Ay Carmela!
Ay Carmela! (with Spanish punctuation: ¡Ay Carmela!) is a republican folk and mobilization song from the time of the Spanish Civil War . The melody goes back to the time of the anti-Napoleonic liberation wars at the beginning of the 19th century . There are different versions with modified text and different titles (Viva la quince Brigada, El paso del Ebro) . As a popular song on the Republican side, it was recorded by a number of well-known and unknown musicians. It was also used in the films Ay Carmela! - Song of Freedom by Carlos Saura and Hemingway & Gellhorn by Philip Kaufman .
history
The melody of Ay Carmela! goes back to a folk song with the title Ay Manuela !. It was created at the beginning of the 19th century during the battle against the Napoleonic troops who were occupying Spain at that time. The lyrics sung to it have adapted over the years to the current political and social circumstances. The one under the name Ay Carmela! known version was created at the time of the Spanish Civil War. Here, too, there were initially various variants. The one known today under the title refers to the Battle of the Ebro in the summer and autumn of 1938 - the last and temporarily successful offensive of the Republicans. Similar to Si me quieres escribir (German: If you want to write to me) - a song that was created around the same time and is often taken up and addresses the same context - is also returning Ay Carmela! the perseverance and confidence of the Republican side.
The contemporary historical popularization mainly took place through song collections (so-called Cancioneros). The possibilities for phonograms were limited at the time of the civil war; However, on anthologies related to the period there are both choir recordings and recordings in which guitar- accompanied singing is in the foreground. Different song titles went hand in hand with the textual variations. The version made famous by Ernst Busch and Pete Seeger & The Almanac Singers, among others, bears the title Viva la quinta brigada (sometimes also: Viva la quince brigada). Another is called El paso del Ebro (Spanish: El Ejército del Ebro; German: The breakthrough on the Ebro ). The song variant popularized by Busch and Seeger should not be confused with the song of the same name by the Irish singer-songwriter Christy Moore , of which there are also a number of cover versions . Moore's folk song also deals with the deployment of the International Brigades in Spain, but focuses on the biographies of Irish brigade volunteers listed by name .
Interpretations and cover versions
As a popular song from the Spanish Civil War, Ay Carmela! interpreted by different interpreters, bands and artists or recorded as a cover version. Apple's iTunes Music Store had around two dozen versions on offer in September 2018. In addition to those of Pete Seeger & the Almanac Singers and that of Ernst Busch, those of the Spanish songwriter Gomez Naharro and that of the film music composer Alejandro Masso are particularly widespread. Other recordings are the Members of Antoine Ciosi, the Choro Popular Jabalón, the folk or folk punk formations and -Interpeten Quetzal, El Comunero and Ian Campbell Folk Group and the punk bands The Ex and Los Muertos de Cristo. Other performers: the musician combo Henry Lowther , Tracy Holloway & Abigail Newman, the singer Sarmina Slavenica and the Croatian rock musician Darko Rundek . The latter interpreted Ay Carmela! with Serbo-Croatian text. Jazz musician Charlie Haden recorded a free interpretation of the subject on his album Liberation Music Orchestra in 1969 .
As a contemporary song from the Spanish Civil War, Ay Carmela! also used in two films. The first is Ay Carmela - Song of Freedom by Carlos Saura from 1990, which deals with the trials and tribulations of two theater mimes between the civil war fronts. The second is the film adaptation of the partnership between the writer Ernest Hemingway and the journalist Martha Gellhorn (Hemingway & Gellhorn; 2012). In the first, the shot of Alejandro Masso comes into play, in the second that of Antoine Ciosi.
With represent is Ay Carmela on a number of compilations the Spanish Civil War or the struggle of the International Brigades - among other things:
- Songs of the Spanish Civil War. National Side and Republican Side (2010; Bela Records)
- 75 Años de la Guerra Civil Española - Canciones (Banda y Coro República Histórica; 2013; Classical Records Gold)
- Spanish Civil War - Songs of the International Brigades in the Spanish Republic (compilation with interpretations by Ernst Busch and Pete Seeger; 2014; Classical Records Gold)
- Chants de la Guerre d'Espagne (Cobla de Barcelone; 1963; Le Chant du Monde)
Ernst Busch (1946)
Pete Seeger (1955)
The Ex (2016)
Darko Rundek (2017)
Carlos Saura (2017)
Others
When naming the original title, both the spelling without a comma ("Ay Carmela!") And that with a comma ("Ay, Carmela!") Are common. In the modern variant of the song, the female name "Carmela" is also inconsistent - the person to whom the events listed in the text are reported and whose name is an essential part of the chorus-shaped chorus part. While "Carmela" has been substituted for "Manuela" (the name from the original song from the 19th century) in most of them, Pete Seeger's Viva la quince brigada comes up with the old name in the chorus. The same goes for a number of other versions that bear this title.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ay, Carmela! . Background information and lyrics in the song collection “Black-red song booklet”; accessed on September 6, 2018 (PDF)
- ↑ ¡Ay Carmela! y la batalla del Ebro . Historia para Aburrir, February 23, 2011 (Span.)
- ^ Song and Popular Culture. Yearbook of the German Folk Song Archive Freiburg. Edited by Michael Fischer and Fernand Höhner, 57th year, 2012, ISBN 978-3-830-92787-7 , page 534 f. Partly online at Google Books.
- ^ El Ejército del Ebro . Comparison of different versions on antiwarsongs.org; accessed on September 6, 2018 (PDF)
- ↑ Query in the iTunes Music Store on September 6, 2018
- ↑ Query in the iTunes Music Store and discogs on September 6, 2018
- ↑ Ay Carmela - Song of Freedom (1990) / Full Cast & Crew at iMDb; Hemingway & Gellhorn . James Christopher Monger, allmusic, both accessed September 6, 2018
- ↑ Viva la Quince Brigada Lyrics . Lyrics on songtexte-lyrics.de, accessed on September 6, 2018