Anthem

Eilen tuli synkisteltyä niin, että tuon vähän valoa sisään Cohenin upealla hymnillä. Kappaleen sanoituksissa on vanhatestamentillista (tai ilmestyskirjamaista), uhkaavaakin jylinää, mutta lopulta kyse on rakkaudesta, jolla ei ole välttämättä mitään tekemistä uskonnon kanssa. Jos Leonard Cohen olisi valtio, tämä olisi sen kansallislaulu.

Luultavasti Lontoossa kuvatun esityksen tulkinta on verraton ja soittajat virtuoosimaisia. Sharon Robinsonin sekä Hattie ja Charlie Webbin taustalaulusta saa kylmiä väreitä. Lopussa Cohen-maan kansalaiset osoittavat suosiotaan seisten. Muistan hyvin tuon ekstaattisen tunnelman Helsingin keikalta viime vuoden lokakuussa.

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Yesterday I was so pessimistic that some light needs to be let in with this magnificent anthem by Leonard Cohen. There is Old Testamentian (or apocalyptic), even ominous thunder in the lyrics, but in the end it is about love that hasn’t necessarily got anything to do with religions. If Leonard Cohen was a country, this would be its national anthem.

The performance, which is probably shot in London, is marvelous. Cohen’s interpretation is deep and the players are virtuosos. I get shivers listening to Sharon Robinson’s and Hattie and Charlie Webb’s background vocals. In the end the citizens of the Land Cohen applause standing up. I can recall that ecstatic atmosphere from the gig in Helsinki on October last year.

The birds they sang / at the break of day / Start again / I heard them say / Don’t dwell on / what has passed away / or what is yet to be

Ah the wars / they will be fought again / The holy dove / She will be caught again / bought and sold / and bought again / the dove is never free

Ring the bells that still can ring / Forget your perfect offering / There is a crack in everything / That’s how the light gets in

We asked for signs / the signs were sent: / the birth betrayed / the marriage spent / Yeah the widowhood / of every government — / signs for all to see

I can’t run no more / with that lawless crowd / while the killers in high places / say their prayers out loud / But they’ve summoned, they’ve summoned up / a thundercloud / and they’re going to hear from me

Ring the bells that still can ring …

You can add up the parts / but you won’t have the sum / You can strike up the march, / there is no drum / Every heart, every heart / to love will come / but like a refugee

Ring the bells that still can ring…

There is a crack, a crack in everything / That’s how the light gets in…

Christmas greetings from John Lennon, Charles Dickens & leethal59

John Lennonin ja Yoko Onon vuonna 1971 äänitetty Vietnamin sodan vastainen (protesti)laulu Happy Xmas (War is Over) on yhä varsin ajankohtainen.

Musiikkivideon alussa ja oheisessa kuvassa näkyvä banneri oli osa taiteilijapariskunnan vuonna 1969 järjestämää kampanjaa, jossa he ostivat eri kaupungeista mainostilaa sodanvastaiselle julistukselleen.

Musiikkivideon muu kuvamateriaali on täydellisesti ristiriidassa sanoitusten kanssa. Kokonaisuus on epäreilu, sillä se tarjoaa katsojalle vain kaksi positiota: empaattinen katsoja järkyttyy ja ahdistuu; kyyninen tiedostaa, että hänen tunteitaan manipuloidaan ja ehkä torjuu teoksen viestin. Tai voi manipulaation toki tunnistaa ja silti järkyttyä. Vaikka olen usein aika kyyninen, minun on vaikeaa katsoa videon kauheita ja murheellisia kuvia liikuttumatta.

Liikuttava on myös kirjailija Charles Dickensin (1812–1870) käsitys joulusta: ”I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round, as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.”

Nimimerkki “leethal59″ kommentoi Happy Xmas -videota YouTubessa tänään toteamalla: ”Unfortunately humans are fucking evil.”

Kumpaa uskoa, häntä vai Lennonia ja Dickensiä ja toivon sanomaa? Haluaisin ajatella, että jälkimmäistä.

Silti: John Lennon kuoli 29 vuotta sitten joulukuun 8. päivänä sen jälkeen, kun hänen selkäänsä oli ammuttu neljä luotia.

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The anti-Vietnam War (protest) song Happy Xmas (War is Over) by John Lennon and Yoko Ono was recorded in 1971, but is still very current.

The banner in the beginning of the music video and in the picture above was part of a campaign the artist couple arranged in 1969. They bought advertising space in many cities for their anti-war declaration.

The rest of the footage on the video contradicts completely with the lyrics of the song. The ensemble is unfair, for it offers the viewer only two positions: the empathetic viewer gets upset and becomes distressed; the cynical viewer recognizes that his / her feelings are being manipulated and perhaps rejects the message. Or one can recognize the manipulation and still be shocked. I’m often quite cynical, but for me it is really difficult to look at those images without being affected by the horrors and the sadness.

Affective is also Charles Dickens’s perception of Christmas: “I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round, as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.”

Alias ”leethal59″ commented on Happy Xmas -video on YouTube today by saying: “Unfortunately humans are fucking evil.”

Should we believe him, or Lennon and Dickens and their hopeful message? I’d like to believe the latter.

Yet: John Lennon died 29 years ago on December 8th after being shot four times in the back.

Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story

Paul Auster lukee ihastuttavan joulukertomuksen, joka on tuttu Smoke-elokuvasta. Brooklyniin sijoittuva Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story ei sisällä joulupukkeja, -kuusia eikä muutakaan joulusälää, mutta tavoittaa silti (tai siksi) oikean hengen. Tarinan voi myös lukea itse täällä.

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Paul Auster reads his delightful Christmas Story that is known from the movie Smoke. Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story that takes place in Brooklyn isn’t about Santa Clauses or Christmas trees or any other Christmas stuff, but still (or because of that) has the right spirit. You can also read the story yourself.

Jazz Poetry

Tämä on erään ystäväni suosikkiruno. Sen lausuu tässä itse runoilija, 1920-luvun Harlemin renessanssin johtohahmoihin kuulunut Langston Hughes (1902 – 1967). The Weary Blues julkaistiin alun perin vuonna 1926 Hughesin samannimisessä esikoisrunokokoelmassa.

Pakko rakastaa!

Droning a drowsy syncopated tune, / Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon, / I heard a Negro play. / Down on Lenox Avenue the other night / By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light / He did a lazy sway… / He did a lazy sway… / To the tune o’ those Weary Blues. / With his ebony hands on each ivory key / He made that poor piano moan with melody. / O Blues! / Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool / He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool. / Sweet Blues! / Coming from a black man’s soul. / O Blues! / In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone / I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan– / ”Ain’t got nobody in all this world, / Ain’t got nobody but ma self. / I’s gwine to quit ma frownin’ /And put ma troubles on the shelf.” // Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor. / He played a few chords then he sang some more– / ”I got the Weary Blues / And I can’t be satisfied. / Got the Weary Blues / And can’t be satisfied– / I ain’t happy no mo’ / And I wish that I had died.” / And far into the night he crooned that tune. / The stars went out and so did the moon. / The singer stopped playing and went to bed / While the Weary Blues echoed through his head. / He slept like a rock or a man that’s dead.

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This is my friend’s favourite poem. Here it is read by the poet himself, Langston Hughes, who was one of the central authors of the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920′s. The poem was originally published in Hughes’s first collection of poems, The Weary Blues (1926).

Got to love it!

Where dat stuff come from?

Kun pakkanen (-15) puristaa sielua, ei voi kuin paeta jonnekin kauas. Se onnistuu kuuntelemalla saksofonisti Billy Harperin Blueprints of Jazz -levyä. Musiikillisesti levy on freetä, mutta varsin lähestyttävää. Ja svengaa niin, että veri alkaa kiertää rytmin tahtiin, tanssijalka käy ihanimmalla tavalla levottomaksi ja ajatus lentää, lentää.

Parasta levyllä on lähes 17 minuuttia pitkä avausbiisi Africa Revisited, jossa akateemikko, kirjailija ja poliittinen aktivisti Amiri Baraka jutustelee tiukan soitannan päälle. Selostus koskee jazzin ja muunkin rytmimusiikin historiaa, jota Baraka jäljittää sen alkukotiin, Afrikkaan, “where dat stuff came from”.

Jazz-luennossa käydään läpi myös instrumenttien kehitystä: ”As the piano emerged, voilà, it was segregated into all the white keys and the black five set up top. So what? Well, when the slaves got over here they could immediately pick out their notes, ha! - to make the blues. You gotta have the blues to have any memory of yourself.”

Minua tämä musiikki kantaa kylmyyden yli; niitä, jotka sen toivat meille, se auttoi kaikkein pahimmassa.

Missä ovat rytmimusiikin juuret? ”[In] the earliest blood songs the African made at the bottom of the ship.”

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When the freeze (-15 degrees Celsius) clenches the soul, one can only try to escape far away. This can be done by listening to saxophonist Billy Harper’s Blueprints of Jazz. Musically the album is free jazz, but very approachable. And it swings so that blood starts to circulate to the rhythm, feet become restless in the most wonderful way, and the mind flies, flies.

The best thing on the record is the almost 17 minutes long opening song Africa Revisited, where academian, poet and political activist Amiri Baraka speaks as the players play intensively. He reports about the history of jazz and other rythm music, and tracks it down to its birthplace, Africa, “where dat stuff came from”.

In his lecture on jazz Baraka also goes through the evolution of instruments: “As the piano emerged, voilà, it was segregated into all the white keys and the black five set up top. So what? Well, when the slaves got over here they could immediately pick out their notes, ha! - to make the blues. You gotta have the blues to have any memory of yourself.”

This music makes me get through the coldness. For those people who brought it to as, it was even more important: it helped them overcome the worst.

Where are the roots of music? ”[In] the earliest blood songs the African made at the bottom of the ship.”

http://www.billyharper.com/

http://www.amiribaraka.com/

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah – Ishmael Beahin Leikin loppu: lapsisotilaan muistelmat

Lue teksti suomeksi Mustekalasta.

There was intense discussion over Ishmael Beah’s book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier when it was released two years ago. However, I didn’t read it until this autumn after my friend recommended it. I’m not the kind of person who is always up to date with literature – I often read books a year or two after they’re released. Sometimes I reproach myself of being so sluggish. Anyway, I’m not sure whether up-to-dateness is a relevant criterion for interesting or significant literature.

Beah’s autobiographical novel is hard. I can’t remember reading about violence this shocking ever before. The brutalities are especially disturbing because there are children on both sides of the violent acts. Beah fought for the army of Sierra Leone against guerrilla fighters in the civil war that was levied between 1991 and 2000. The novel describes in a realistic way how easy it is to brainwash and train traumatized children into cold-blooded butchers with the use of simple psychology and drugs.

Beah was saved by Unicef’s intervention and treatment. According to Unicef there are currently about 300 000 child soldiers fighting in over 30 armed conflicts. Beah’s novel makes clear that some of the boys who went through therapy with him never have a chance in returning back to normal life because they have no guardians or caretakers. They return to war.

Beah tells about military training and the harsh reality of Unicef’s centre of demobilisation and reintegration only in the end of the novel. Most of the story is about Ishmael, who has been separated from his family, wandering across Sierra Leone’s villages and jungles looking for food and shelter. The story progresses slowly and there are many repetitive situation motifs: running from guerrilla soldiers, loosing a companion, feeling lonely.

I thought a long time about the meaning of depiction of drifting and the reason behind repetition, until I understood that it expresses child’s way of perceiving and telling about experiences. I’m not familiar with West African tradition of storytelling but I assume that the novel uses its conventions too.

A Long Way Gone is a crushing story of what war can do to children at its worse. It also tells about customs and traditions of Sierra Leonean culture that crumbles when people turn against each other.

I believe that the novel’s artistic value is perfected due to its open ending and especially the allegorical story Beah tells in the end. The story is about a monkey who torments a hunter with an impossible riddle: “If you shoot me your mother will die, and if you don’t your father will die.” Beah has an answer to this dilemma that doesn’t exclude violence and suffering, but cuts into the core of the problem.

When Beah’s book was released it received a lot of positive attention. There was also jarring. Some journalists compared the novel’s story with historical documents and claimed that not all the details correspond to facts. Beah denies converting the truth. I don’t question Beah, but in my opinion the whole demand of veracity is absurd when we’re talking about this novel. What if the stories told in the novel differ from facts partially, would it decrease the value of this literary document? What if the whole story was fiction? What if Sierra Leone wouldn’t exist? What if there were no child soldiers in real life?

I argue that even if the novel was entirely fictional, it would still tell us more about human beings and their lack of moral than we would like to know. The value of literature is not in its correspondence with reality but in the fact (!) that through it we can see reality in another way – which in many cases isn’t flattering to humankind.

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(I’ve translated the quotation from the Finnish translation myself so it might not be accurate with the original novel.)