Albatros (song)

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Albatros , sometimes called The Albatros , is a song by the group Karat that was released in 1979. The text is by Norbert Kaiser , the composition by Ulrich "Ed" Swillms .

history

The first record release of the song was in 1979 on the album Over Seven Bridges . In the same year the album was released under the name Albatros in the Federal Republic of Germany. On this album the piece is referred to as The Albatross . The song did not appear as a single. In 1979 the title reached number 13 in the GDR annual hit parade , the following year number 19. In September 1979 the nine-minute DEFA disco film Albatros was released, which is similar to a music video, but also contains spoken passages. The exterior shots were taken on the Caspian Sea .

Further editions of the piece subsequently appeared on best-of albums. Another version of the piece was created in 2007 in the name of the Ostrock in Klassik concert series in collaboration with the German Film Orchestra Babelsberg . Claudius Dreilich was the lead singer .

description

Excerpt from the sheet music of the instrumental middle section of Albatros

The text is by Norbert Kaiser, who worked for Karat for a long time, the composition by Ulrich Swillms, the band's keyboardist. The piece was recorded in the following line-up in the Amiga Studio Berlin:

Albatros is 8; 15 minutes long and written in a minor key. The music is a synthesis of song-like, symphonic and rock elements. The piece begins with restrained synthesizer sounds , followed by calm singing, until it takes on a powerful, orchestral character in the middle section. The flight of the albatross over the calm or troubled sea is portrayed musically. A final verse with a powerful guitar riff as in the middle section follows before the song ends with synthesizer music as it began.

The pictorial text is about the love of freedom of an albatross who lives on the sea and defies people and storms. In captivity, however, he perishes if he cannot - as in the song - break his "fetters and chains" in order to fly out to sea again. The singer emphasizes: "The albatross knows no borders" and "To be trapped means death for him". The text can be understood as a criticism of the lack of freedom in the GDR . According to Bernd Römer, the censorship authority only approved the text because it echoes the works of the communist poet Pablo Neruda .

Outputs (without compilations)

Albums

Movies

Others

A documentary DVD by the band Karat, released in 2011, is called Albatros: A band tells its story .

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Götz Hintze: Rock Lexicon of the GDR. 2nd Edition. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-89602-303-9 , pp. 325–326.
  2. ↑ a b DEFA Discofilm , accessed on May 31, 2018.
  3. ↑ Ostrocker: the censorship played out. In: Volksstimme . November 14, 2014, accessed May 30, 2018.