Musician Poets

 

 

 

 

                                         

Paul Celan -Todesfugue  

The poet reading his own poem:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVwLqEHDCQE

Somebody drew my attention to this recording today. You don't have to understand German, to apprecite this. You don't even have to understand the meaning of the words, you can just listen to the way Celan intones and times the rhythm of his speech. The stress, phrasing, repetition and slowing up, at the end of words he really wants us to remember is extraordinary. Musicians can learn a lot from poets. You also do not have to understand a language, to listen to it and hear it as if it is music.

Sometimes as English speakers we apologise for not knowing or understanding other languages, but I think the first step is just to listen for a while. Allowing your ear just to swim through the sounds and be ignorant.(hopefully temporarily!) Later on, you can find out what the words mean and try and understand their deeper  significance. Of course there are always English translations but how different it is to hear a poem spoken in it's original language by a great interpreter. Looking at it on the page does not have the same effect.

In the german language this poem is iconic and a national symbol. I cannot explain the deep resonances of this poem in a short blog post. And actually all I am trying to do, is encourage people to hear the music in language and the language in music. 

Many  artists and musicians have been inspired by this great poem. I will just name a few, in case you have not come across them.

Anselm Kiefer has  made a whole series of artworks inspired by Celan, below I have just put two of them,  named after the German and Jewish icons of the poem  Margarete (1981)  and Sulamith (1983) ( Sulamith comes from the Song of Songs)

 

Harrison Birtwistle has set the poem to music  in " Pulse Shadows", as has Hans- Jürgen von Bose and Samuel Adler to name but a few. Phrases from the poem have been used in punk rock songs (Slime) and even book titles ( a biography of the philosopher Martin Heidegger  who collaborated with the Nazis )

But for me it is the recording of Celan at the start of this post, that stops me in my tracks.