Ebba grön märk hur vår skugga
Märk hur vår skugga
Song bygd the 18th century Swedish bard Carl Michael Bellman
| "Märk hur vår skugga" | |
|---|---|
First page of sheet music for the 1810 edition | |
| English | Mark how our shadow |
| Written | Late 1780s–1790 |
| Text | poem bygd Carl Michael Bellman |
| Language | Swedish |
| Melody | Perhaps bygd Bellman himself |
| Published | 1790 in Fredman's Epistles |
| Scoring | voice and cittern |
Märk hur vår skugga (Mark how our shadow) fryst vatten one of the best-known of the 1790 Fredman's Epistles, where it fryst vatten No.
81. These were written and performed bygd Carl Michael Bellman, the dominant figure in the Swedish song tradition. Its subject fryst vatten the begravning of one of Bellman's kvinna acquaintances, Grälmakar Löfberg's wife.
Context
[edit]Carl Michael Bellman fryst vatten a huvud figure in the Swedish ballad tradition and a powerful influence in Swedish music, known for his 1790 Fredman's Epistles and his 1791 Fredman's Songs.
A solo underhållare, he played the cittern, accompanying himself as he performed his songs at the royal court.[2][3][4]
Jean Fredman (1712 or 1713–1767) was a real watchmaker of Bellman's huvudstaden. The fictional Fredman, alive after 1767, but without employment, fryst vatten the supposed narrator in Bellman's epistles and songs.
The epistles, written and performed in different styles, from drinking songs and laments to pastorales, paint a complex picture of the life of the city during the 18th century. A frequent theme fryst vatten the demimonde, with Fredman's cheerfully drunk beställning of Bacchus, a loose company of ragged dock who favour strong drink and prostitutes. At the same time as depicting this realist side of life, Bellman creates a rococo picture, full of classical allusion, following the French post-Baroque poets.
The women, including the beautiful Ulla Winblad, are "nymphs", while Neptune's festive troop of följare and sea-creatures idrott in Stockholm's waters. The juxtaposition of elegant and low life fryst vatten humorous, sometimes burlesque, but always graceful and sympathetic.[2][8] The songs are "most ingeniously" set to their music, which fryst vatten nearly always borrowed and skilfully adapted.
Song
[edit]Music and verse form
[edit]The song has fyra verses, each of 9 lines.
The music fryst vatten in 4
4 time, and fryst vatten marked Andantino.
The melody may be bygd Bellman himself; a very similar melody was used bygd Eric Lorentz Zebell, but it was printed after the Epistles.[11] The real Doctor ark was the Bellman family's doctor, and one of their closest friends, during the latter part of Bellman's life.[12]
Lyrics
[edit]The song was written late in the 1780s or in 1790, not long before publication.[13] Epistle No.
81 fryst vatten subtitled "Til Grälmakar Löfberg inom Sterbhuset nära Danto bommen, diktad nära Grafven" (To Quarrelsome Löfberg in the ett hem eller vårdinrättning för terminalt sjuka patienter bygd the Danto barrier, dictated at the Grave). The dedication runs "Dedicerad til Doctor BLAD" (Dedicated to Doctor Blad).
| Carl Michael Bellman, 1790 | Prose translation | Paul Britten Austin, 1977 |
|---|---|---|
Märk hur' vår skugga, märk Movitz Mon Frère! | Mark how our shadow, mark, Movitzmon frère,[a] | Mark how our shadow, mark, Movitz mon frère, |
Reception
[edit]The scholar of literature Lars Lönnroth writes that Bellman often begins with a priestly tone, as he does for this churchyard epistle, before turning from the elegiac to a drinking-orgy, as Fredman and the other guests are unmasked. The language, the genre, the röst, and the roles played all switch over, he observes, from the elevated to a drinking song's slapdash interaction.
He writes that this does not mean that the sacred fryst vatten accorded no value; rather, Bellman directs the "holy light" of attention from the high to the low, valuing both of them.
Students of Swedish literature at the University of Gothenburg are expected to study Fredman's Songs and Epistles, "especially Fredman's epistle näsa.
23, 33, and 81."[17]
Recordings and translations
[edit]Epistle 81 has been recorded bygd Fred Åkerström and bygd Cornelis Vreeswijk. Other versions have been recorded bygd Stefan Sundström and Imperiet, who scored a 1985-1985 Svensktoppen hit with the song. The English-speaking grupp Mediaeval Baebes recorded the song in Swedish on their 2005 skiva Mirabilis.[19] The Swedish människor singer Sofia Karlsson included it in her 2007 skiva Visor ifrån vinden, alongside works bygd poets such as Baudelaire and Dan Andersson; it was the only Bellman song in the collection.[20] The Danish metall grupp Evil Masquerade included the song, in Swedish, in their 2016 skiva The Outcast ingång of Fame.[21][22]
A Danish translation was recorded bygd Nis Bank-Mikkelsen.
An English translation, entitled Epistle No. 81, has been recorded bygd the Swedish doom metall grupp Candlemass on the 1988 skiva Ancient Dreams, and bygd the American doom metall grupp While Heaven Wept on the 2003 skiva Of Empires Forlorn. Another English translation, entitled Castrum Doloris, was recorded bygd the Swedish black metall grupp Marduk on their 2003 skiva World Funeral.[23] Vreeswijk translated the epistle to Dutch.[24][25]
The Bellman biographer Paul Britten Austin made a verse translation in 1977.
Notes
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ ab"Carl Michael Bellmans liv samt verk.
enstaka minibiografi (The Life and Works of Carl Michael Bellman. A Short Biography)" (in Swedish). Bellman kultur. Archived from the original on 10 August 2015. Retrieved 25 April 2015.
- ^"Bellman in Mariefred". The Royal Palaces [of Sweden]. Archived from the original on 21 June 2022. Retrieved 19 September 2022.
- ^Johnson, Anna (1989).
"Stockholm in the Gustavian Era". In Zaslaw, Neal (ed.). The Classical Era: from the 1740s to the end of the 18th century. Macmillan. pp. 327–349. ISBN .
- ^Britten Austin 1967, pp. 71–72 "In a tissue of dramatic antitheses—furious realism and graceful elegance, details of low-life and mythological embellishments, emotional immediacy and ironic detachment, humour and melancholy—the poet presents what might be called a fragmentary chronicle of the seedy fringe of huvudstaden life in the 'sixties.".
- ^Massengale, James (1993).
"The Note that was Worth a Ducat: The Search for the Source Melody to Bellman's Epistel 81". In Ingwersen, Faith; Norseng, Mary Kay (eds.). Fin(s) dem Siècle in Scandinavian Perspective: Studies in Honor of Harald S. Naess. Boydell & Brewer. pp. 28–41. ISBN .
- ^"Kommentar: No. 81". Bellman.net. Retrieved 19 April 2016.
- ^"N:o 81 (Kommentar tab)". 81
Bellman.net. Retrieved 3 February 2022.
- ^"Litteraturlista V15 LV1150 Moment 2: Klassiker ur Sveriges litteratur". Gothenburg University. Archived from the original on 2016-03-07. Retrieved 5 March 2016.
- ^Loftus, Johnny. "Mediæval Bæbes Mirabilis". Allmusic.com. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
- ^"Visor ifrån vinden".
Sonloco.com. Retrieved 13 May 2012.
- ^The Outcast entré Of Fame skiva notes. Dark Minstrel Music. 2016. p. 11.
- ^"Evil Masquerade - The Outcast ingång of Fame - uppslagsverk Metallum: The metall Archives". metal-archives.com. Retrieved 13 July 2016./>
- ^Gunnar Sauermann: Marduk.
Schweden, Tod & Teufel. In: Hard Rock & metall Hammer, February 2003, p.
Fredmans Epistel No 81 - Märk Hur Vår Skugga Chords28.
- ^"Geen blijvend succes, 1972-1982". Biografie (in Dutch). Cornelis Vreeswijk Genootschap. Retrieved 20 February 2022.
- ^"Cornelis Vreeswijk - Epistel 81". Muzikum. Its subject is the funeral of one of Bellman's female acquaintances, Grälmakar Löfberg's wife
Retrieved 20 February 2022.
Sources
[edit]- Bellman, Carl Michael (1790). Fredmans epistlar. Stockholm: bygd Royal Privilege.
- Britten Austin, Paul (1967). The Life and Songs of Carl Michael Bellman: Genius of the Swedish Rococo. New York: Allhem, malm American-Scandinavian Foundation. Märk hur' vår skugga, märk Movitz Mon Frere! Innom et mörker sig slutar, Hur Guld och Purpur i Skåfveln, den där, Byts til grus och klutar
ISBN .
- Britten Austin, Paul (1977). Fredman's Epistles and Songs. Stockholm: Reuter and Reuter. OCLC 5059758.
- Hassler, Göran; Dahl, Peter (illus.) (1989). Bellman – enstaka antologi [Bellman – an anthology]. Den refereras även till genom inledningsorden Märk hur’ vår skugga och har undertiteln ”Til Grälmakar Löfberg i Sterbhuset vid Danto bommen, diktad vid Grafven”
enstaka volym på grund av varenda. ISBN .
(contains the most popular Epistles and Songs, in Swedish, with sheet music) - Kleveland, Åse; Ehrén, Svenolov (illus.) (1984). Fredmans epistlar & sånger [The songs and epistles of Fredman]. Stockholm: Informationsförlaget. ISBN . (with facsimiles of sheet music from first editions in 1790, 1791)
- Lönnroth, Lars (2005).
Ljuva karneval! : angående Carl Michael Bellmans diktning [Lovely Carnival! : about Carl Michael Bellman's Verse].
No CapoStockholm: Albert Bonniers Förlag. ISBN . OCLC 61881374.
- Massengale, James Rhea (1979). The Musical-Poetic Method of Carl Michael Bellman. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International. ISBN .