Pust wsegda budet solnze
Pust wsegda budet solnze ( Russian Пусть всегда будет солнце ) is a Russian song that wascomposed in1962 by Arkady Ostrowski (1914-1967). The text is ascribed to a boy named Konstantin Barannikow and wasexpanded upon by Lev Ivanovich Oschanin . The American folk singer Pete Seeger made an English version under the title May There Always Be Sunshine a song of the international peace movement . In the GDR it was known under the title Always live the sun . Fredrik Vahle processed the refrain in his children's song The Peace Painter .
history
Russian original
The then 4-year-old Konstantin (Kostja) Barannikow from Moscow is said to have written the lines that form the chorus of the song in the margin of a drawing in 1928. They were first published in 1960 by the poet Kornei Tschukowski . The composition by Arkadi Ostrowski with the verse text composed by Lev Oschanin was performed by Tamara Miansarowa in 1963 at the Sopot Festival , for which she won first prize. The song became very popular and within a short time it became an integral part of the pioneering culture and one of the most famous children's songs in the entire Soviet Union .
English version
The chorus of the song was translated into English by Thomas Botting and made known worldwide by folk musician Pete Seeger under the title May There Always Be Sunshine . Seeger played the song in the context of his protest against the arms race of the Cold War and against the Vietnam War , breaking it away from the tradition of socialist pioneer organizations. In this form, May There Always Be Sunshine became known in the USA and Western Europe and took its own parallel development there.
Seeger recorded a live version of the song at his concert at Carnegie Hall in Pittsburgh on February 20, 1965. Another recording with the musician Arlo Guthrie appeared in 1975 on their joint album Together in Concert .
German versions
The song was also received separately in the GDR and the Federal Republic of Germany :
A German translation with the title Always live the sun by Hans Naumilkat and Manfred Streubel became known in the GDR and was a popular song of the Young Pioneers , who also often sang it in Russian.
The West German songwriter Fredrik Vahle processed the chorus of the song in the title track of his 1983 album Der Friedensmaler . In it he tells the story of how the song came about and how it was spread by Pete Seeger. The chorus is sung in various languages, including the original Russian text and Seeger's English translation. The German version is a new translation that differs from Naumilkat's and Streubel's version. Vahle makes no reference to the Soviet Union or the GDR in his story, but, like Pete Seeger, emphasizes the importance of the song as an international peace song.
Further processing
A Hebrew translation by Gideon Koren under the title אלוהים שמור על אמא was recorded in 1974 by his band The Brothers and the Sisters .
The musician Raffi published translations of the song into English, French and Spanish on his 2002 album Let's Play . In his autobiography, he wrote that he first heard May There Always Be Sunshine from Pete Seeger, who personally explained the background of the song to him.
The Swedish group Hootenanny Singers around Björn Ulvaeus used the melody of Pust wsegda budet solnze in 1964 for their song Gabrielle with completely different lyrics, which was particularly successful in the Norwegian charts. There was an English, Dutch, Finnish, Low German, Swedish and German version of this song (Remember).
text
The first stanza of the original Russian text tells of a little boy painting a picture on which he writes his wishes for the future: the sun should always shine, the sky should always be blue, his mother should always be there, and so should he. These words make up the chorus of the song:
|
Russian version (original text) |
Russian version (Latin script) |
English version (Thomas Botting) |
German version (Naumilkat / Streubel) |
German version (Fredrik Vahle) |
|
Пусть всегда будет солнце, |
Pust wsegda budjet solnze, |
May there always be sunshine, |
Always live the sun, |
The sun should always shine, |
The other stanzas of the Russian version and the version known in the GDR are an appeal to mankind to secure peace for the sake of the children. Pete Seeger only sang the chorus; Fredrik Vahle composed a new stanza text to a melody of his own composition, the beginning of which is based on the original version, but then moves away from it.
Web links
- Audio sample of the original Russian version
- Excerpt from May There Always Be Sunshine by Pete Seeger on Musicline.de
- Excerpt from Always live the sun , sung by the Great Radio Children's Choir Leipzig, on Musicline.de
- Excerpt from The Peace Painter by Fredrik Vahle on Musicline.de
- Lexicon entry in the song dictionary
Individual evidence
- ^ Yevgeny Yevtushenko : Twentieth Century Russian Poetry. Silver and Steel. An Anthology. New York, Doubleday 1993, ISBN 0-385-05129-8 , p. 1010.
- ↑ John E. Bowlt: Stalin as Isis and Ra. Socialist Realism and the Art of Design. In: The Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts. No. 24, 2002, ISSN 0888-7314 , p. 37.
- ↑ Marina Balina, Evgeni Dobrenko (ed.): Petrified Utopia. Happiness Soviet Style. Anthem Press 2009, ISBN 978-1-84331-310-6 , p. 8.
- ↑ Susan Emily Reid: Khrushchev in Wonderland. The Pioneer Palace in Moscow's Lenin Hills, 1962. University of Pittsburgh 2005, p. 24.
- ↑ Peter John Georgeoff: The Social Education of Bulgarian Youth. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press 1968, p. 145.
- ↑ Thomas Goll: Songs from the GDR as sources in historical-political lessons. In: Thomas Goll, Thomas Leuerer (Eds.): Ostalgie als memory culture ? Symposium on song and politics in the GDR (= Würzburg University publications on history and politics. Volume 6). Nomos, Baden-Baden 2004, ISBN 3-8329-0999-0 , p. 22.
- ↑ Michael Pilz: CD review: "Be happy and sing - The most beautiful pioneer songs". In: Der Spiegel . December 10, 1998, accessed December 22, 2011 .
- ↑ Fredrik Vahle : The great Vahle songbook. Songs and lyrics that children enjoy. Beltz, Weinheim / Basel 2000, ISBN 3-407-22070-7 , pp. 221–222.
- ↑ http://www.gidikoren.com/gidikoren/album_hasfina.asp
- ^ Raffi : The Life of a Children's Troubadour. To Autobiography. Vancouver, Homeland Press 1999, ISBN 1-896943-44-6 , p. 233.
- ↑ http://www.norwegiancharts.com/showitem.asp?interpret=Hootenanny+Singers&titel=Gabrielle&cat=s , accessed on June 23, 2012.