How it Works, and "BOOBS!"

Author's Note:

So first of all, I woke up and had to get a drink of water. And on the way back I was thinking about the tone of the reviews for "Flandoria" and "Here's to the Boys." People seem to like them, which is great, but also there's a tone of mildly amused/impressed confusion, so I thought I'd explain how *I* do my songfics and hopefully demystify the process. You know, like tomorrow... or over the weekend... something like that, not at 1 AM when I have to face several dozen teenagers the next day.

OH WELL.

Because this one little tiny piece of the fourth movement out of Beethoven's Ninth popped into my head and I'm like... "Bugger. That would be a perfect example." And more details started filling in, and... well... this kind of happened!

So I really love the Ninth. The part that most people are familiar with is the finale, which takes the "Freude, schoner Gotterfunken, Tochter aus Elysium" theme that's actually been flowing in and out of the whole piece, even back in the instrumental parts, and dials it up to eleven and THEN some. But the funnest part of it is heart-crushingly a part I will never get to sing, because it is a tenor solo accompanied by the men's choir: "Froh, wie seine Sonnen," and you can watch it on youtube at video G3cLCdRXLUI - go ahead, it's really short.

(Interruption: I almost listed it as my favorite part, BUT sort of it isn't because I think my favorite part is "Ihr stutz nieder, millionen. Ahnest du den Shapfer... VELT! Zuch in uberm sternen zelt?" Crap, just thinking about it is making my eyes tear up. I love the sense of hushed awe in that one line, both musically and lyrically, especially the marvelous way it contrasts with the majesty of the parts immediately before and after it. It's like - "aren't you kneeling, o you millions? Can't you feel your maker - HERE?!" and then, all whispery and amazed, "Look for him among the stars," and then passionately, "Both in the stars and yet-with! in-us!" the latter of which is NOT an accurate translation from the actual German lyrics but the music tells me that's what Beethoven meant, like 'holy shit, that's amazing, how the hell is it possible?!'

Absolutely masterful. Found it on youtube at rRifdGGvAF4 and now I'm crying because it's so good but even listening to it on a recording just doesn't do it justice. If you ever have the chance to go to a performance of the Ninth, do it. Or if you are a singer, or an instrumentalist, YES. There is nothing in the world like being IN this piece and having this music surround and fill you...

Okay, okay, getting back to things.]

The first thing to do is to find a connection between music and meaning. So, for "Froh," it's always, always struck me as a bar song, even though when I first sung it I was too young to have gone to a bar myself! Ignore the vocal stylings from the soloist and the restrained nature of classical music and imagine a few pipes, some brass, and a big thumpy drum. Can't you hear a slightly more rollicking beat, a bit oompah-y?

You know, there's a part of me that says that's why Beethoven has this part be only the dudes - I can just picture a bunch of guys, big burly German field workers, in a tavern with their tankards and steins foaming over, clunking them on the tables on the echoes, "FROY-dig! FROY-dig!"

So for the next part, now we think about individual lyrics. In the two previous songs I've done, they've had verses and choruses with a particular meter and rhyme scheme - this one doesn't follow that as much, so I'm going to skip it, but I'll try to find an example I can post later that uses it. I find it works best to work in the patterns as I go, and I'll talk about how in the next chapter.

It helps me to have both the lyric text to look at and a recording to listen to as I'm thinking about the changes I want to make to the original to fit my re-envisioning of the song. So for this, I'm looking at a webpage that has both the German and a translation into English, so that I can think about the rhythm as well as the meaning. Which, meh, I'm gonna be changing a lot. Because what do guys sing about?

BOOBS.

Especially with how, uh, BOUNCY this song is! It's OBVIOUS that they're really singin' about titties, and very cheerfully so! So here we go - bear with me, because now it's almost two and I don't know if this is gonna be any good!

"BOOBS!"

Boobs!

BOOBS!

They're just so much fun

Just so much fun to squeezy

Boobs are so much FUN to squeezy

And I can not EVER get enough!

Brothers, let's salute our girls!

Brothers, let's salute our girls!

Friendly, happy, curvy, and horny!

Always curvy and horny!

Brothers, let's salute our girls!

Brothers, let's salute our girls!

Friendly, happy, curvy and horny!

Always curvy and horny!

Friendly

Friendly! Friendly!

Always curvy... and horny!

There were some 'cue' words I used here - fliegen means 'to fly' but in my head it scans as "Flingin'" so they're talking about flingin' the boobs around! But then that doesn't quite make sense, sooo I changed to "squeezy." Also I wanted to keep 'bruder' which means 'Brothers'. 'Freudig' means 'joyful' but scans, to me, as 'friendly,' so I tried to keep that. And then when I looked back at the repeated parts, I love that they're cheering about how "friendly" their girls are... *snigger* SO IT IS DEFINITELY STAYING.

I do try to choose words and phrasing that fit the rhythm of the lines, but I didn't have to worry about rhymes for this, and that made it a lot easier. It helps if I can avoid being locked in to any particular words or phrases. Originally, the first part that came to mind was the part that I have as "Friendly, Friendly! Friendly!" and in my head these guys with their tankards were singing "BOO-bies! BOO-bies!" but I'd forgotten that 'freudig' was used in previous lines and I came up with a phrase that worked for both that line and the chant. So I kept that instead.

And there you have it! I left the solo parts regular and put the choral parts in italics to sort of help clarify that. Other than that, I'm glad THIS was the example I came up with in the middle of the night, because it's really short AND there's lots of repetition, so that made it a lot easier! It's now about 2:15 AM and I'm gonna post this and try to get some more sleep.

[Note for self: There's a song we dance to at our Zumba group and I'm not even sure of the title but I think it's going to be a Vacy-for-Corso late-in-game, right around the point where she realizes that she really does love him. (I don't need to spoiler-alert that, I hope!)

I think it's called "You Make Me Feel" maybe? It's the one with the line "You make me feel so... la-la-LA-LA-la!" repeated like four times as the chorus. And what's stuck in my head is that the 'la-la-la-la-la' means both "I can't find the words" and also "can't say that out loud!" like it's love-beyond-expression and playful and slightly-naughty-desire all wrapped up together. Video on youtube at HpyZEzrDf4c - though I wish I could find the one we dance to. Also, I wish I could get rid of the male vocals. :P

I'll look at that one tomorrow or over the weekend and see if it works well to look at the use of rhyme and meter.]