Bilingual Songs

Subject: Bilingual Songs
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Mar 09 - 01:31 PM

I'm not thinking of Tete Epaule et Genoux Pieds / head and shoulders knees and toes, but rather something like Marianne s'en va-t-au moulin / Miss Marianne went to the mill, where each line is sung in its own language.

Any others? In other languages, too?

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Mar 09 - 01:37 PM

In Ireland they are known as Macoronis,but they are generally a verse in each language.

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 30 Mar 09 - 01:44 PM

These are generally referred to as macaronics.
There's this thread which reuited me with a Gilles Vigneault recording of I Went To The Market.
It's very common in Scots / Irish song with alternate Gaelic / English lines but Wikipedia lists a host of examples from many bilingual sources.

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: MartinRyan
Date: 30 Mar 09 - 01:49 PM

Click here for the main Mudcat thread on macaronics.

Regards

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Jack Campin
Date: 30 Mar 09 - 02:19 PM

There are some good ones in Hugill - shanties were often multilingual because the crews were. You could get almost any pairing of languages.

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: sian, west wales
Date: 31 Mar 09 - 07:30 AM

There are some Macaronic songs in Welsh/English, sometimes every other line and a few with words interspersed throughout.

A ai di deryn du (will you go, blackbird,)
to my dearest love
O gais fy nghangen gu (o search for my lovely one)
for I'm so deep in love.

Being an example of the first, and Cân Merthyr (Merthyr's Song) combining both in one:

Ye lads all through the country
Gwrnadewch ar hyn o stori. (Listen to this story)
You better go dros ben y graig (Over the rock i.e. jump off a cliff)
Than go with gwraig i'r gwely. (wife to bed)

sian

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: richd
Date: 31 Mar 09 - 08:12 AM

There's also one which Dr Price quotes in the thread on Welsh Drinking songs thread.

"Yr Wyf I Little Collier"

Yr wyf i little collier
Un gweithio underground
the rope will never torri
When I go up and down
Bara menyn when I'm hungry
Cwrw when I'm dry
Gwely when I'm tired
and Nefoedd when I die

Nefoedd when I die
Nefoedd when I die
Gwely when I'm tired
and Nefoedd when I die.


yr wyf i = I am
yn gweithio = working
torri = break
bara menyn = bread and butter
cwrw = beer
gwely = bed
nefoedd = heaven

This is still current, certaily in the Merthyr Valley.

It was also sung in the recent 'Coal House at War' series on BBC Wales.

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 31 Mar 09 - 08:49 AM

Preab San Ol sung by Ciaron Burke in Irish and Luke Kelly in English, alas both gone now.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Artful Codger
Date: 31 Mar 09 - 09:29 PM

"Voulez-vous coucher avec moi": Possibly trilingual, since I have no idea what language the "Gitchee gitchee" part is supposed to be.

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: oldhippie
Date: 01 Apr 09 - 07:27 AM

Somos El Barco - Lorre Wyatt

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Artful Codger
Date: 01 Apr 09 - 03:18 PM

"Alla en el Rancho Grande" is usually sung bilingually in the US, with the English being no attempt at translation from the Spanish.

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Beer
Date: 01 Apr 09 - 03:23 PM

Nous Vivons Ensemble by Gordon Lightfoot.
Beer (adrien)

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Crane Driver
Date: 01 Apr 09 - 06:08 PM

I know several songs in English and Gibberish
Derry down, down, down derry down

Subject: RE: Bilingual Songs
From: Jack Campin
Date: 01 Apr 09 - 06:11 PM

The Chechen national song alternates Chechen couplets with the Arabic refrain "La ilallah il allah". You can find it on Michael Church's compilation "Songs of Defiance" of music from the North Caucasus. (There is a YouTube of it, but the sound is too indistinct to make much out and the translation in the comments is nowhere near in the same league as the one Church provides). It's one hell of a dramatic song.

Neither Church nor the YouTube uploader say who wrote it or when.

Chechen is one of the world's most challenging languages to pronounce if you didn't learn it from birth. I can't see this becoming another Kumbaya.