Its been a busy month for me. I've been
ploughing through the research with my primary focus on traditional
Finnish laments (itkut, itkuvirsi) or crying songs. I went to a lecture on the healing
power of laments and was truly touched by the honesty and feeling in
the songs. In fact when I got home I wrote my own lament to my
grandfather who passed in 2007 and was a big influence in my life.
You can view the video of it and though it is in Finnish I think the
feeling comes across in the voice.
I've also been lucky enough to have the
use of my band mates recording device. It has brilliant sound quality
for a small carry recorder and I am hopeful that it might be good
enough quality for me to make my actual sound work recordings with
it. I recorded the whole lecture on it and though I’ll probably
never publish it, the sound itself has been invaluable for my
research and notes.
Last week I went for my first visit to
the Finnish Folklore Archives, where they house a collection of
laments from the mid 1800's to present day. They come in these big
boxes with small cards written on a typewriter for each lament. I
spent 3,5 hours going through one box and I will hopefully get a
chance to put in another 3 hours next week to go through another.
There are 5 massive boxes and there is a lot of info. My favourite
part was reading the writers notes and observations on these
incredible women who sang for them. Many of them sang in old Karelian
which, to my delight I could understand quite well and often only
sang a song once which made the recording of this oral tradition
quite a debacle in the time before recorders.
This weekend I have been invited to the
Äänellä Itkijät ry (official lament singers in Finland) meeting
at the home of Pirkko
Fihlman. It is the first time I am officially meeting these singers
and I have been allowed to do some sound recording and I hope to also
take some pictures. Video I will have to leave to a later date as I
can't get my hands on a good enough video camera and also considering
the nature of Laments I don't want to freak anyone out. I think it
will be a good thing to just get to know everyone and build trust.
That is amazing. In India also there are these communities of women who are also lamenters. One community I know of is called 'Rudali'. And I think these communities exists in other states of India as well. Would be very interesting to explore if there are any connections between, or to see if these lamenting women exist in other countries/cultures as well.
ReplyDeleteDo you know if these women have gypsy ancestry?