A cuckoo on a tree

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A cuckoo on a tree (also a cuckoo sat on a tree ) is a German children's song ( moving Singspiel ), folk song and poem from the Bergisches Land (19th century). The lyricist and the composer are unknown. In 1838 it appeared in Erk - Irmer's German Folksongs 1 . An early version is also in a small collection of carnival songs , Narhalla songs , Mainz around 1842. Since around 1900, the song has been in the repertoire of books of utility songs from the Wandervogel and the Bündische Jugend and in hiking song books.

The meaning of the text of this very famous folk song has been lost over time. The " cuckoo " symbolizes freedom and resistance, the "hunter" embodies the absolutist ruler who wants to suppress or even eradicate the idea of ​​freedom. But the desire for freedom keeps coming back.

Well-known interpreters of the song are Nena , PR Kantate , Rio Reiser and Hannes Wader .

Text versions

Current versions

On a tree a cuckoo, -
Sim sa la bim, bam ba, sa la du, sa la dim
A cuckoo sat on a tree.

Then came a young hunter -
Sim sa la bim, bam ba, sa la du, sa la dim
A young hunter came along.

He shot the poor cuckoo, -
Sim sa la bim, bam ba, sa la du, sa la dim
He shot the poor cuckoo dead.

And when a year passed, -
Sim sa la bim, bam ba, sa la you, sa la dim
And when a year had passed.

There was the cuckoo again -
Sim sa la bim, bam ba, sa la du, sa la dim
The cuckoo was there again (also: alive).

Then the people were happy -
Sim sa la bim, bam ba, sa la du, sa la dim
. The people were very happy.

Text from 1838

On a tree a cuckoo -
sim sa la dim bam ba sa la du sa la dim,
On a tree sat a cuckoo.

Then came a young hunter -
sim sa la dim bam ba sa la du sa la dim,
there came a young hunter-man:

He shot the poor cuckoo -
sim sa la dim bam ba sa la du sa la dim,
who shot the poor cuckoo to death !

melody

The melody according to Ludwig Erk, Wilhelm Irmer: The German folk songs with their singing modes , Berlin 1838, p. 21:

\ relative c '' {\ key g \ major \ time 5/4 \ autoBeamOff d ^ \ markup {\ halign # -0.5 "Moderately agitated." } b8 gadd [c] a4 | g8 g16 g g8 gg g16 g \ bar "" \ break a8 f sharp16 f sharp d4 | d 'b8 gadd [c] a8. r16 | g4 \ frr r2 \ bar "|." } \ addlyrics {\ set stanza = # "1." A cuckoo | on a tree sim sa la dim bam ba sa la du sa la dim, | a cuckoo on a tree | sat. }

Others

There is a related nursery rhyme in Sweden, Norway and Denmark (recorded before 1886). In this parallel song, however, the bird is a raven. In Danish there is a translated early document with the three stanzas in Erk-Irmer (1838), a crow sat high on a branch ... an ugly hunter shoots the poor crow from the tree , in a play by JL Heiberg , dated 1840.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c The German folk songs with their ways of singing. Collected and edited. by Ludwig Erk and Wilhelm Irmer, 1st issue. Berlin: Plahn'sche Buchhandlung (Louis Ritze) 1838, p. 21 (No. 20) ( digitized , transcription in the Historisch-Kritischen Liederlexikon).
  2. ↑ Cf. Otto Holzapfel , Liedverzeichnis , Volume 1. Hildesheim: Georg Olms 2006, p. 134 (with further information) = Otto Holzapfel : Liedverzeichnis: The older German-language popular song tradition . Online version since January 2018 on the homepage of the Folk Music Archive of the District of Upper Bavaria (in PDF format; further updates planned), see song file "Auf ein Baum ein Kuckuck ..."
  3. ↑ Student for Europe, Student for Berlin e. V. (Ed.): Liederkiste: Liederbuch II. 2nd edition, Bad Soden 1977.
  4. ↑ Lyrics on ingeb.org, accessed on June 25, 2011.
  5. ^ Johan Ludvig Heiberg: Vaudeviller , Volume 1. Copenhagen: Reitzel 1895, pre-bound part p. 33 f. (in the Danish vaudeville monologue Emilie's Palpitation , 1840).