Nana Mouskouri - Song for Liberty

[Xipe Totec]

Run time: 03:46 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dma4r9ymDC4   Posted on YouTube: January 19, 2008 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: February 06, 2009 By DU Member: Xipe Totec Views on DU: 717

 
As an immigrant to this country, I wanted to share this with all my friends at DU.

Nana Mouskouri - Song for Liberty

When you sing I'm singing with you liberty
When you cry I cry with you in sorrow
When you suffer I'm praying for you liberty
For your struggles will bring us a new tomorrow
Days of sad darkness and fear must one day crumble
For the force of your kindness and love make them tremble
When you sing I'm singing with you liberty
In the void of your absence I keep searching for you
Who are you dream illusion or just reality
Faith ideal desire revolution
I believe you're the symbol of our humanity
Lighting up the world for eternity
I can see why men die to defend you
Try to guard to protect and attend you
When you sing I'm singing with you liberty
With your tears or your joys I love you
Let us sing and rejoice make our own history
Songs of hope with one voice guide us to victory
Liberty, Liberty

More information

The first great opera by Giuseppe Verdi. The usual name Nabucco is short for the full name Nabucodonosor, Italian for the Assyrian* king Nebuchadnezzar. It tells the story of the captivity of the Jews, when Jerusalem was captured by forces led by Nebuchadnezzar's ambitious supposed daughter Abigaille.

Late in the 1800's, Austria occupied Northern Italy, Lombardy specifically. They apparently understood little as they were bemused by the pre-occupation Italians had with music, in particular Verdi's 'Va Pensiero'. They thought is was quaint and did not attach much importance to it at the time.

On the streets, the walls, they would find scrawled or painted the word VERDI. And so they thought everyone was in love with the composer. In fact, that word was a call to nationhood and spoke to Italian patriotism, but perhaps more to Lombardy re-unification. Because it was not just the song - it was because the name of Verdi was also an acronym for Vittorio Emmanuele Re d'Italia. (Vittorio Emmanuele, King of Italy).

Special thanks to Historian Marzio Apolloni for this intriguing information.
December, 2003

The Libreto translated to English reads:

Fly, thoughts, on wings of gold;
go settle upon the slopes and the hills,
where, soft and mild,
the sweet air of our native land smells fragrant!
Greet the banks of the Jordan
and Zion's toppled towers.
Oh, my country so lovely and lost!
Oh, memory so dear and despairing!
Golden harp of the prophetic seers,
why do you hang mute upon the willow?
Rekindle our heart's memories and speak of times gone by!
Mindful of the fate of Jerusalem,
either sound a song of sad lamentation,
or else let the Lord give us the strength to bear our sufferings!