Thursday, January 03, 2008

My Father's Grasslands and My Mother's River

At dinner tonight - San Marino's Pizza, the best Roman pizza in the neighbourhood - Jack was telling me about his trip to Mongolia this past fall. He mentioned a video set to a pop-treatment of a Mongolian folksong that he really enjoyed and that is very popular in China right now.



He gave me a very rough translation from the Chinese: the singer has never visited his parents homeland but when he sees it for the first it awakens something in his soul. He discovers that this place has always lived in his heart and rejoices that now he is part of the grasslands of his father and the river of his mother.

Though I'm not really a big fan of this type of pop I find the initial melody and the visuals quite arresting.

04 gennaio - Santa Angela

5 comments:

sageweb said...

That is a beautiful video. Striking is more like it. I don't even care that I can't understand a damn thing.

Elizabeth said...

Yes, when they're doing the initial wordless vocals, it's pretty great. (I was disappointed when that ended and they went into what I call, "Taiwanese taxi music" standard pop. A whole song or record like the beginning would be wonderful. But the pics are lovely throughout!

Anonymous said...

Yurts! I love Yurts!
I once tried to make a childrens pop up book about houses called "Burts Yurt" but is didn't quite work for me. Unlike this song - which totally worked for me in a kind of oddly Asian Loreena McKennitt sort of way.

Willym said...

Elizabeth: I agree with you on that "canto-pop" stuff - personally I find it irritating.

A friend of mine was given a Yurt when she lived in Poland by a Mongolian friend. Its ended up in storage until she can set it up on her land on the Pacific Coast - they are magnificent structures.

BigAssBelle said...

i long to live in a yurt. that opening was beautiful indeed. a yurt! i need one!!