Plaisir d'amour

One of my favourite classical (wince!) songs at the moment is "Plaisir d'amour". It's a beautiful and very moving song of lost love written in 1780 by Jean Martini (aka Johann Scwartzendorf, of all things!) to words by Jean de Florian. The song inspired Elvis Presley's "Can't help falling in love with you". I've been practising it for a while now but still can't quite "open" my voice on the high F's and G's. But, as my teacher says, it will come with time, and I know it will. I think it's a must for the CD I'm planning to record.

The lyrics of the song go like this:

Plaisir d'amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d'amour dure toute la vie.
J'ai tout quitté pour l'ingrate Silvie,
Elle me quitte et prend un autre amans.
Plaisir d'amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d'amour dure toute la vie.
"Tant que cette eau coulera doucement
Vers ce ruisseau qui borde la prairie,
Je t'aimerai", me répétait Silvie.
L'eau coule encore, elle a changé pourtant.
Plaisir d'amour ne dure qu'un moment
Chagrin d'amour dure toute la vie.

Pleasure of love lasts only a moment,
Chagrin of love is lifelong.
I left everything for the ingrate Silvie,
She leaves and takes another lover.
Pleasure of love lasts only a moment,
Chagrin of love is lifelong.
"As long as this water will run gently
Towards this brook which borders the meadow,
I will love you", repeated to me Silvie.
The water still runs, Sylvie changed, however.
Pleasure of love lasts only a moment,
Chagrin of love is lifelong.

Being the philistine I am, I only discovered it recently, a couple of months ago to be more or less exact, on my friend Davor's blog. Joan Baez did a version of it, as did Brigitte Bardot, Charlotte Church and Andrea Boccelli, among others. But my favourite version is by Nana Mouskouri (the one Davor posted). Now, I'd listened to Nana as a kid (growing up in Belmore, at that time a very heavily Greek populated suburb, it was more or less obligatory that my friends and I sat around on Saturday mornings watching "The Greek Show" where Nana made many guest appearances) but had never heard this song before.

And see, that's the beauty of blogging to me. Besides getting some personal satisfaction from writing my own blog, I get even more from reading my friends' blogs and learning something new with every post - about the world we live in, about a new song, about a new artist, and most importantly, about them. I feel privileged to be able to take a look at what's going on in their lives and get to know them better. Some of my friends are a suburb away, some are on the other side of the world. But this blogging, perverse as it sometimes may seem putting our hearts and souls "out there", is something that, even though continents apart, keeps us close together.

So without further adue, here is the lovely Nana Mouskouri singing "Plaisir d'amour". I might take her lead and sing it in D too instead of F so I don't sound like a cat in heat on those high F's and G's!

Thanks for the inspiration Davor! And thanks again Ross for inpiring me to sing anew!

It was seven days ago today

Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Oh man, didn't I (and still do) love that album. I'll never forget when I first bought it. It was 1988, I was a hormone infested Year 12 pupil and "it was twenty years ago today, Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play". To celebrate the 20th anniversary of its original release they re-released it as a limited edition red vinyl LP. And being a mega Beatles fan I just had to have it. But I wasn't the only one and had to reserve my copy from the record store near my school. Thankfully, they knew me well and said "no prob, bob!". What bliss it was holding it in my hand and then playing it on my record player...I played it over and over again, knew all the words off by heart, could dissect almost all the millenia of E major scales in "A day in the life", laughed at some of the songs and stopped and pondered others...

And so time goes on and this year marks 40 years since its original release. Sergeant Pepper has "been going in and out of style" since then and apparently the album's not as highly rated as it once was...which makes me think of my blog. "You're such a lovely audience", but I think I'm a bit of a bore and am considering giving up. It's been seven days since I started this blog and I've received a few comments, both good and bad. But like Julia Roberts says in "Pretty Woman", it's easier to remember the bad stuff. But then a friend and fellow blogster said "why should you care what other people think?", which is absolutely true. And so, I've decided to stick to it...for now...

Anyways, here's a great song from the album, one of my faves, written by the "quiet Beatle", George Harrison, "Within you without you". And the lyrics hold true for all of us, this blogster included - "Try to realize it's all within yourself, No-one else can make you change, And to see you're really only very small, And life flows on within you and without you". RIP George...

What can I say?

Yes, what can I say. Except that I've been sucked into the world of blogs. I resisted it for a while, it seemed a bit, I don't know, technical for me I suppose and I'm anything BUT technical (just ask my husband - I can barely change a lightbulb!). But after having read the blogs of a few great friends of mine (who, I might add, write fabulous blogs) I decided, oh, what the hell, let's give it a try. Don't have much to lose except a bit of my time and dignity...

I don't have very high hopes for this blog, I look at it more as a diary of my thoughts, things I've done, recipes I've made (I'll post a yummy recipe for lemon semolina drizzle cake tomorrow), songs I've sung or aspire to sing, things and people that inspire me, most especially things and people that inspire me. My Lord, there's so much inspiration out there, it's sometimes overwhelms me. So much stuff going on and so little time...I'm sure a lot of you out there will agree with me...

Well, that's it for now. I'm gonna do a profile of myself now. How selfabsorbing is that gonna be?!?!

Take care and be very healthy, a little wealthy and most of all, wise,
The Knitting Songbird

PS I bet that some of you that know me are thinking "The Knitting Songbird, what's that all about?!?!?". Well, it's the three 'P's that keep me sane everyday - pjevanje, pletenje and pecenje or in English, singing, knitting and baking. I love to knit and adore Eva Cassidy who was the ultimate songbird so it's an ode to her and my love of knitting that I named my blog The Knitting Songbird. Now that I think about it, maybe I should have named my blog the Baking and Knitting Songbird....too late now!

PPS You're probably asking yourselves about the horse photo too. Well, I've gotten back into horses after a 30-odd year break thanks to my daughter and the Viennese lippizaners I saw in July (the photo is of a Croatian lippizaner).