Václav Neckář & Helena Vondráčková - Znám jednu starou zahradu (I Know an Old Garden)

I've realized that I haven't yet posted a single song from a "pohádka" - fairy tale; what a blunder that needs to be rectified!

Fairy-tale films, filmové pohádky, hold a special place in Czech culture. It started in the 1950s when filmmakers turned to adapting fairy tale stories into films as a way to escape the harsh censorship of the Communist Party. The first feature-film fairy tale was Pyšná princezna (The Proud Princess) from 1952, directed by Bořivoj Zeman. Even though it was highly ideological, it became the most-watched Czech film of all time. 

In the 1960s, the censorship was growing more lenient, and the Czechoslovak New Wave affected fairy tales, too. Directors were experimenting with genre and playing with established tropes. Many popular fairy-tale films implement elements of comedy. It has become a tradition to watch these classic pohádky during Christmastime, and since 1993, the Czech public-service broadcaster Česká televize releases a new fairy-tale film every Christmas Eve (and there would probably be public outrage if they didn't).

This song comes from the comedy musical fairy tale Šíleně smutná princezna (The Insanely Sad Princess), written and directed by the same Bořivoj Zeman who directed The Proud Princess. Ivo Fischer wrote the text, and the music was composed by Jan Hammer, Jr., who received several Grammy Awards after he emigrated to the US shortly after the invasion, and is known for theme music of the TV series Miami Vice.

The film was released in June 1968, and stars two of the biggest pop-culture idols of the time, later members of the group Golden Kids, Helena Vondráčková and Václav Neckář (whom you may know from the Oscar-winning film Closely Watched Trains). They play Princess Helena and Prince Václav, who were promised to each other as babies by their fathers, King Dobromysl and King Jindřich, to ensure peace between the two kingdoms. Both Helena and Václav despise the idea of an arranged marriage, and on the way to King Dobromysl's castle, Václav escapes his father's entourage. He accidentally enters the castle garden and meets Helena, but because they're both dressed plainly, it doesn't occur to them that the other may be the king's child.

They fall in love, and in an effort to make her father change his mind about the arranged marriage, they conspire on a plot inspired by a classic fairy tale, The Sad Princess (sometimes called How Honza Made the Princess Laugh). Unfortunately, the King has not read it...

The film creators took quite a few jabs at the regime, which were then disappeared for twenty years. For example, this exchange between the two kings' respective advisors, Iks and Ypsilon:

Y: We must take further...
I: Intrigues?
Y: Yuck! Steps in the common interest.
I: That's the same thing.
Y: But it sounds better.

Their duet Kujme pikle (Let's Conspire) was among the things that were cut out during the post-1968 "normalization", and it only returned after 1989.

You can read more about Czech fairy-tale films here; there's a Czech, Simple Czech, English, and Russian version of the article. The whole website is worth taking a look at; it collects information about Czech cultural and linguistic heritage and is funded by the Ministry of Culture.

Waldemar Matuška - Krysař (The Rat-Catcher)

 

I haven't posted here for a while (a long while), mostly because I've been either busy at work or had family issues. Apologies for that, and if you let me know that you like this blog, I will continue. I just didn't feel the need when I didn't have any followers.

However, in the current situation, a post like this might be relevant to at least a few people. 

There are plenty of Czech songs that reflect on the invasion of 1968, and I picked this one because I believe it reflects perfectly on current events as well. History repeats itself, unfortunately.

That being said, our Ukrainian brothers are putting up a fight that we were not capable of, they are the true heroes. The men who put their lives at risk at the front, the women who are strong enough to leave their husbands behind and take a step into the unknown, moving their children to a foreign country, often without any contact there, and everybody else who are just trying to survive in what looks like an apocalypse.

Sláva Ukrajině!

The song is a cover of Hugues Aufray's Le joueur de pipeau (The Pied Piper), Czech text was written by Ivo Fischer. It was recorded just a year before the invasion of the Warsaw Pact (mostly Soviet) armies in 1968, and it is harrowing in retrospect. And in present times, alas.

Karel Kryl - Dvacet (Twenty)

The holidays are coming to an end and I hope that you've had a nice vacation. This week marked the 49th anniversary of the invasion of the armies of the Warsaw pact in Czechoslovakia, so I think it would be appropriate to once again look at the brilliant work of Karel Kryl.

I chose his song Jeřabiny (Rowanberries) for my very first blogpost, because I simply cannot get enough of Kryl's masterful poetry. Today's song will be a little more complex, so that you can get the gist of why he's praised not only by casual listeners, but also by literature scholars. Dvacet may not be among his most well-known songs, but it is definitely one of my favourites. Kryl wrote it for the 20th anniversary of the invasion, in exile. In his later songs, Kryl tends to play with words and implement very subtle barbs at the Czechoslovak regime. He also criticized the people for not taking action and being compliant with the regime. However, at the same time, he was trying to inspire them to do something, and to give them hope.

Modlitba pro Martu (A Prayer for Martha)

I'd like to dedicate the second part of this series to my number ONE favourite Czech singer, Marta Kubišová. And which other song to begin with than her signature song, A Prayer for Martha?

I'm going be returning to this extraordinary artist many times, because I'm simply in love with every single song she's sung. Her deep voice is captivating like none other's, and her soulful interpretation turns these profound lyrics into an almost transcendental experience.

This song - composed by Jindřich Brabec and written by Petr Rada - was originally written for the TV series Píseň pro Rudolfa III. (A Song for Rudolf III) in 1968 - then called simply "A Prayer". Unsurprisingly, it became immediately connected with the events of the Prague Spring and the following invasion. In 1989, it became the unofficial anthem of the Velvet Revolution. You can read more about this song here or here. Needless to say, in addition to some other protest songs Ms. Kubišová published in 1968-9, the song was banned by the Party and Ms. Kubišová could not perform publically any more.

Karel Kryl - Jeřabiny (Rowanberries)

Alright, so I've decided to kick this site off with a post about my absolute favourite singer-songwriter of all time. Karel Kryl's (1944-1994) speciality were protest songs - "he identified and attacked the stupidity and inhumanity of the Communist and later also post-communist regimes in his home country," reads the introduction of his Wikipedia entry, and continues:

"The lyrics of Karel Kryl's songs are highly poetic and sophisticated, with a frequent use of metaphors and historical allusions. The sparse sounds of an accompanying acoustic guitar served to underscore the natural flow of the lyrics themselves. In certain respects—especially the complexity of his lyrics and his accompaniment by a single acoustic guitar—Kryl was similar to a young Bob Dylan. However, unlike Dylan, the Czech singer had a smooth and pure voice, which gave a hauntingly sad quality to his mournful lyrics. He was bitterly critical of the new regime established after the collapse of communism in his country, including of Václav Havel, and those who were responsible for the destruction of Czechoslovakia in 1992."

Jeřabiny (Rowanberries) is one of Kryl's most famous songs, and also one of the earliest. It was first published on his debut album, Bratříčku, zavírej vrátka (Close the Gate, Little Brother), in 1969 - shortly after the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia. The album's cover was originally supposed to be Josef Koudelka's photo of two dead bodies in a passageway, covered by the Czechoslovak flag from August 1968, but the publishers feared that it would get banned by the censors. Another Koudelka's photo was then chosen instead - again, from August 1968 - of a boy sitting on a street in Prague, with a bullseye drawn on his back.