On Sunday mornings we had got into the habit of listening to Desert Island Discs on Radio 4. Just the theme tune alone is very pleasing - in fact, if I were to choose my eight discs that theme tune might have to be one of them. And suddenly there’s no more Desert Island Discs. It’s been replaced with The Reunion, where a group of people who together involved in something in the past get together and talk to Kirsty Wark, an admirable programme in its way but possibly more fun to make than to listen to. It all depends on who is being reunited.
So this morning we sought out on catch-up old editions of Private Passions, a slightly more intellectual (or would-be intellectual) version of Desert Island Discs on Radio 3. The trouble with such programmes on catch-up is that they don’t play the selected music in full, but only a few opening bars. So it goes. I suppose you can always find the full version of the music online. We selected Isabel Allende’s Private Passions, recorded originally in 2020. I’ve read a fair few of her books and she is interesting to listen to.
Amongst her selection of music was this Spanish Civil War song by Rolando Alarcón, with a rhythm that for me is very typical of those Civil War songs, a cheery rhythm for a bleak subject matter, probably good to sing as you march:
Si me quieres escribir
Ya sabes mi paradero
En el frente de batalla, primera línea de fuego
En el frente de batalla, primera línea de fuego
If you want to write me
You know where I am
At the battle front, on the front line
She also chose “Gracias a la vida” written by Violeta Parra and sung by Mercedes Sosa, a song of gratitude for life, without any religious overtones, unless you want to bring them in for yourself. As I said Isabel Allende chose the version sung by Mercedes Sosa but for me this has always been a Joan Baez song.
There was also a love song by Victor Jara, Chilean singer - songwriter - political activist put to death by Pinochet. Isabel Allende’s description of how he was tortured, his hands that the songs and played the music broken and smashed before he was killed was full of her emotion. We were reminded that we don’t have but need to acquire a CD of Jara’s songs.
And I was reminded of a song to which my Spanish sister sent me a link the other day. This is Al Alba written by Luis Eduardo Aute and sung by Rosa León, another Spanish singer whose CD’s I don’t really have enough of. Al Alba was written as a love song but Rosa León, another of those singers with a strong political sense, understood it and sang it as an anti-war song about a Spanish Republican soldier about to be executed at dawn - al alba.
I was going to write about other things this morning but music has taken over. Somehow I don’t want to mix other stuff in with it. It must be my nostalgic mood. We’ve been listening to a lot of old music lately.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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