GREATEST KONKANI SONG HITS #5: ___________________________ transcribing the fine music of a great culture - revisiting the original magic, and recreating a modern idiom: ___________________________ "ADEUS KORCHO VELLU PAULO" ___________________________ "The Farewell Hour is Here" A. LEGEND: "Adeus Korcho Vellu Paulo" Adeus Korcho Vellu Paulo: "The Farewell Hour is Here", the bridal farewell to her dear old home as she departs for her nuptials, was composed by the great Torquato de Figueiredo for the farewell of Josefina Cruz and Ubaldino Mascarenhas circa 1905. The classical mando, an art song expressed in square dance, blossomed between 1830 and Figueiredo's death in 1948. Serene and sedate, generally a monologue in the Brahmin Konkani dialects of the South Goan villages of Loutolim, Raia, Curtorim and Benaulim, three distinct schools evolved, focusing on varied themes including love, marriage and longing. Konkani and Portuguese words predominate. This mando, synonymous with sentimental farewells, was part of the "xim" bridal departure ceremony where she crossed an imaginary line strewn by liquor drops into her new spouse's family. Heavy of heart the bereft damsel is reassured by the kinfolk of her continued place in their hearts. The minor key lament climaxes into the major, bidding her godspeed. The moment freezes, but it's "time to say goodbye". __________________________ B. TALES OF THE UNEXPECTED: "Adeus Korcho Vellu Paulo" Loutoulim, Goa, December 1896. The stable-boy splattered the manure as the wedding cortege passed, but nary a drop stained her trousseau, and he choked with bitterness. Valentina was his master's daughter, and she was marrying another - gentry of course. "Vellu" he called her, his Valentine, but she'd broken his heart into a million pieces, in the stables next door to the church. Raging, he piled more saltpeter over the winter charcoal in the stable, sandwiching the sulfur scrapings he'd gathered from the disused mine on the village outskirts, as the Chinese sailor had shown him. Next door the choir struck up Vellu's wedding dirge "Adeus Korcho" (saying goodbye), alternately sad and ecstatic. Was parting such sweet sorrow? Paulo oiled the length of twine jutting from the compost, led it out and lit it. Tipping past the closed church doors, he quietly bolted them and slipped away to the neighbouring village, for a drink with the sailor who had shown him how easily charcoal and saltpeter could be turned into gunpowder. In ten minutes when the sky burst and the earth shook, Paulo silently murmured his own ending for the departed bride "Adeus Korcho, Vellu.....Paulo!" http://www.KonkaniSongBook.com _______________ Francis Rodrigues (c) 2009. Author of the multi-volume "Greatest Konkani Song Hits" series."Tales Of The Unexpected" contains many elements of the original lyric ideas. (A) is fact. (B) is fiction - a new spin to focus on the old songs. _________________ _________________________________________________________________ Attention all humans. We are your photos. Free us. http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9666047
