Mi Contra Fa

porkCHOP porkCHOP

The reversed emphasis on "pork CHOP" in "None Suffer" is really starting to annoy me.  I'm not sure if it sounds as bad as I think it does, but I'd like to fix it.  Not sure how, yet.

GTP: Non sofre with edits

Ho-ly Ma-ry will suffer not
That her true-hearted pilgrims be put on the spot
She hears their prayers and she will answer them
For she does not abandon her own children

This is a story of Mary's blessing
Miracle done all at her command
Nine of her pilgrims were walking onward
Visit her shrine is what they had planned
Darkness did fall so they all found an inn
To take meat and some bread and some good red wine
Nine hearty suppers from landlord they asked
Then to rooms for to pray went the faithful nine

Nine hearty suppers is what they asked for
Nine hearty suppers he did provide
That's what he gave to the young girl serving
She saw the food and her eyes opened wide
There was so much on the platter she held
So much bread and the wine and the nine pork chops
Good pious pilgrims do love charity
So she stole a fat pork chop from right off the top

Nine pious pilgrims sat down to dinner
Broke their white bread and they passed their wine
But when they went for to share their pork chops
Eight on the plate they found, not their nine
So they all prayed to the Virgin so fair
Yes they prayed that she might help them in this thing
Asked that she send them another pork chop
That their dinner in full to her servants she'd bring

Knock-knocking, rapping sound, where's it come from?
I think it's coming from that trunk there
Open the trunk very slowly, slowly
What could be making the knocking there?
See, it's a pork chop all juicy and fat
That is dancing about in our wooden trunk.
It is a miracle, nobody doubt
To her shrine we will take it, to give the monks

So they didn't eat the pork chop sent them
Took it with them to the shrine instead
If Mary gave me tasty pork chop
I think I'd eat it with wine and bread!
But to her shrine they did take that pork chop
To her shrine where it hangs on a silken thread
Now it's a famous and holy pork chop
And no one will dare eat it with wine or bread

GTP: Non sofre edits

Line-by-line fixes to problems in the first draft:

Refrain line 4: For she does not abandon her own children
Problem: Emphasis wrong on "children"
Resolution: Singing it... it doesn't strike me as being so bad, actually.  For now, I'll leave it.

Verse 2, Line 7: That's what he gave to the young serving girl
Problem: Musical emphasis turns this into YOUNG serVING girl
Resolution: "young girl serving," "young girl servant," "serving girl there"... I dislike nonce words (although I'll use them) so I tend to want to go with "young girl serving."  What's she serving? Dinner, clearly.  I'll run it past some other people to see if the meaning comes through.

Verse 3, Line 6: Yes they prayed that she might help them in this thing
Problem: Sounds vaguely gangster; "thing," like "stuff," is a word best avoided
Resolution: None as yet. It's not that bad and one of the goals for the GTP is to knock these pieces out quickly.  It's singable and the meaning is clear, so I'll leave it alone.

Verse 3, Line 8: That their dinner in full to her servants she'd bring
Problem: Flagged for scansion
Resolution: Was I smoking something? The line seems to scan fine this morning.

Verse 4, Line 6: That is dancing about inside of our trunk
Problem: Stress on "of" is awkward to sing
Resolution: "That is dancing about in our SOMEthing TRUNK" - traveling/trav'ling?  Hate to delete the syllable to force the fit.  "Baggage" is redundant.  "Leather"?  Or "wooden"?  What's a trunk made of?  Wood, probably.  "That is dancing about in our wooden trunk."

Verse 5, Line 3: If Mary gave me a pork chop to eat
Problem: Stress on "to" is bad form, possibly awkward
Resolution: If Mary gave me a tasty pork chop. 

Verse 5, Lines new 3, 5 and 7: "pork chop" in all
Problem: Musically stressed as "pork CHOP" instead of "PORK chop"
Resolution: This is a toughie.  Yesterday, I wrote with the assumption that either single syllable word, pork or chop, could take the stress. But you know, we say "PORK chop" pretty consistently.  I'll have to think about this one.

GTP: Non sofre rewrite

Again, it's a virelai or estampie-like in form, so the tune for the refrain is also the second part of each verse's melody.  This is the first draft.

Refrain:
Ho-ly Ma-ry⁰ will suffer not
That her true-hearted pilgrims be put on the spot
She hears their prayers and she will answer them
For she does not abandon her own children¹

This is a story of Mary's blessing
Miracle done all at her command
Nine of her pilgrims were walking onward
Visit her shrine is what they had planned



Darkness did fall so they all found an inn
To take meat and some bread and some good red wine
Nine hearty suppers from landlord they asked
Then to rooms for to pray went the faithful nine

Nine hearty suppers is what they asked for
Nine hearty suppers he did provide
That's what he gave to the young serving girl
She saw the food and her eyes opened wide
There was so much on the platter she held
So much bread and the wine and the nine pork chops
Good pious pilgrims do love charity
So she stole a fat pork chop from right off the top

Nine pious pilgrims sat down to dinner
Broke their white bread and they passed their wine
But when they went for to share their pork chops
Eight on the plate they found, not their nine
So they all prayed to the Virgin so fair
Yes they prayed that she might help them in this thing
Asked that she send them another pork chop
That their dinner in full to her servants² she'd bring

Knock-knocking, rapping sound, where's it come from?
I think it's coming from that trunk there
Open the trunk very slowly, slowly
What could be making the knocking there?³
See, it's a pork chop all juicy and fat
That is dancing about inside of our trunk
It is a miracle, nobody doubt
To her shrine we will take it, to give the monks

So they didn't eat the pork chop sent them
Took it with them to the shrine instead
If Mary gave me a pork chop to eat
I think I'd eat it with wine and bread!
But to her shrine they did take that pork chop
To her shrine where it hangs on a silken thread
Now it's a famous and holy pork chop
And no one will dare eat it with wine or bread⁴

0 - Two notes each on "Ho-" and "Ma-"
1 - Emphasis is wrong on children; music goes chil-DREN instead of CHIL-dren
2 - This should be a one syllable word and/or the line needs a rewrite
3 - "There" rhymes with "there."  Something needs a rewrite, possibly involving "dare" or "scare"
4 - Reusing the rhyme here, although it is echoing the earlier line, I think to some effect

GTP: Non sofre (Cantiga 159)

Working from the liner note translation of the Martin Best Ensemble and the original as found here.

If I'm parsing the language correctly at all, the refrain is two lines, 15 and 17 syllables.  Rhymes are aa. The verses are 14-14-15-17, with the last two lines being sung to the same melody as the refrain. Rhymes are bbba.

Each of those lines, musically, feels like it's two parts.

The tune, as I know it, does not have that many notes!  Zah?  Listening to the recording isn't much of a help - they go so fast I can't make out which words they are singing, let alone to which notes.  If anything, I expected melismas (several notes per syllable) in some places.

Approach taken is "good enough for folk music," at least for the first draft.  I'll put a "/" in to denote where the musical break is in each line, because there's a lot of stretching and melismas going on. I'll also boldface the syllables that fall on stressed notes.

Refrain (needs work):
Ho-ly Ma-ry will suffer not / Her loy-al pil-grims be put on the spot (x2)

(Each half of the  line should actually be its own line, rather than just repeating the refrain.)

There is a miracle that I'd like to / Tell you all about, listen well
('that I'd like to' is asking for rhythmic trouble)
That Holy Mary had a hand in / That's the story, as I heard tell
Nine praying pilgrims, Rocamador bound / where the monks and the nuns live in their cells
(stress on "in" isn't good form)
Simply and humbly they went over land / very simply and humbly as good Christians ought

Then in the e-ven-ing, lodgings found they / Entered town and found an inn
(Not happy with inverted word order)
Meat and bread is what they asked for / Supper ordered for all within
Wine for their drink, but then they all got up / to their rooms where they prayed to the fair Virgin
(It's Virgin, not Virgin)
To beg her, to beg her Son to attend / and to hear all their prayers and their pious thoughts

Hrm.  The next two verses have five lines... what?

Also, a close translation is proving... slightly stodgy.  There's too much set-up and not enough dancing pork chop.  (And way too much religion for the comfort of many Scadians, although there's also an element of 'why is that my problem?' there.)

Maybe the best thing would be for me to take the overall story and rewrite it in the details, using the same tune.  My very own Hollywood adaptation.

GTP: Non sofre Santa Maria

Original lyrics.  I'll be using the liner notes from my Martin Best Ensemble CD for a non-poetic translation.  The lines in the linked page are long; if I were breaking them up by musical phrases, I'd cut them in half.  Then you get, for rhymes:

ABA'B for the refrain (A = Maria and A' = romarias)

CD ED FD GB for the verse.

I will almost certainly not be able to sustain that for all five verses; I don't know what sound I could pick for "D" so that I could find fifteen useful rhymes.  I expect I'll do as I did for "Morenica" and use a different "D" rhyme for each verse, but try to tie each one to the refrain with the same "B" rhyme.

I'm also not going to worry so much about preserving the exact sense of the lyrics this time around, because this isn't a lyric; it's a narrative, a story.  The precise images are less important than the overall story and its impact, which appears to be meant to be humorous.  In outline:

Nine pilgrims are going to Mary's shrine.  They stop at an Inn for dinner and order nine steaks.  While the steaks cook, they pray.  While they pray, a serving girl steals one of their steaks.  Sitting down to eat, they find they are a steak short, and again pray that it will be restored to them.  And lo!  They hear a knocking sound from a traveler's trunk, open it up and discover a steak dancing around inside!  And they took the miraculous steak to the shrine and hung it before the altar on a silken thread.

Seems a shame they didn't eat the steak, since one assumes that's what Mary gave it to them for.  It's what's for dinner!

GTP: I, the lovely darksome woman

PDF sheet music and lyrics for my English translation of Yo me soy la morenica from the Cancionero de Upsala. (My original research on the song and source here.) Lyrics have changed slightly from what was here in the blog.

Maybe I'll do a podcast of it on Thursday.

GTP: Morenica, lest I forget

Couldn't sleep last night, worked out the second verse while tossing and turning:

I, the rose which is not thorny
Solomon sang of my beauty
Black I am, but still am lovely
And they will all sing for me

Cut, print.  I should do a PDF of the music and translation to post.

GTP: Morenica

"Darksome" is a word; it apparently means "somber or dark." 

Here's the original refrain:
Yo me soy la morenica
Yo me soy la morena

Given that "morenica" is pretty much just a diminutive of "morena," I think I could/should do a similar echo.

I, the lovely darksome woman
I, the beauty who is dark

The day after, I'm still moderately pleased with verses 1 and 3.  It's verse 2 that needs the work.  The final line can stay, but the rest need to go.  The original:

Soy la sin espina rosa
Que Salomon canta y glosa
Nigra sum sed formosa
Y por me se cantara

I am the without-thorns rose
Of which Solomon sings and writes/glosses
Nigra sum sed formosa*
And for me they will all sing

*"Black I am, but beautiful", a Latin quote from the Vulgate edition of the Song of Songs

Workin' on it.

GTP: Yo Me Soy La Morenica

"GTP" is the Great Translation Project.

Here's a link to some ChoralWiki sheet music for the original Yo me soy la morenica.  I've sung this song in Spanish with harp accompaniment (PDF of documentation here).  Now I'll take a stab at translating it.  This is a first draft and is definitely rough in places.

Rhyme scheme
The original has a refrain that is only very loosely rhymed or unrhymed ("morenica" with "morena;" they both end in "-a" but that's it).  The verses go aaaB, where the a's can vary between verses but the B's are all the same.

Meter
There are some rough patches in the original, too; I'm fairly sure the first verse tries to stuff two syllables of "Que en" into a single, slurred "que-en."  (At least, that's how I sing it.)  "Ni de aquel" in the third verse is also three syllables in the melodic space of two.  So if I need to subdivide a note here or there to make things fit, I'm not going to flog myself over it.

First draft
Chorus:
I, the lovely darksome woman            [Is "darksome" a word?]
I, the beauty who is black

Handsome tall dark man, good lookin'
Was so guilty of the same sin
That in my heart no, never has been
And not ever shall it be

I, the red rose thornless growing
That King Solomon was showing         [Hard-ish to sing, because it shifts the "Salomon" of the original over a note and a stress]
Black I am, my beauty flowing            [Can beauty flow?  I thought about leaving this in Latin, as it is in the original, but can't think of English rhymes for "formosa."]
And they will all sing for me

I, the bush that is on fire
Untouched as the flames rise higher
It is a flame that will inspire
Among the others it burns free