# Incredibly beautiful??



## dandylion (Dec 9, 2010)

I have discovered this youtube video in the last several days and find it incredibly beautiful. I just have to share it with someone! It is not classical and could be considered overly sentimental by some. The soloist is Vladimir Albatayev from Buryat. What do you think of this? 





Sorry I don't know how to embed youtube video.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

I would like to hear the tune in its original context, simple, not over-sung, perhaps unaccompanied. 

It is, to my ears, a ghastly bad drippingly sentimental excessive over-arrangement, making it no better (worse) than a deliberately and cheaply sentimental film score.

There are arrangements where a composer has taken a folk melody, left it intact, and given it a fresh harmonic context, and many of these can be quite successful.

When this kind of arrangement is done to folk tunes, it so distorts the tune itself - by context of harmonization, tempo, and stylized delivery -- that the melody now sounds cheap and commercial.

One mans meat, I suppose. The link, the musical treatment is for me, poison. Pity, too. I have a strong sense an arranger killed a good thing.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Well, I like it.

Haters gonna hate.


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## Taneyev (Jan 19, 2009)

Hope you learn, Dandylion. Anything you write here, someone will destroy it.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Russian choral music is some of the best to be found anywhere. I´ve been lucky to witness some of it sung in modest provincial churches in Ukraine and this clip brings back memories, including this church in the fortress town of Kamyanets Podilskyi:


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Odnoposoff said:


> Hope you learn, Dandylion. Anything you write here, someone will destroy it.


Yes, it's discouraging, isn't it?

We come here for friendly conversation about the music we love, and what we get is people telling us how awful it is for one reason or another. It's been particularly bad lately, though.


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## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

What is this structured, non-atonal, unintelligent rubbish? The contributions around here lately have been pathetic! I can't believe I sat through the entire thing and wasn't overtly offended by what I heard. Now I have to pretend to have been! I don't want to look like I enjoyed accessible music.


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## Iforgotmypassword (May 16, 2011)

I found this piece to be Both shallow AND pedantic... yes, shallow and pedantic.


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## Guest (Mar 31, 2012)

I thought it was beautiful but I'd also like to hear a simpler arrangement. The videos were nice also.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I thought it was nice but not that beautiful.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Taneyev said:


> Hope you learn, Dandylion. Anything you write here, someone will destroy it.


I note that he has not been back. So I guess he learned much faster than I have.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I thought the music was very nice with appropriate visuals. For me, it's a "one listen and move on" piece.


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## cjvinthechair (Aug 6, 2012)

Beautifully, sensitively sung - yes, probably true to say I wouldn't want to listen to music of this ilk all the time, but as a change it's quite delightful, thank you !


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

I must, uncharacteristically, side with PetrB on this one, although I think he might have stated his opinion a bit more diplomatically. The tempo sounds ridiculously slow for a folk tune. And the arrangement completely obliterates the tune, drowning it in a soup of sentimental slush. I too want to hear the folk song as it actually might have been performed.


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## Simon Moon (Oct 10, 2013)

science said:


> Yes, it's discouraging, isn't it?
> 
> We come here for friendly conversation about the music we love, and what we get is people telling us how awful it is for one reason or another. It's been particularly bad lately, though.


Wait a second...

The OP specifically asked, "What do you think of this?". Then, when PeterB gives his honest opinion, as he was asked to, he gets slammed?

He didn't put anyone down for liking it, there was no venom, no hostility, he simply criticized the version of the song itself. He stated it pretty straight forward here, "I have a strong sense an arranger killed a good thing."

Maybe the OP should have specified that he only wanted opinions that agreed with his...


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## Chris (Jun 1, 2010)

It's pleasant enough. A translation would have helped.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Simon Moon said:


> Wait a second...
> 
> The OP specifically asked, "What do you think of this?". Then, when PeterB gives his honest opinion, as he was asked to, he gets slammed?
> 
> ...


Slammed" is probably an exaggeration, but otherwise you've got a fair point.


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## Judilyn1957 (Nov 9, 2015)

After reading through all these comments, and even though this is probably too late to respond on this topic, I joined this forum so I could give an answer.

1. Just because a song is labeled 'folk song,' doesn't mean it has to be catchy or lively. "Black is the Color of My True Love's Hair" - an American folk song - comes to mind. Some of the most beautiful music on earth is slow folk music.

2. If you know the lyrics to this Russian folk song, ('Monotonously Rings the Little Bell'), you would understand why it's slow, and why this version is the most popular one in Russia.

_Literal translation:_
"Monotonously the little bell is sounding,
And the way is a little bit dusty,
And over the plain fields
Flows the song of the coachman."

"There is so much longing in this song,
So much emotion in the familiar tune
That in my cool breast
My heart lights with fire.

And I remembered other nights
And the fields and forests of my home,
And to my eyes, which had been dry for a long time,
A tear rose like a spark.

"Monotonously the little bell is sounding,
Softly echoing from afar,
And my coachman fell silent.
And the way before me is long and far."

_Poetic translation, with help from a Russian artist:_
The little bell rings steadily, rhythmically,
And dust along the road swirls 'round behind.
Wistfully o'er the open fields
Wafts the song of my coachman.

There is such tender longing in this song,
So much yearning in this familiar tune,
That in my cold and tired breast
My heart is lit with a passionate fire.

Then I remember other nights,
the fields and forests of my home,
And my eyes, which had been dry so long,
Fill with aching, burning tears.

The little bell rings steadily, rhythmically,
Softly echoing from afar.
My coachman has fallen silent,
And the road before me is still long, still so long.

~As a professional musician, I can assure you this arrangement is neither shallow nor pedantic, and it's certainly not 'over-arranged.' In fact, it's arranged quite simply, leaving the haunting melody to work its own magic. This is one of the most beautiful songs I've ever heard, and believe me, I've heard many "most beautiful songs". I could listen to this for hours!


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

And now we have all dust in our nose.:lol:


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Thanks for posting the beautiful lyrics. I must agree that this is not "over-arranged," "shallow," "pedantic," or otherwise to be faulted. I can only wonder how jaded (or snobbish) people are to be unmoved (or to refuse to be moved) by the delicacy and poignancy of a simple melody, simply harmonized, and exquisitely sung.

Oh that's right. Boulez is full of great melodies too - and not one of them over-arranged, shallow, or pedantic! Let's see... Remember the one that goes...um...uh...?


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## Sloe (May 9, 2014)

I think to call the piece shallow and pedantic was a joke:


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

Yes, a very pretty song . The Buryats are Buddhist Mongols who live in southern Siberia around lake Baikal not too far from the republic of Mongolia .


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## Judilyn1957 (Nov 9, 2015)

Sloe said:


> I think to call the piece shallow and pedantic was a joke:


:lol:

Thanks, I didn't know about this! Funny!


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## Judilyn1957 (Nov 9, 2015)

superhorn said:


> Yes, a very pretty song . The Buryats are Buddhist Mongols who live in southern Siberia around lake Baikal not too far from the republic of Mongolia .


I'm somewhat familiar with that region and history, as my son-in-law is a Russian Mongol, raised Buddhist, and has shared the history of his family with us. Quite interesting, especially since world history in school barely touched on that part of the world, or Africa.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Simon Moon said:


> Wait a second...
> 
> The OP specifically asked, "What do you think of this?". Then, when PeterB gives his honest opinion, as he was asked to, he gets slammed?
> 
> ...


Wait another second! There are several ways to express an opinion. Do we not want to support people posting music that they find incredibly beautiful? If so, then if one doesn't particularly find the piece quite so beautiful, they can say so without trashing it as if it's a piece of garbage which is how the following makes it sound: (Besides, how can one know if a piece is over-arranged or if it has distorted how a folk tune should sound if one is not familiar with the piece/folk tune at all?)

' ...a ghastly bad drippingly sentimental excessive over-arrangement, making it no better (worse) than a deliberately and cheaply sentimental film score. ...When this kind of arrangement is done to folk tunes, it so distorts the tune itself - by context of harmonization, tempo, and stylized delivery... Pity, too. I have a strong sense an arranger killed a good thing. the melody now sounds cheap and commercial. the musical treatment is for me, poison.'


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Judilyn1957 said:


> ...I can assure you this arrangement is neither shallow nor pedantic, and it's certainly not 'over-arranged.' In fact, it's arranged quite simply, leaving the haunting melody to work its own magic.


Exactly what I thought also.


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## Figleaf (Jun 10, 2014)

It is very beautiful indeed, and I'm wiping away a little tear. Vladimir Albataev has that lovely soulful, ethereal Russian tenor sound which I thought must have died out. I will have to look out more of his recordings. I'm guessing from the hairdos that this clip is circa 1990, around the time of the collapse, so that gives it an extra poignancy.

If PetrB found even this chaste arrangement excessive, I would advise him not to listen to Ivan Rebroff's recording, with its throbbing strings and falsetto crooning!


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

I think 'B' must've been trolling. I don't hear anything cheap or excessive in this song . . . that is unless one considers the human soul to be cheap . . . which I kinda do sometimes but I'll just leave it at this: lovely song.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

It sounds very much in the Russian Orthodox choral tradition, with which I suspect PetrB was unfamiliar.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> Thanks for posting the beautiful lyrics. I must agree that this is not "over-arranged," "shallow," "pedantic," or otherwise to be faulted. I can only wonder how jaded (or snobbish) people are to be unmoved (or to refuse to be moved) by the delicacy and poignancy of a simple melody, simply harmonized, and exquisitely sung.
> 
> Oh that's right. Boulez is full of great melodies too - and not one of them over-arranged, shallow, or pedantic! Let's see... Remember the one that goes...um...uh...?


Boulez or schmaltz? I'll wait for another choice …


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## Levanda (Feb 3, 2014)

Some forum members maybe too advance knowledge about music and too critical, I did liked song why we should be embarrassing to share.


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## OldFashionedGirl (Jul 21, 2013)

I liked it. But the most beautiful song on the internet? No way.


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