Yodel

Yodelling is singing without text on meaningless syllables; some definitions also require frequent switching between chest and falsetto voice (change of register ). The derived word yodel means either "what happens when someone yodels" ( Nomen Actionis ) or it describes "a person who yodels" ( Nomen Agentis ). In Switzerland the yodeled piece of music is called yodel.

Common features of yodelling are large leaps in intervals and wide pitch ranges .

The yodel should not be confused with the Juchitzer (Juchzer) , the yodel call, the Betruf, the Almschrei (call for understanding between neighboring alpine huts), the cattle call and the cattle row , although there are overlaps. In contrast to the Juchzer and the Ruf, the yodel has a more complex form with several bars and changes in harmony.

Origins

Joseph Ratzinger (grew up in Bavaria) suspects that the eminent theologian Augustinus von Hippo meant yodelling when he wrote of the Jubilus , a “form of wordless calling, screaming or singing”, the “wordless outpouring of joy that is so great that it breaks all words. ” Jubili were later also called ritually fixed melisms of Gregorian chant .

According to numerous assumptions, yodelling is said to be derived from shouting, rows of cows, cattle calls, calls from lumberjacks and salt rafters, from echoes, from the imitation of wind instruments or from shamanic practices. Musical style comes to us traditional yodeling tunes from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries: modern functional harmony, mostly eight-bar Landler - or 16-bar waltz form.

The earliest evidence for the word yodelling comes from the German-speaking Danube region in the 17th and 18th centuries. Yodelling originally meant rough behavior, shouting, shouting people and animals and provoking brawls. The word yodelling did not originally have a musical meaning. Only in this original, non-musical sense of the word can one say that the origins of yodelling go back to prehistoric times: hunters and gatherers, shepherds and warriors called each other to communicate. The musicalization and alpinization of the term yodelling is a work of the cultural journalists in the yodelling fashion, which began in the 1810s, reached Berlin, Vienna, Paris and London, brought numerous alpine singers to German and international stages and animated well-known composers to compose yodelling songs. At that time the word yodel got its current meaning. Some of the numerous synonyms such as dudeln, ludeln, rugusen, zauren, juuzen, jolen, almen and hegatzen occur earlier than the word yodel in vocal musical meaning in printed works, the earliest the word dudeln. In the most important traditional yodelling landscapes, these expressions are still in use, here the word yodelling has not been able to displace the original names until today.

distribution

Yodelling is at home in the German and French-speaking Alps , outside the Alps in the Harz and Thuringian Forest, in Upper Austria's Innviertel ("almern"), in the Mühlviertel and in the Bavarian Forest ("Arien singen").

Chants with meaningless syllables or with alternation between chest and head voices also exist among the African pygmies ( mokombi ), the Eskimos , in the Caucasus , in Melanesia , in Palestine, China, Thailand and Cambodia, in the USA, Spain ( alalá ), in Sápmi ( Lapland ) ( joik , also juoigan ), in Sweden ( kulning , also kölning, kaukning ), Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Georgia ( krimanchuli ), Bulgaria. The American yodelling of the alpine singers comes from this alone. Whether one should call the other chants, which have no cultural-historical connection with Central European yodelling, "yodel" is a matter of dispute.

Today the yodel can often be heard in the context of popular music . One of the best-known Bavarian interpreters was the "yodel king" Franzl Lang . In the resin yodelling contests take place annually in Clausthal-Zellerfeld , Altenbrak and Hesserode instead. Yodelling is still part of the typical regional folklore in the Harz Mountains . It also plays an important role in musical customs in the Ore Mountains , the Thuringian Forest and the Thuringian Slate Mountains .

The Bavarian Andrea Wittmann holds the world record in (continuous) yodelling with 15 hours 11 seconds. The Swiss Peter Hinnen holds another world record : In 1992 he received an entry in the Guinness Book of Records when he set the world record in fast yodelling with 22 yodelling tones in a single second. Oesch's third place made it into the Swiss charts in 2008 , not least thanks to Peter Hinnen's voice-acrobatic “Ku-Ku Jodel”.

Alpine yodelling

In the alpine folk song , the yodel was developed into a yodel song by adding a yodel to a song. A distinction is made here between the sung yodel - which is only sung in the chest voice and mostly only in short sequences between the song verses - and the beaten yodel in which the chest and falsetto voices frequently and artistically alternate. Beaten yodels can be very long and require real vocal acrobatics.

Most yodelling songs are polyphonic; yodelling often appears as the turning and closing refrain of folk songs. Particularly in Switzerland, and partly also in the rest of the Alpine region, yodelling in choirs developed in the 19th century. The ecclesiastical, sacred folk music tradition, for example in South Tyrol, has one or more voices yodelling. The best-known example is probably the devotional yodeler , which has been handed down since 1830 and is now mostly sung as a three- song or chorus. And instrumental yodels are also played by small groups.

Local names are Wullaza ( Styria ), Almer ( Upper Austria ), Dudler ( Lower Austria and Vienna ), Gallnen ( Upper Bavaria ), Ari ( Bavarian Forest ), Roller (Upper Harz), Gäuerli or Ruggusseli ( Appenzellerland ), Naturjutz ( Muotathal , Ybrig and Schwyz ), Juchzer and others.

Probably the most extensive yodel collection was published by Josef Pommer in 1902 : 444 Jodler und Juchezer .

Yodelling worldwide

Even outside the European Alpine region and the music typically associated with it, yodelling was and is used as a stylistic device, according to the American DJ and “yodel researcher” Bart Plantenga in almost thirty different musical styles.

The Old Chisholm Trail

In the USA and Australia in particular , yodelling was very important in the field of country music . After the first connections between Alpine yodelling and Anglo-American traditions in the Appalachian Mountains at the beginning of the 19th century, guest performances by Austrian and Swiss artists first aroused the interest of a broader public in yodelling in the 1930s. There was also an increasing number of American artists performing in this style. At the same time, in the area of wandering vaudeville and minstrel shows, influenced by Afro-American traditions, a new style of yodel emerged that was also influenced by the blues . This was picked up by white old time musicians, in 1924 the guitarist Riley Puckett published a (then called) "Hillbilly" song with yodels. The American country singer Jimmie Rodgers developed blue yodeling in 1927 , where he enriched elements of the blues and traditional white music with yodelling. His first hit T for Texas (Blue Yodel) drew numerous followers and inspired countless musicians who emulated him.

In addition, yodelling is still an important part of western music , but it differs significantly from the country performances.

In Jazz was Leon Thomas an outstanding representative. He used yodelling as a stylistic device in Scat , drawing on ancient African influences such as the singing of the pygmies , whose singing traditions he had studied intensively. Groundbreaking in this context was his collaboration with Pharoah Sanders on The Creator Has a Master Plan (1969).

Yodelling and new folk music

Contemporary yodelling artists who combine yodelling with new folk music are z. B. the Swiss Christine Lauterburg , Christina Zurbrügg and the German Thomas Hauser .

Oddities

With his sketch Die Jodelschule and the concept of the yodelling diploma, Loriot caricatured the tendency of some Germans to take even the funniest seriously and to develop systematic rules for them.

In the 1975 album Pete Seeger & Arlo Guthrie : Together In Concert there is the song Yodeling . In it, Seeger describes how good yodelling sounds in the urban canyons of New York and urges concert-goers to try it out the next morning to wake up New York's residents.

Classic

Richard Strauss composed some almost unsingable yodels for the role of Fiakermilli in his opera Arabella .

literature

Max Peter Baumann : Music Folklore and Music Folklorism. An ethnomusicological study of the functional change in yodelling , Winterthur 1976.
Franz Födermayr , Gerlinde Haid : yodelling, yodelling, yodelling. In: Oesterreichisches Musiklexikon . Online edition, Vienna 2002 ff., ISBN 3-7001-3077-5 ; Print edition: Volume 2, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 2003, ISBN 3-7001-3044-9 .
Lutz Wille: How old is yodelling in the Harz Mountains? In: Sachsen-Anhalt-Journal , Issue 1, 2020, p. 25