and speak Gaelic from birth
Recorded at Briton Cove
Follows the common theme of the faithful sweetheart who fears that her lover might be unfaithful, but wishes him well wherever he is
Tomoya Takaishi - One Man’s Hands
He’s a Japanese folksinger who’s been active since the 1960s
While studying at Rikkyo University, he started singing folk songs that he translated from Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger recordings to earn money for school expenses
That’s a song by the folk musician Pete Seeger and the scientist, physician, and pacifist anarchist Alex Comfort
David Nzomo - Mageuzo Tupu (Changes Only)
He’s a musician from Kenya who recorded six albums of traditional Kenyan songs for Folkways records while he was studying at Columbia University in the 1960s and 70s
His early musical gigs were at local events like dances and wedding parties
Off his 1973 album African Politics: More Songs from Kenya
This song, which is in Swahili, talks about the process of going from pronounced political colonization into subtle political, economic, and cultural colonization, with the expectation of gaining freedom and dignity
Nzomo states that the process “may eventually be recognized as perpetual slavery”
Ian & Sylvia - V’le Le Bon Vent
Ian and Sylvia Tyson from Toronto
This song was sung by the Voyageurs over 300 years ago to keep pace as they paddled and to keep spirits up during 18 hour days
The title translates to “Here Comes the Good Wind”
Alash Ensemble - Karachal
From their 2017 album Achai
Alash are an ensemble of Tuvan musicians, who are an ethnic group indigenous to Siberia and now living in Russia, China, and Mongolia
They began playing together in 1999 while they were all studying music
The title of the song translates to “Common Man”
It compares the common man’s life to the feudal bureaucrats’
Pete Seeger - Ragaputi
Seeger was a folk singer and an activist who advocated for Civil Rights, environmental causes, and peace through his music
This is off his 1965 album of songs from one of his world tours
This is an Indian song that was apparently one of Gandhi’s favourite Hindu hymns
Christine Fellows - Un Canadien Errant
She’s a well-known Manitoban musician who’s been performing since 1993, both with groups like Helen, the Mountain Goats, and Old Man Luedecke, and on her own
This is from her 2011 album Femmes de chez nous
Song written in 1842 by Antoine Gérin-Lajoie after the Lower Canada Rebellion of 1837–38
Boubacar Traoré - Minuit
He’s a Malian musician who became very popular in his country as a symbol of their recent independence in the early 1960s
His popularity declined through the 1970s, but interest in his music was revived in 1987 after a TV appearance
A British record producer discovered a recording of one of his performances during that time, and he signed a record deal, releasing his first album in 1990
Since then, he’s released 10 more albums, had a film made about him, and has toured internationally
This song is from his 2011 album Mali Denhou
Taj Mahal and the Hula Blues Band - No Na Mamo
Grammy-award-winning musician from New York City with a career spanning over 50 years
The Hula Blues Band are a Hawaiian band
That one is off the 1998 album Sacred Island
That song is in Hawaiian, and the title translates to “For the Children”
Tony Schwartz - Austrian Song
He was an agoraphobic sound archivist who spent much of his life documenting the sounds of his neighbourhood in New York City, though he also collected recordings from around the world by corresponding with international musicians
This one is off his 1958 album The World in My Mail Box
Makambale Brothers - Migolo Migolo Ndalama
This is off an album of home-made banjo and guitar music from southern and central Malawi
The Makambale Brothers mix reggae with traditional music played on homemade instruments
Lisa LeBlanc, Patrick Bourgeois - Donne-moi ma chance
This is off a 2014 album of French-language improbable duos
LeBlanc a New Brunswick musician
Bourgeois was a Quebecois musician, known as a member of the band Les B.B.
The song was written by Hal David and Burt Bacharach, and translated to French by Andre Salvet
Atis Indepandan - Gade Mache Ti Peyi Mouin (Look What’s Going On!)
Off an album of Haitian protest songs released in 1975 during the repressive reign of Jean-Claude Duvalier
The name of the group “Atis Indepandan,” means “independent artists” in Haitian Creole
They were a New York-based group that played traditional Haitian troubadour music with contemporary American and Brazilian influences
The liner notes for this song state, “The bourgeoisie has tried to make us believe we are incapable of any thought by refusing to build schools for our people. We have one of the highest rates of illiteracy because of this policy. They also try to sow ideas of racial inferiority by skin colour, and myths about women, to keep us from building the unity we need. The people are learning to throw off these lies.”
Les Filles de Illighadad - Achibaba
They’re a Tuareg band from a village in the Sahara Desert in Niger
They were formed by Fatou Seidi Ghali, who is believed to be the first professional female Tuareg guitarist
Since releasing their first album in 2016, they’ve toured internationally and released 2 more albums
That one is from their debut self-titled album
Lus Mangi Grin Neks String Band - Sadness
Off a 1999 album of 25 years of selected field recordings from a rainforest community in Papua New Guinea
They were the first string band to form at Sibalema village
Their name refers to the short-necked green-label bottles of South Pacific brand beer, an exotic item in the region, and references the outsider, renegade identity many young men in the string band scene would try out when they returned to the region after time away
This is a New Year’s song, created to remind everyone who had gathered of the year that was passing
Olina Asgeirsson Struthers - A Song of Summer
From an album of Saskatchewan songs collected by Barbara Cass-Beggs and released in 1963
The first Icelandic immigration to Canada was in 1875, when a small group settled in Gimli
The singer’s maternal grandmother was part of that group, and arrived in the country as a small child
The singer’s father came to Winnipeg directly from Iceland right before WWII, and homesteaded in Mozart, Saskatchewan
One of the major Icelandic social events in Mozart was the first day of summer, when this song was usually sung
It talks about how beautiful the world is in the summer
Agnes Nanogak - Agnes Nanogak’s Song
Off an album of Inuit music from 1983
She was an influential Inuk visual artist from Ulukhaktok (oo-luke-hak-took), Northwest Territories, and part of the first generation of artists involved in the local printmaking cooperative
Sebastion Wilson, Henrici Anderson - DuPali Padaling
From a 1981 album of music of the Miskitu people of Honduras and Nicaragua recorded by New York artist and designer David Blair Stiffler
Unfortunately, because Stiffler was not trained in folklore fieldwork, we don’t get much context beyond that in the liner notes for the recording, and we know nothing about the men who perform the song, aside from their names
We don’t even have a literal translation of the song, though we know it’s about a boy asking for a girl’s hand in marriage
Phyllis Nafuna - Tulo, Tulo
Off an album of music from the Jewish people of Uganda from 2002
A popular lullaby
The narrator is a babysitter, who sings, “sleep, sleep, take the child. If you don’t, then you are a witch! I want to go dancing, change my life. You only live once.”
Ensemble Hilka - Provedu la Rusalochky (Early Summer Song)
From a 2015 album that presents the sketch of a ritual year in songs that would have been performed in typical Polissian villages for centuries before the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986
It was directed by Yevhen Yefremov, an ethnomusicologist and singer who began field expeditions into the Chernobyl Zone in the 1970s
The rusalki, spirits of waking dead girls, were believed to make nature grow, but could also bring trouble to the village
The women would urge the rusalki back to the cemetery from the village and fields when the wheat fields began to sprout
The lyrics translate to, “I will lead the rusalki to the river’s ford, and then I’ll return home alone… Hey, rusalki, here is a sprig of herbs, don’t come to me in my dreams”
Luz Morales - Leron, Leron Sinta (My Dear Little Leron)
This is from an album of folk songs from the Philippines from 1960, sung by the Filipino soprano Luz Morales
Wataru Takada & the Hilltop Stringband - Rye Whiskey
He was a Japanese folk musician who came from a family of artists and activists, and who was active in the Kansai folk movement which began in the late 1960s
In 1966, music critic Kazuo Mitsuhashi introduced him to American folk music, and he sent a letter to Pete Seeger while considering studying folk music in the US
He learned banjo and worked towards becoming a folksinger while still attending high school
He also maintained contact with Pete Seeger, who he met after Seeger gave him a concert ticket for one of his shows in Japan
He remained active in the folk scene in Japan and performed with well-known artists like Haruomi Hosono
That version of Rye Whiskey was from the 1977 album Bourbon Street Blues, recorded with The Hilltop Stringband, which he formed with Junpei Sakuma
The album was produced by Hitoshi Komuro, who we’ve played on the show before
N’Gou Bagayoko - Kulu
He’s the guitarist for his wife Nahawa Doumbia, one of the best-known female singers from the Wassoulou region in South Mali
He first began playing guitar around 1970 when he was in his early 20s
That one is from his 2005 album of the same name, and his daughter sings on the recording
Isabel Parra - Porque los Pobres no Tienen (Because the Poor Have Nothing)
That is from a 1970 album of protest songs from Latin America
Isabel Parra is a Chilean folksinger who began her recording career at the age of thirteen with her mother, the folklorist Violeta Parra
This is her mother’s song, and the title translates to Because the Poor Have Nothing
Patricia Pasieka - In the Carpathian Hills
Another one from the 1963 album of Saskatchewan folk songs
It’s a Ukrainian folk song, and the singer was about 13 when she recorded it
Malcolm Angus McLeod - Mo Dhachaidh (My Home)
Off a 1956 album of folk music from Nova Scotia, recorded by the folklorist Helen Creighton
McLeod was an old friend of Creighton’s, and recorded this song for her at a Gaelic festival held on Cape Breton island every summer that featured competitions in fiddle, bagpipe playing, singing, and highland dancing
It’s a song about a woman who married and had a little house that she loved because, though it wasn’t a castle, it was a home
Kaia Kater - Ti Chagrin
Based in Toronto
Off her 2016 album Nine Pin
Florence Davidson - Tsimshian Song
This is from an album of Haida music recorded by the musicologist Ida Halpern and released in 1987
Halpern was originally from Austria, but arrived in Canada in 1944 to flee Nazism
She’s known mainly for her work with the First Nations people of British Columbia, which she conducted at a time when the government was working against efforts to celebrate and preserve Indigenous cultures in Canada
Reading her biography, it seems as though her work reflected more recent efforts for reciprocal relationships between ethnographers and the people whose work they study, which was pretty unusual for an ethnographer working in the 40s and 50s
She also seems to have built relationships enough to be entrusted with these songs, which were largely withheld from people outside of the communities from which they came
That was partially a response to Haida visual art being exposed by European missionaries in the 19th century, which understandably caused Haida elders to more firmly protect their creative heritage from western influence
At the same time, it’s noted that Halpern’s work is criticized for its “cultural material”, probably meaning the contextual information for the music, including misspellings and improper citation of the songwriters
Her work on the music itself is described as “flawless” though, and her contributions and many recordings are extremely valuable for the preservation of these older songs, though her work has been largely overlooked by anthropologists, folklorists, and ethnomusicologists even in recent years
This song was given by the Tsimshian people to the Haida people
Afel Bocoum - Jeeny
He’s a Malian musician and agricultural advisor who began his musical career in 1968 at the age of thirteen as a member of Ali Farka Toure’s group ASCO
He started his own group, Alkibar, in the early 1980s as a way to communicate with people about irrigation and water
This song is from his debut album from 1999, also called Alkibar, which was recorded in an abandoned school near his hometown over six days
Gerard Delorier, Bob Hill - Ma Femme Avait un Grand Chapeau
Off a 1956 album of songs and dances from Quebec
Unspecified - Luksampati (Song of Grief and Courage)
From a 1976 album of Songs of the Philippine National Democratic Struggle, which protests Ferdinand Marcos’ military dictatorship and American imperialism’s role in supporting his regime
That song was adapted from a poem by Amado Hernandez, written in memory of Enrique Santa Brigida, an activist killed by the Marcos fascist army in 1970
Elisabeth Landreneau - Saute crapaud
From a 1977 album of Cajun music
This is a widespread tune among the French community in Louisiana
It’s a joke song, often sung to children
While the words are original to Louisiana, the tune comes from an old French country dance
Jean Carignan - Medley, G Scott Skinner
Carignan born in Levis, Quebec
Made a member of the Order of Canada in 1974 as “the greatest fiddler in North America”
