Music in Languages You Don't Understand

[Brigantia]

Lately I've found myself listening to a lot of music in Finnish.

I had a friend back in 2019 who introduced me to a lot of this music. I don't know what it is about the music, and the language, but I find it really enjoyable to listen to. Just something about the phonology I think just makes it sound very satisfying and enjoyable to my ears I suppose.

Has anybody else had this kind of experience? Maybe just a specific song or artist, or as in my case, a large set of genres with just the language and country of origin in common.

I do actually listen to other non-understood language music from time to time such as Zamrock (Progressive rock from Zambia).

What's your experience with this? Which languages do you tend to listen to that you don't understand? How did you get into that music/learn about it? Do you know what you find so appealing about it?

[watermoon]

oh shit it's time to shill chimurenga / sungura / jit / etcetera.

there's something about this branch of zimbabwean popular music that really tickles my melodic sensibilities. i never knew there could be so many inventive ways of weaving melodies around a backbone of exactly one chord progression! but having (usually) two guitars plus bass plus vocals all playing their own looping melodic lines is delightfully overstimulating – it's like there's something new to focus on no matter where you turn your attention. it scratches the same part of my brain as like the smiths' jangle pop-era work, except more intensely and potentially less insufferably due to not really knowing the lyrics.

the four brothers are a good gateway into them, as they had the advantage of having a british radio dj repping them hard back in the day so they seemed to have established a fanbase there. maybe the other big name that managed to cross over is thomas mapfumo, who gained fame due to writing songs critical of zimbabwe's government pre-revolution, which both got him into political hot water yet gave him a devoted following among the revolutionaries… and then soon after zimbabwe got its independence he started writing songs critical of the new government and he got ran out of town by his former fans.

but i think about one of his songs – chitima nditakure – a lot, specifically because of the rift of understanding that it being in another language creates. there's just something haunting about his delivery in this song. it's the sound of someone possessed, or preoccupied, or with something heavy weighing on his mind. but when it comes to decades-old songs written in a language that's not especially in the limelight, it's not like translations are easy to come by; oftentimes the most you can hope for is just a summary.

though in this case, the song did make an appearance in this academic article, where the author notes that it's "very difficult to translate." still, he makes a good effort to translate a lot of the lyrics, and while that's definitely appreciated, it just brings us back to the classic question of how fully something can be understood if it comes from a culture different from your own…

i did end up stumbling on another interpretation though, in a youtube comment on a now-deleted upload of the song. it aligns in some ways to the one in the article, particularly when it comes to the translation of individual lines, but the interpretation as a whole diverges pretty starkly from the one in the article, interpreting the song much more metaphorically. since the article mentioned that it most likely would require deep cultural knowledge to understand these lyrics, i'm inclined to see this interpretation by (to my knowledge) a native speaker as closer to the truth.

Benedict Kunaka 10 months ago

Chitima Nditakure (Train Carry Me) by Thomas Mapfumo in the words of young black Zimbabwean man.

Chitima Nditakure is a traditional Shona hymn by legendary Chimurenga artist Thomas Mapfumo. It is a bitter-sad exploration of the dilemma of a man in colonial Rhodesia at the height of the war. It's a melancholic reflection of the reality for many a young black native at this time in the country. The dilemma of having to go to war and fight for a better country which you might ironically die for and never get to see. Leaving your wife your lover to join the others who have gone before you. A certain kind of insecurity and dread is expressed, "Hona kwedu kure handingakusvike" (Home is so far I might not make it). It's a man's quest to find the fate of his brothers and sisters who have left their lives to join the struggle...thus he personifies the train to be a human carrying him (Ho Chitima Nditakurewo...which translates train please carry me) to some place where those who have gone ahead if him are. The train could perhaps not be as literal though it was the most iconic and dominant means of transport at the time for the masses. Perhaps it's a story after all of a man embracing that death will grant him safe passage to the after life to those who lost their lives in the war. And death becomes a vehicle to get him to this place.

It puts into perspective how high the stakes are..the call to go to war overrides everything. "Hona yarira Mai veMwana hona yarira ndisina kudya" (It's time my wife. Though I haven't prepared for it it's time.) Though it is quite a hard call to make it must be done. His mind is a chaotic convolution of memories, uncertainty, regret, horror, fear and sentimentality. Memories of his those who have gone ahead of him to the war, uncertain if they are at all still alive, regret that an unknown fate will befall him, horrors of war, fear of the unknown and what awaits him on this journey thus he resorts to traditional frightening imagery of witch craft, snakes and owls: "Hona ndakumbire Mai vanofuta hona vane zizi mutswanda vane mhungu inoita sadza hona nyamapfingu ichi vhenekera" (I've broken up with you because your mother is a witch she has an owl in her basket she has a mysterious black mamba and a two headed snake) and a fear of what will become to his family in his absence "Hona bhrukwa remwana rabvaruka"(The child's clothes are now torn), sentimality towards a lover that he has to part with "Hona musikana ndangandichikuda" (I was willing to love you). Sentimentality with his family "Hona rune guru rinoshereketa hona roti bwai bwai me so ane vana" (A grown daring man blinks his eyes with tearful eyes as he looks at his children) The song is quite rich in instrumentation with the key instrument being the traditional mbira being this spiritual lead instrument from beginning to start and bass guitar...and an accompanying electric guitar. With backing female vocals quite the contrast with Mapfumo's natural male voice. The chorus cements the traditional religious aspect to the song. "Ah hoye oh vakuru woye" (A religious chant, a call to the (vakuru) ancestors or maybe just the patriarchy of the elderly figures in his life).

maybe later i'll also talk about my love for traditional okinawan music which is sung in uchinaaguchi, the language of the former ryukyu kingdom, now classified as a dialect of japanese for the sake of genociding it out of okinawan life. that could be fun.

[Brigantia]

had the advantage of having a british radio dj repping them hard back in the day

The moment I read this I instantly knew who you meant. John Peel was great. Amazing talent for getting obscure artists heard.

Really awesome post, thank you for the introduction and I'll be sure to check out those artists you made reference to!