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We were visiting my husband's parents this Christmas. Three idle days, I was reading Hofstadter's Le Ton beau de Marot for the second time, and came across "Music and sadness" section, where he mentions the Italian song "Bella Ciao":

One topic led to another at random, and at some point - I'll never know why - I was reminded of an Italian restaurant in Ann Arbor where many years ago Carol and I had once eaten, called "Bella Ciao". Out of the blue, I asked, "Does the phrase 'Bella ciao' have some special significance, or is it just something somebody once made up for a restaurant name?" Without warning, Alex launched into a most haunting, sad melody in a very pure singing voice, and I found myself enormously moved without being able to say why, almost as if I'd known this heart-piercing song all my life.

It turned out this song had a complex history. It was originally sung by women called mondine -- workers who did backbreaking labor in the rice paddies -- as their lament about the endless toil and trouble that made up their barren lives. In that way, the original "Bella ciao" was like the old Negro spirituals in the United States, filled with a pain and a sadness so powerful that one could recognize them if one didn't understand the words. However, in World War II, "Bella ciao" took on a new life as the rallying song of the partigiani -- the anti-Fascist who took refuge in high mountains lairs and courageously fought the dark forces of Mussolini. The new words to "Bella ciao" were mostly different, but even so, there was a recognizable commonality of theme -- a sense of suffering, strength, and refusal to give up, even were death to come. Here are some of them:

This morning early,
From sleep I wakened,
My love good-buy, love good-buy
Love good-buy, bye, bye,
This morning early,
From sleep I wakened,
And I found
The enemy.

O freedom fighter,
Spirit me off now,
My love good-buy, love good-buy
Love good-buy, bye, bye,
O freedom fighter,
Spirit me off now,
For I fear that
I shall die.

And should I perish,
By your side fighting,
My love good-buy, love good-buy
Love good-buy, bye, bye,
And should I perish,
By your side fighting,
Then I pray you'll
Bury me.

D. Hofstadter, Le Ton beau de Marot, p.33

I remember this song. We had music classes in school when we were 11-12. Mostly we were made to listen to classical music on records, and sing in chorus to the accompaniment of our teacher. She chose the songs. I think, "Bella ciao" was the only song we actually liked to sing. We sing it in Russian translation. Interesting, that "ciao" (pronounced "chao") wasn't translated, as the word was borrowed into Russian and was quite popular at that time. If my memory serves me right, "bella" was replaced by "Mom", though, and instead of the sad theme of death there was "I go to visit the Sun" -- perhaps this variant of translation was designated specially for Soviet children. :-). Still the text was poetical and tragic enough, and, most important, the original melody was here. I tried to find "Bella ciao" on the Internet and found a few variants, this is the closest to what Hofstadter describes. I wish there was a single-voice-no-accompaniment record...

Here is a rather joyful gipsied :-) version of the song, I like it a lot also.


you have heard a version of this song by Garik Sukachev, have you not? http://neprikasaemye.ru/mp3/bella_chao.mp3
Hi Map, thanks to your article, I'm downloading the song...thank Dmitry too.
I never knew the meaning of the words I sang.. I learned a rough version for entertainment at work, we sing it to work up the crowd of guests on busy nights at the Italian resteraunt where I work. I was looking for the rest of lyrics online when I stumbled across this site. Someone would like to hear a single voice sing it? Maybe I'll record something and send it.. Of course I sing Soprano and all the recordings I've heard have been male. I'm sure my fellow singers at work would appreciate knowing the meaning, thanks!
To Bluefirelucky: sure, send it to mapraputa on gmail...
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