Hey people! 🙂
Today I’d like to share with you all some Norwegian folk from a musician whom I only discovered last week – Eli Storbekken. – The first album from her that I came across has been Fabel (Fairytale) recorded together with bass player Sigurd Hole, who is actually a jazz musician himself so the album does have quite a jazzy feel to it as well. Both Eli Storbekken and Sigurd Hole come from the part of Norway that until recently was known as hedemark, and now is called Innlandet.
I don’t know fully well what this song even is about. It seems like kjærring means woman, in particular either a married or an old woman, I don’t know whether it’s still used like that in Norwegian or any of its dialects specifically or is it more of an obsolete thing. I’ve also come across a source claiming that it’s a slang word for a girl, and it also seems like kjærring is some sort of feminine character in the Norwegian folklore. I haven’t found any written lyrics of this song that could possibly help me understand more of it or maybe even translate it for you into English with a bit of luck, but mostly what I gather from it from little words and phrases that I understand or think I might understand correctly is that this woman rides on her sow from one place to another, seeking some sort of consolation. She went to a priest, but the priest told her that he can’t help her so she should go to the bishop, because he rules over him, then the bishop tells her that it’s the king who rules over him so she rides to the king and so on, but I have some gaps in what I understand from it, and I don’t really get what exactly the conclusion of all of that is other than it seems to involve some girl if I hear it right. I also didn’t know what exactly did she want comfort for, I originally thought she has beaten someone, but according to the description of this song on YouTube she killed a taylor, which after listening to it again I was really surprised that I couldn’t figure out before, especially that the Norwegian word is very similar to the Swedish one, so she must have shot him rather than beaten him. Anyway, I think it’s a really cool-sounding folk tune and with a very interesting arrangement.
My Inner MishMash 