Yodel!

[OurCreature]

Franzl isn't with us any more; born in 1930, he passed away 3 weeks before his 85th birthday in 2015. He and his wife had been married for just over 60 years. His home town was Munich.

[TRavine]

So yes, my dad does know who Franzl Lang was. Would have been a shame if he hadn't, whith him collecting music records and all. Sad to hear that he passed.

[TRavine]

Here's a true Austrian classic: Hubert von Goisern. Always liked that song. (It's sung in Austrian dialect)



Lyrics:

Can't you hear it?
How the time passes?
Only yesterday,
people talked so differently.
The young ones have grown old
and the old ones have died,
and yesterday became today,
and today will soon be tomorrow

Can't you hear it?
How the time passes?



The video to this was shot in Hallstatt, a very famous little town alongside a lake. My grandfather lived there for a few years, learning the cabinetmaker's trade.

[OurCreature]

Hallstatt, a very famous little town alongside a lake.

Famous as in having the predominant proto-Celtic culture in Central Europe named after it - the Hallstatt Culture covered the Bronze Age and the Iron Age time-wise. Hallstatt itself was lucky enough to have a big salt mine which guaranteed its prosperity in that period.

The song is very pleasant to listen to, and I'm grateful to Tom for his translation of the lyrics!

[TRavine]

Hallstatt, a very famous little town alongside a lake.

Famous as in having the predominant proto-Celtic culture in Central Europe named after it - the Hallstatt Culture covered the Bronze Age and the Iron Age time-wise. Hallstatt itself was lucky enough to have a big salt mine which guaranteed its prosperity in that period.

The song is very pleasant to listen to, and I'm grateful to Tom for his translation of the lyrics!

Why am I not surprised that you would know all about that, OC?
And you are absolutely right, of course. We actually went to see the salt mine when I was in school. They have wooden slides there which you can use to get down into the mining gallery and we went on the mining car too, which I remember being a lot of fun.

They actually rebuilt Hallstatt in China as a tourist attraction, but I think they accidentally did it laterally reversed.

[OurCreature]

Why am I not surprised that you would know all about that, OC?

- a rare feeling of omniscience..................often laid low by the next question on popular culture............

[TRavine]

I recorded two songs on the accordion for Merry, and she said I should also post them here.

The first is "Erzherzog Johann Jodler" a very famous Yodel song from Styria (one of the more alpine federal states of Austria).



The second is a song called "Hiatamadl" which is about a guy who does not want to marry a shepherd's girl, because her legs are not strong enough - he wants a girl from the city, who is well-built.



This is my dad's accordeon. He got it when he was a boy, and it's over 60 years old. Good instrument, that one!

[AnnabellaGrace]

I recorded two songs on the accordion for Merry, and she said I should also post them here.

The first is "Erzherzog Johann Jodler" a very famous Yodel song from Styria (one of the more alpine federal states of Austria).



The second is a song called "Hiatamadl" which is about a guy who does not want to marry a shepherd's girl, because her legs are not strong enough - he wants a girl from the city, who is well-built.



This is my dad's accordeon. He got it when he was a boy, and it's over 60 years old. Good instrument, that one!

What a treat for us all, Tom! Lovely, just lovely!!!

[OurCreature]

"Erzherzog Johann Jodler" is the yodel song that Angela, Melanie and Herlinde are singing in turn in the video I linked to earlier in this thread. To save you going back, here's the link again.



What a lovely instrument your Dad's accordion is. And the chap playing it is pretty good as well............ Tom, you are an incredibly talented gentleman!

[TRavine]

What a treat for us all, Tom! Lovely, just lovely!!!

Oh thanks a lot, Annabella Happy you liked it!

[TRavine]

"Erzherzog Johann Jodler" is the yodel song that Angela, Melanie and Herlinde are singing in turn in the video I linked to earlier in this thread. To save you going back, here's the link again.



What a lovely instrument your Dad's accordion is. And the chap playing it is pretty good as well............ Tom, you are an incredibly talented gentleman!

I must indeed have missed that one somehow. It's one of my favourite Yodels of all time, and this version is beautiful!!

Thanks a lot, OC My dad only takes it out on Christmas. He can play the basic Christmas carols on it. I started playing it occasionally when I was a kid - it was WAYYY to big for me - it actually still is HUGE and HEAVY!
Learned all the songs by ear. I do play the piano though, which is a good foundation.

[OurCreature]

Canton Appenzell has an orchestra. Every so often you'll hear a sound like a dog howling and wanting to be let out to escape the music. It is in fact a sort of whistle that looks like a pipe, held between the lips of an elderly-looking gentleman in a pale yellow jacket and a cap and playing a hackbrett. When the full orchestra starts up they remind me a little of the trio playing at dinner in Carry On Up The Khyber.

[OurCreature]

Here's Nicolas Senn and his chum Elias having fun with In The Mood.



The audience seems to like it and I hope you do as well.

[TRavine]

That is some amazing Hackbrett playing.

Here's a very famous zither song; the soundtrack of "The third man", a popular movie taking place in Vienna. Performed by Anton Karas, who also composed it.

[TRavine]

Also, here's a traditional Austrian dance: The "Schuplattler" (shoe slapper), showing some scenes from the lives of the "Holzknechte" (woodcutters). I think it looks a bit riddiculous.

[OurCreature]

Thanks for posting those 2 clips from Youtube, Tom! I enjoyed them both. They also do Schuhplattler at the Oktoberfest in Munich.



Back in my childhood days there used to be a lady called Shirley Abicair who played the zither; she was in fact Australian from Melbourne and born in 1930, coming to the UK around 1952. Upon arrival she had a great stroke of luck because she was photographed by someone looking for pretty faces arriving at the airport, and within weeks she was on the BBC playing her zither. She moved to Oregon in the USA in 1971, and now divides her time between the USA, UK and Australia. YouTube has audio discs of her, but no film of her singing and playing her zither. I got the background info about Ms Abicair from Wikipedia.

[OurCreature]

Two clips for today. The first is 8 years old and shows Joshua Broger playing a tune called Steiner Chibli - I don't know what that means; enjoying the performance is master hackbrett player Nicolas Senn.



And here is a group of people dancing to the same tune............open-air..........in the rain............... I looked on Yahoo! and the dancers are a company called the Crazy Feet Company who mix traditional folk dancing with tap dancing and are based in Oberwil in Canton Basel-Landschaft.

[OurCreature]

Steiner Chibli seems to be a popular tune.

[OurCreature]

Oops! I made a mistake with one of the videos. It's headed up 'Appenzeller Chääsfescht - Trio Fässler-Kölbener' and I thought it was at the Appenzell Cheese Festival. It wasn't - the trio were performing in a competition at Innsbruck. 'Appenzeller Chääsfescht' is the name of the tune and here is young Joshua playing it somewhere else. I got the meaning correct, though.

[OurCreature]

Time for some yodelling! Here's Takeo Ischi who came to Germany to learn more about yodelling and never left. I gleaned that he was helped by Franzl Lang. One person replying to one of his videos described him as the most German man in Germany.