So as you may know, I’ve recently managed to translate a couple of songs by one of my faza people, Cornelis Vreeswijk, from Swedish, and I’m quite satisfied with the results, and I thought I should try translating this one, as it has fairly easy lyrics and also is one of his more popular and recognisable songs in Sweden, I guess only the one about Cecilia Lind whichh I also shared years ago is more popular. It comes from one of his earlier albums – “Tio Vackra Visor och Personliga Persson” (Ten Beautiful Songs and Personal Persson) from 1968. Even though, being a Christian myself, I don’t agree with a fair bit of stuff he sings about in this song, at the same time I think I do understand why someone would have this kind of perspective on things and even though I don’t agree with some things here, I feel similar about not getting attached to life too much, which is why I like it. Interestingly, the shoes problem seems to be very persistent and intergenerational, because Jack Vreeswijk (Cornelis’ son) also has an original song called “Mina Gamla Skor” (My Old Shoes). 😀
So today I thought we’d listen to a lullaby. I love love listening to lullabies, and not just for sleep. They are very comforting and often have either a fair bit of folklore in them or hide something interesting in between the lines about the times when they were sung/written, kind of like this one although in this one I guess it’s not even hidden very deeply at all but rather straightforward.
This lullaby was written by Cornelis Vreeswijk (one of my faza people, if you don’t know yet) for his son, Jack, and recorded on his debut album in 1964, so exactly the year when Jack was born. It reminds me of very old Polish lullabies, which often go something like this in a nutshell: sleep, my little baby, while you have the time for such luxuries, and while you sleep, grow very big and strong and grow very quickly, so you can start working right away, preferably tomorrow, and help your poor old mother or father because that’s how life works and once you’re big and strong you’ll only get to sleep after you die. I suppose it may not be just a Polish phenomenon but simply something I happened to notice with Polish lullabies specifically.
This lullaby is kind of similar to that pattern, and, given that Cornelis had a lot of knowledge of European folklore and various motives in it and used them a lot, I wonder if he knew about that lullabies actually used to be very much like that in the past and whether this similarity was intended. Here, little Jack, who can’t have more than half a year, is already being made aware of how life generally sucks and is all about making money, so he should take his time to sleep now when he has it. I’m not sure how good a strategy that seriously is to convincing your child to sleep, I’d be afraid I’m going to raise a neurotic and a ruminator who won’t sleep at night because of thinking about all the shitty stuff that is awaiting him in the future, but perhaps that’s just me as I’m a neurotic ruminator myself.
Whether this similarity to old lullabies was or was not intended, surely his main inspiration behind it, just like a lot of his other music, were his strongly socialist views, which shows clearly and I guess especially when you know about his leanings in this direction, but also, since it’s a lullaby, here I feel it isn’t as much in-your-face with the socialism as some of his other songs are. I – being anything but socialist – really love it, which I can’t say about all of his works because I simply do not agree with a lot of stuff in them. Whether you are a socialist or not, I guess most of us agree that adulting is shitty and the idea of being a carefree baby who can sleep the time away, be taken care of, have everything he wants and be free (because for Cornelis, from what we can assume from his other lullaby, one is only free when one is asleep) is more appealing, at least to us escapists for sure.
I also really love this song musically. Vreeswijk, while highly regarded in Sweden for his lyricism, language skills, expression and guitar style, is not considered the greatest composer and I totally agree, usually those of his songs who were composed by other people sound better. Yet there are some absolutely mind-blowing exceptions (I’m thinking “Grimasch om Morgonen” for example, which I’ve shared on my blog before) and “Vaggvisa” is one of them, at least to me. It’s just a simple tune and there’s just Cornelis and the guitar, but there’s something very grand about it.
For comparison, I also want to share with you a cover version from the album Cornelis vs Riedel, where there are Cornelis’ poems in Georg Riedel’s jazz arrangements, sung by his daughter Sarah Riedel and Nikolai Dunger, and a few of his already published songs but with new melodies composed by Riedel. Even though I’m not a huge fan of jazz, I really love this album because there’s just so much real feeling in it, so much care put into it and it’s very friendly for a jazz layman like myself. Their version does not have the same lyrics as the one Cornelis originally wrote for Jack, but they are from the film Rännstensungar (Guttersnipes), where Cornelis played Johan Fahlen and sang this lullaby in this shortened and more neutral, less personalised version to Ninni – the main character. – One day I may also share this song sung by Jack himself.
Below is my attempt at translating the lyrics (the original ones), very literally of course, just to give you an idea what this is about. I’ve always found that metaphor here about working hard as the cat very amusing, ’cause since which time do cats work hard. 😀 I don’t think this is a legit Swedish idiom, never heard of it, and I doubt it especially that it’s “the cat”, so it looks like he means some specific cat. I wonder why is that, perhaps just for the sake of rhyming? As for the factory thing in the lyrics, among quite a few things that Cornelis did before becoming a singer and poet, he did work in a factory for a while.
Today, I have a beautiful Cornelis Vreeswijk song for you (or Swedes would say a Cornelisk song, Cornelisk is an adjective and I like it because it shows how he really is a huge and recognisable part of Swedish culture. I think this is one of my favourites. We could say nowadays that it is so beautifully emo. 😀
It is a very sad and beautiful love song, and if we’re talking Cornelis and love songs, of course we’re also talking Ann-Katrin Rosenblad, to whom he most often dedicates his love songs, and other of his songs often mention her too. If you’re not yet in the know, Ann-Kat(a)rin Rosenblad was his fictional muse, based on the real life one – Ann-Christin Wennerström. – This comes from his debut album – “Ballader Och Oförskämdheter” (Ballads And Rudenesses/Impertinencies) from 1964.
I even managed to translate the lyrics (go Bibielle!!! I guess it’s my fourth Swedish-English translation if I’m counting right) and they surely do tell you what the song is about, but I wonder if it’s just me who feels that the English lyrics are way clunkier than Swedish. Perhaps it’s because it can’t be otherwise, or maybe I could do it better, I don’t know. If you speak Swedish and read this, lemme know.
Also, honestly, ever since I’ve first listened to this song (which was like… 2016 I guess?) and then understood its lyrics fully, I’ve never really figured out what’s the deal with the “sieve” in the lyrics (see translation below). I thought maybe this word has more meanings in Swedish or it’s some idiom or something, but when I was translating this today I couldn’t find anything like that. So I still don’t know. Maybe it means that she was so selective in love or didn’t retain her emotions for long, meaning that she easily fell out of love, or something? I found out that sieve can symbolise virginity, because of a vestal in ancient Rome who proved her virginity by carrying water in a sieve and not spilling any of it. Cornelis read a whole lot and we could say that he was quite nerdy, and there are mythological references in some of his poems and songs. But here it doesn’t seem very likely to be the case. Yeah, I was the best in my class at poem analyses but have always felt like I’m not very good at it actually. 😀
So as you may remember I shared with you yesterday a song from Swedish pop singer Pernilla Andersson, and I said that I might share one more soon, that is her cover of a song originally written and sung by Cornelis Vreeswijk. And so that’s what I decided to do today.
This song is what made me fall in love with the name Saskia so much that if I ever considered having kids, Saskia would be a very serious candidate for a girl. I’d never really come across that name a lot before hearing this.
The song comes from one of Cornelis Vreeswijk’s earlier albums – “Tio Vackra Visor Och Personliga Persson” (Ten Beautiful Songs And Personal Persson). There is a recording of his live performance at an Örebro jazz club called Powerhouse, which was released as an album after his death, where he says that this song was inspired by a real life Saskia he once met in his “green youth”, on the way back home to his wife with whom he was at the time (Ingalill Rehnberg I think based on the timing), he would often stop at some sort of other beer place I don’t really know, to have a few beers with his “good friends and other condemned individuals”. And one time when he was there, there was a girl called Saskia who was working there, and she apparently asked him what was Rembrandt’s wife’s name, so he said that she was called Saskia van Rijn, and then he had free beer for the rest of his stay there. How magnanimously of her… I don’t know though if what they were doing after her work according to the song is also based on facts or not really. His second wife, Bim Linnea Warne, said once that, while he was awfully jealous which is quite well-known, he was very faithful himself, although, as much as I like Cornelis, I can’t help but feel a little doubtful about that. 😀
I love Cornelis’ original version, but Pernilla Andersson also does a really great job. Her song doesn’t have the last couple of verses though.
According to the lyrics, Saskia is cross-eyed, and that’s why she is a subject of ridicule for everyone, which I’ve always found a little surprising because, perhaps I’m totally wrong at all that but I guess strabismus (I suppose that’s how it’s called in English?) isn’t an uncommon thing, it’s also not like a very disabling condition or making one somehow grossly unattractive even if it’s commonly seen as not very beautiful, so while I get that someone could be bullied due to something like this, would that really raise so much attention? In the 60’s? As I said though, I may have no clue, since I’m blind myself and don’t know how much things like that can affect one’s view of a person, it’s just something that I’ve found kind of interesting and strange.
Below is the translation of the song, I wrote it myself but I used
I thought that today I’d share with you this lyrical piece by Cornelis Vreeswijk. I like it a lot because, well, Cornelis being one of my faza subjects, I’ve been very interested in him as an individual, and this song tells us a whole lot about what his love life and relationships generally looked like. I once found a Swedish programme called “Cornelis Och Kärleken” (Cornelis and Love) where a few people analysed in quite an interesting way some of his lyrics that are about love and women – since a lot of his lyrics and poems talk about various women – and how they illustrated the way his relationships looked like. Having had lived a stormy life overall, it was no less stormy and intense with love, because while on one hand he was seeking love and closeness quite desperately, he had some extreme difficulty with forming and maintaining relationships and whenever there was indeed a possibility of having a closer, deeper relationship with someone, he would basically run away almost in panic immediately. It’s flamin’ difficult having fears which conflict with your basic needs. He was also pathologically jealous – largely due to abusing alcohol and all sorts of drugs and other things, many of which can do such things to your brain – so it also wasn’t easy for the other side to be with him for sure.
And in this song, it really shows, in a both lyrical and raw way. Its lyrics weren’t awfully difficult to translate so I tried my best to do it although there may be some errors in here.
My beloved is like a sparkler,
like a sparkler easily ignited.
She burns so hot when she catches fire,
my beloved is like a sparkler,
like a sparkler easily ignited.
Red-hot like a kiln are my sweetheart’s embers,
but no fire is eternal.
Cold it is for the charcoal burner when his kiln dies out,
Today, I will share with you another poem-song written by Cornelis Vreeswijk. With this one, I am sure it was written by him and as it seems originally was intended as a poem and not as a song as it didn’t seem to have a melody. The interesting thing about this poem which later became a song though, that I want to show you, is what came out of that it didn’t have a melody in the first place. Namely now people who cover Vreeswijk have all the freedom in the world to create their own, and here we have almost two different songs, very different in style yet with the same (only slightly varying) lyrics.
The poem – maybe a little surprisingly for someone who would know about Cornelis and roughly about what kinds of things he wrote – is not political, not a protest, not about people/society, not about love, not about Ann-Katrin Rosenblad (his muse) and not even about drinking. It’s, as you can guess from the title, about rain. Little rain. He addresses it in a way that makes you think this rain is a child. It’s a gentle encouragement for it to fall. “Of course the Earth is heavy and cold, but rain anyway”. And when it finally has fallen, the birds are hesitantly starting to sing more and more.
I think it’s very nice, and the two totally different musical versions take two totally differing looks at it.
Jack’s version comes from the same album from which is his last song that I shared with you – “Till Den Det Vederbör” – also written by Cornelis. Jack composed the music to it (or so I assume it was Jack) and it feels very deep but also minimalistic.
And then there’s another version of it composed by Georg Riedel, who is a Swedish jazz musician, and sung by his very talented and sensitive daughter Sarah on their album Cornelis vs Riedel. I’ve already shared a song from this album much earlier that was also sung by Sarah – “Se Här Dansar Fredrik Åkare”. – This is a very carefully made, heartfelt and refined album and both Sarah Riedel and Nikolai Dunger (who is another singer on this album) do a great job, in my opinion, of conveying the feel of each of these songs, as if they really took a lot of time to truly feel them and could relate to them personally. It is a very jazzy album as both Georg and Sarah Riedel are jazz people, which is normally something that would discourage me more or less as I usually don’t have a strong connection with jazz music, but here it doesn’t bother me at all and is great since Cornelis himself also drew from and was inspired by jazz among other genres, and it was his more jazzy songs that convinced me that jazz doesn’t always have to be awful and incomprehensive.
And so I seriously don’t know which version I like more. I wonder which one would be Cornelis’ favourite. And how about you guys? Do you like one of these more than the other?
I’ve decided to share this song with you quite spontaneously, as I didn’t have any other ideas planned. And I have sort of mixed feelings about it because I feel I didn’t research it quite as well as I should, or perhaps there’s just not enough info on this. Usually if I post a song for you guys – and especially if it’s in another language – I try to put it in a context so even if, as it often happens, there is no translation, and I am unable to provide it myself, you can have a basic idea of what it’s about and what was the background of it. Here, I know very, very little.
I was listening to Jack Vreeswijk a while back, as I hadn’t in a long time and wanted to refresh some of his music for myself. And when listening to this song and trying to understand its lyrics (which I always prefer to do when having them written especially if I’m not sure of something and that was the case here) I learned that this was written by Cornelis Vreeswijk (which is actually no surprise when you look at them more closely) and Jack Vreeswijk. In case someone feels confused, Jack is the son of Cornelis. I’ve written a lot about Cornelis Vreeswijk on my blog before as he’s been one of my major fazas but to sum up quickly, he was a Swedish singer, songwriter, poet, guitarist and actor born in Netherlands, he passed away in 1987 (way too early) but his son, Jack, is still alive and also sings as well as composes music, often drawing from his father’s huge legacy and covering his songs not too badly at all (only when you compare him with Cornelis he just… ahem… lacks that charisma a little bit, so this is a clear example why we should not compare people to each other and why following your parent’s career isn’t always the best choice if you do not want to be compared. But don’t get me wrong, I do like Jack. A lot. I just see a lot that people compare him, and I do too, and I’ve heard how on his concerts people are far more enthusiastic about hearing his covers of his dad’s music rather than his own songs. Although maybe it’s just how I interpret or maybe it’s just me who would feel awful about myself and my music if I were in his shoes). I wonder whether this piece was originally a poem to which Jack composed music later on (it does musically sound more Jack-esque) or a poem late enough that Cornelis could somehow write it in collaboration with Jack (I’ve never heard about them ever having such collaborations but who knows, right?…) or a song that was unpublished or somehow very obscure or something. And if it was a poem, was it actually published in any of Cornelis’ poetry books or not? I can’t find any info or hint anywhere about it in another context than it being a song by Jack, but thenn I don’t have Cornelis’ poetry books as such so it’s possible it is there somewhere.
Moreover, I don’t really know the context of the lyrics. I can understand them quite well – although because neither Swedish nor English is my native language I don’t think it would be a good idea if I tried translating something I don’t have much of an idea what it’s more broadly about, also there are some single words I am not sure what they mean in here – and I couldn’t find a translation either.
But I just found this song interesting because the lyrics made me think, they’re intriguing, murky, weird and haunting. I’m not sure I like them as such but I don’t necessarily always love Cornelis’ lyrics, I doon’t have to agree with them and I often don’t, I don’t have to relate, there’s just something else that is not about plain liking. And I’m always excited to see something new from Cornelis (see how some people are so prolific that even after their death it feels like their creativity is a whole endless well), though I’d like to have more of an understanding of it, perhaps I will over time. Also I feel like I haven’t shared anything by Jack in a very, very long time. So basically these are the reasons why I decided to share with you guys a song about which I know next to nothing, and perhaps you’ll like something about it too. 🙂
Here’s another kind of poetic cover sung by Ida Redig. The song was originally written and sung by Mats Paulson in the 60’s, and is quite a classic example of a visa, visa is a Swedish sort of ballad, it’s a bit like a separate Scandinavian music genre. This is a summer visa, and it has a very lullaby-ish feel to it, which I like. But apart from the version by Ida Redig, which is again quite different from the original, I’m also going to show you another one that I like even more than hers, and it is Alexander Rybak’s version. Alexander Rybak is the guy who won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2009, he has Belarussian parents but lives in Norway, he sings and plays fiddle, and he sang the song “Fairytale” at the Eurovision. I really like him, and even more so does Zofijka. Alexander’s version is more similar to the original, as well as longer than Ida Redig’s. It comes from his album, which is also called “Visa Vid Vindens Ängar”, and the album is entirely in Swedish, which is fun since his mother tongue is Norwegian. I’ve heard people saying that they don’t like that he has such a strong Norwegian accent on here, but I think it’s very nice! I also have the lyrics for you.
Today is Jack Vreeswijk’s 55th birthday, if I count correctly. Happy birthday, Jack!!! 😍To avoid any confusion, and I guess it can be a bit confusing for the uninitiated, everyone in my surroundings who doesn’t know Jack, so most people, get confused which Vreeswijk is which and, especially that I love the name Jack, they usually think it’s Jack who is my crush. Jack is the son of Cornelis, and he is also a singer, and Cornelis is – besides Jack’s father – the one on whom I’ve had a crush, and whose poems I’ve been trying so desperately to translate to Polish, and he passed away over 30 years ago when Jack was 23 I believe. But Jack is still alive. I think Jack is also great, although luckily in his own way and not a copy cat of his dad, I’m glad he has his own individuality, even though he has made some covers of Cornelis’ songs, I like him a lot. And I think the song I’m going to show you is interesting. As for Gull, it’s a feminine Nordic name. So, let’s celebrate Jack’s birthday and listen to some of his music. 🙂
It wasn’t on purpose at all, but today’s song really fits the time, because its lyrics talk about the June days and that summer is coming and the person speaking in the lyrics is admiring the nature and waiting for someone who is “her heart’s friend” and “who isn’t like others are”, but isn’t coming, to put it briefly.
I think it’s a very nice song and hope you’ll like it too. I like how idyllic it sounds. And this is the last song by Helen Sjöholm for now.
Today I share with you another version of this fabulous song – “Grimasch Om Morgonen” – written and originally performed by Cornelis Vreeswijk. This is a cover made by Swedish singer Pugh Rogefeldt.
A month or so ago I shared with you this song in its original version, performed by Cornelis Vreeswijk, my previous musical crush whose poetry I would love to translate into Polish sometime in future, it is my very big dream. Also I’ve made an attempt to translate that song into English, which you can see here
. But today I wantd to share with you this song in another stunning performance. Anything by SOfia Karlsson is stunning, but since I love Vreeswijk’s music and poetry so much, this is my favourite song I’ve heard by her. Hope you’ll like it too, She’s so expressive.
Today’s song is in Swedish as well. I decided that since I showed you something from Cornelis Vreeswijk already, we shouldn’t forget about his son – Jack.
Jack (or Lars Jacob) Vreeswijk was born on January 25th 1964 and his mother is Cornelis’ first wife, Ingalill Rehnberg. Having such an unusual and complicated father Jack had undoubtedly very interesting, but also a bit chaotic childhood. He decided to follow his father’s footsteps and become a musician.
Of course, because his dad is so much beloved in Sweden, he is widely known as his son over there and often covers his songs, but has also quite a lot of his own.
“Rosenblad, Rosenblad” is Cornelis’ song though. However, as much as I love Cornelis music, as for “Rosenblad…” I feel like Jack’s version speaks to me more.
The song is really expressive and just great I think. As for the word Rosenblad, it may mean rose leaf in Swedish, but it is also a surname of Vreeswijk’s fictional muse, Ann-Katrrin Rosenblad.
I guess this song doesn’t exist on Youtube in the album version, so I will give you the link to it on Spotify. Hope you don’t mind.
So the song for Friday will be again quite exceptional. It is one of my favourite songs of a man whom I really admire for his poetic talents and generally for his artistic skills and who was my third musical crush. His name is Cornelis Vreeswijk, he comes from Netherlands, but lived and created in Sweden for most of his life, so spoke Swedish fluently. He was a singer, poet and actor and is beloved and famous in Sweden. He lived in 1937-1987. Was quite controversial, being an extreme left-winger, alcoholic etc. Honestly, being a rightist, I disagree with many of his views, but I love his sense of humour, intelligence and how he can describe the world, people, the life, feelings and stuff in an often very straight-away manner, but also with some melancholy at times. I have a whole file with all my favourite quotes of him. One of my big future dreams is to translate some of his works into Polish. Until now, I’ve translated a few of his poems, but the effects are rather miserable.
It’s hard to introduce Cornelis to people who don’t speak any Swedish, as the beauty of his music lies mainly in lyrics, his music is good too, but as he wasn’t a big composer it isn’t always as good as his lyrics, so people with no Swedish have it hard to understand what I actually see in him and his music. But I’ll try my best to show you. And besides his guitar skills were also very good and in this particular song you can hear it very well.
So as I said “Grimasch Om Morgonen” is my favourite song from Cornelis’ discography, I think it’s really beautiful, but also quite sad, bitter and even a bit cynical. Maybe that’s why I love it too.
So to lessen the language bareer at least a bit, I’ll do my best to translate it into English, however, keep in mind, that I am not a native speaker in neither of these languages, so it may not be a masterpiece and probably won’t be.
Now the dew is falling and the sun is rising
But you can’t hear it
You’re lying without blouse or skirt on
With your lips close to my ear
Be serious, you firmly ask
You’re laughing out songs and singing jokes
You can, but don’t want to write
a song about the fragile happiness
Now the sun is rising and the dew is falling
for the poor people and for the rich.
But Luck has a poisoned thorn
that you need to carefully avoid.
She (the Luck) happily lingers for a few days
but when you want to capture her
her eyes turn cold as ice
and you become as bitter as bile
Now the dew is falling without a sound
and grass and leaves become wet
And every morning, the sun is the bride
though no wedding hymns sound
Ann-Katarin, you should know that
there is a certain happiness which dies from laughter.
