Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Redz Kur Translation

Spreading information on the internet:

Redz Kur
Jānis Kalniņš (1904-2000)

Redz’, kur jā-ja div’ bajāri ē, ē zīda pušķi zemi slauka, ē zemi slauk’!
Dažu sētu tie izjāja ē, ē tie izjāja dažus suņus lādināja ē lādināj’.
Dažu nakti tie baroja ē, ē tie baroja izjājamus kumeliņus, ē kumeliņs.

Esneietu to celiņu ē, ē kur bajāra dēliņš jāja
ē dēliņš jāj’.

Purvu bridu, niedras lauzu, niedras lauzu, no bajāra vairījosi, ē vairījos.

Lo, two fine fellows come riding, their silken tassels sweeping the ground!
They rode through many a farmstead yard, set many dogs a-barking
and spent several nights feeding up good horses for riding.

To avoid meeting these fellows, the orphan girl doesn’t go by the path that they will take, but takes the long way round through the marshes.

3 comments:

Mezzo with a Mission said...

Can't we just sing it in Portuguese?...

Anonymous said...

^Haha. I laughed out loud.

PearPianist said...

Thank you for the translation. I am working on a piano version of this folksong, and it is extremely useful to know what the Latvian verse means!