Fishtank Ensemble: Lyrics

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Fishtank Ensemble: Lyrics

Page Contents: Bordeas Youkali Papirosn Ringo Bushi

[More lyrics needed!--if you have any Fishtank Ensemble lyrics, please contact the Webmaster]

For translations of additional song titles, see the Records page.

Bordeas

"Bordeas" (more commonly spelled "Bordeias") is a traditional folk song from Romania. The words are Old Romanian.

Bordeias, bordei-bordei
Bordeias, bordei-bordei,
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
Numar carceii de tei
S-a imbuibat dragostea-n ei.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...

Bordeias fara tarpici, bordeias fara tarpici
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
Tu ma faci sa viu p-aici
Descult si fara opinci.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...

Intai p-aici cand veneam,
Intai p-aici cand veneam
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
Patru boi eu injugam
Dar acuma unu' n-am.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
Mancam, beam si chefuiam
Numa-n camasa plecam
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...

Little cottage, cottage-cottage,
Little cottage, cottage-cottage,
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
Linden tendrils I'm counting
For they are surfeited with love.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...

Little cottage without mud brick, little cottage without mud brick,
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
You make me come around
Barefoot, without mocassins.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...

When I was first coming around,
When I was first coming around,
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
I was yoking four oxes,
But now I have none.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...
I was eating, drinking, boozing
Leaving with but a shirt on.
Ooooooooooooooo, ooooooooooooo...

(English translation by Cristina Mihaescu. Thank you, Cristina!)

Youkali

"Youkali: Tango Habanera" (Havana-style tango) was composed by Kurt Weill during his exile in France. Originally written in 1934 as incidental music for the play Marie Galante, in 1946 it was retrospectively given these words by Roger Fernay. Music and words invoke an island paradise and exactly capture the longing for escape from what Europe had become in the 1930s, or was about to become. Within a year of writing this music Weill, would flee France for the United States--one of the lucky few. (To where, one wonders in 2005, will people soon flee from the United States?--as the song says, "there is no Youkali".)

French characters will only display correctly in Windows--sorry. The English translation is by A. Reaux, with modifications. This song has the form ABCB'DB -- italics are used below for the B and B' sections.

C'est presqu'au bout du monde,
Ma barque vagabonde,
Errant augré du l'onde,
M'y conduisit un jour.

L'ile est toute petite,
Mais la fee qui l'habite
Gentiment nous invite
A en faire le tour.

Youkali,
C'est le pays de nos désirs,
Youkali,
C'est le bonheur,
C'est le plaisir,

Youkali,
C'est la terre où l'on
Quitte tous les soucis,
C'est dans notre nuit,
Comme une éclaircie,
L'étoile qu'on suit,
C'est Youkali!

Youkali,
C'est le respect
De tous les Voeux échangés,
Youkali,
C'est le pays
Des beaux amours partagés,

C'est l'espérance
Qui est au coeur de tous les humains,
La délivrance
Que nous attendons tous pour demain,

Youkali,
C'est le pays de nos désirs,
Youkali,
C'est le bonheur
C'est le plaisir,

Mais c'est un rêve, une folie,
Il n'y a pas de Youkali!

Et la vie nous entrâine,
Lassante, quotidiene,
Mais la pauvre âme humaine,
Cherchant partout l'oubli,

A pour quitter la terre,
Su trouver le mystère
Où no rêves se terrent
En quelque Youkali...

Youkali,
C'est le pays de nos désirs,
Youkali,
C'est le bonheur,
C'est le plaisir,

Youkali,
C'est la terre où l'on
Quitte tous les soucis,
C'est dans notre nuit,
Comme une éclaircie,
L'étoile qu'on suit,
C'est Youkali!

Near the end of the world
My vagabond boat
Wandering at the whim of the waves
Directs me there one day,

This island is very small
But the fairy who lives there
Gently invited us
to take a tour...

Youkali,
It is the land of our desires,
Youkali,
It is happiness,
It is pleasure,

Youkali,
It is the land where
One leaves all cares,
It is, in our night,
Like a bright light,
A star which one follows-
It is Youkali!

Youkali,
It is the respect
Of exchanged vows.
Youkali,
It is the land
Of beautiful lovers.

It is the hope
Which is at the heart of all humans,
The deliverance
We want for tomorrow.

Youkali,
It is the land of our desires,
Youkali,
It is happiness,
It is pleasure--

But it is a dream, a folly.
There is no Youkali!

And life goes on,
Weariness everyday.
But the poor human soul
Looks everywhere to forget it,

To leave the earth,
To find the mystery.
We dream on earth
To live on some Youkali...

Youkali,
It is the land of our desires,
Youkali,
It is happiness,
It is pleasure,

Youkali,
It is the land where
One leaves all cares,
It is, in our night,
Like a bright light,
A star which one follows-
It is Youkali!

Papirosn ("Cigarettes")

"Papirosn" (also spelled Papirosen, sometimes also called "A Kalte Nakht") is a Yiddish song derived from a Bulgarian folk tune. The words below were written by Herman Yablokoff (1903-1981), a popular Yiddish theater performer. Born in Grodno in Russian Poland, Yablokoff emigrated to America in 1924. He often played a character called "Der Payatz" (The Clown). Papirosn was written for his play of the same title in 1932. It is said that he was inspired to write the song by his memories of having seen child peddlers during German occupation of Grodno in WWI.

"Papirosn" has been recorded many times, both as a doina or lament in the Rumanian-Yiddish style and also as a rollicking dance-band version in Klezmer style. Fishtank's version falls into the latter category, but uses Rumanian-style instruments. Fishtank doesn't include vocals with their version, but they help us understand what this tune meant to its Yiddish theater audience in the 1930s.

(The lyric really ought to be in the Hebrew letters in which Yiddish is written, but not every computer has a Hebrew font installed.)

A kalte nakht a nepeldike fintster umetum
Shteyt a yingele fartroyert un kukt zikh arum
Fun regn shitst im nor a vant
A kosikl halter in hant
Un zayne oygen betn yedn shtum:
Ikh hob shoyn nit keyn koyekh mer arumtsugeyn in gas
Hungerik and opgerisn, fun dem regn nas
Ikh shlep arum zikh fun baginen
Keyner git nit tsu fardinen
Ale lakhn makhn fun mir shpas

Refrain:
Kupitye koyft zhe koyft zhe papirosn
Trukene fun regn nit fargosn
Koyft zhe, bilik benemones
Koyft un hot oyf mir rakhmones
Ratevet fun hunger mikh atsind
Kupitye koyft zhe, shevebelakh antikn
Dermit ver ir a yosiml derkvikn
Umzist mayn shrayen un mayn loyfn
Keyner vil bay mir nit koyfn -
Oysgeyn velikh muzn vi a hunt

Mayn tate in milkhome hot farloyrn zayne hent
Mayn mame hot di tsores mer oyshaltn nit gekent
Yung in keyver zi getribn
Bin ikh oyf der velt farblibn
Umgliklakh un elnt vi a shteyn
Breklekh klayb ikh oyf tsum esn oyf dem altn mark
A harte bank iz mayn geleger in dem kaltn park
In dertsu di poitsyantn
Shlogn mikh mit shverdn, kantn,
S'helft nit mayn bet, mayn geveyn
Refrain:

Ikh hob gehat a shvesterl, a kind fun der natur
Mit mir tsuzamen zikh geshlept hot zi a gantsn yor,
Mit ir geven iz mir fil gringer
Laykhter vern flegt der hinger
Ven ikh fleg a kuk ton nor oyf ir.
Mit a mol govern iz zi shvakh un zeyer krank
Oyf mayne hent geshtorbn zi, oyf a gasn bank
Un az ikh hob zi farloyrn
Hob ikh alts shoyn ongevoyrn
Zol der toyt shoyn kumen oykh tsu mir.
Refrain:

A cold night, foggy, and darkness everywhere
A boy stands sadly and looks around.
Only a wall protects him from the rain
He holds a basket in his hand
and his eyes beg everyone silently:
I don't have any strength left to walk the streets
Hungry and ragged, wet from the rain,
I shlep around from dawn.
Nobody gives me any earnings,
everyone laughs and makes fun of me

Refrain:
Buy my cigarettes!
Dry ones, not wet from the rain
Buy real cheap,
Buy and have pity on me.
Save me from hunger now
Buy my matches, wonderful ones, the best,
and with that you will uplift an orphan.
My screaming and my running will be for naught.
Nobody wants to buy from me-
I will have to perish like a dog.

My father lost his hands in the war
My mother couldn't bear her troubles anymore
And was driven to her grave at a young age
I was left on this earth
Unhappy and alone like a stone
I gather crumbs to eat in the old market
A hard bench in the cold park is my bed
and on top of that, the police
beat me with the edges of their swords and sticks
my pleas and my cries are of no use.
Refrain:

I had a little sister, a child of nature
Together we shlepped around for an entire year.
When with her, it was much easier for me.
My hunger would become lighter
When I glanced at her
Suddenly she became weak and sick
died in my arms on a street bench
And when I lost her
I lost everything
Let death come already for me, too.
Refrain:

Ringo Bushi ("Apple Song")

(I am still searching for the Japanese lyrics to Ringo Bushi and an English translation, but here is some information on the song.)

Ringo Bushi is a standard in the Tsugaru-style shamisen repertoire, which originates from Aomoi Prefecture in Northern Japan. It is a "new folk song", composed by the singer NARITA Unchiku in 1954. A shamisen part was added by the blind player TAKAHASHI Sadazoh (1910-1998) (known by his stage name Chikuzan, "bamboo mountain").

Chikuzan's story (as told in his Autobiography) is interesting. He left home at 14 to learn the shamisen; to support himself, he became an itinerant beggar. In those days many shamisen players in Tsugaru were blind beggars, called bosama. The life of a bosama was very hard. Chikuzan's fortunes improved when he began touring with Narita Unchiku in 1954, and he began to develop a reputation throughout the region. Narita had been a famous singer in Tsugaru since the 1930s, when Chikuzan was still a penniless beggar. Beginning in the 1960s, at the start of the Japanese economic boom, , Tsugaru-style shamisen became popular throughout Japan, and Chikuzan's situation changed from beggar to recording artist. By his death in 1998, Chikuzan was the world's best known Tsugaru shamisen player--but never forgot his bosama origins or the roots of Tsugaru music in regional folk song and dance.

The words to "Ringo Bushi" describe the beauties of Tsugaru in terms reminiscent of a picture postcard. The is in sharp contrast to the older Tsugaru folk songs, which tended to lament the fate of star-crossed lovers or the hardships of life, or else were light-hearted bon dance songs.