Since I believe Finland is getting cold right now, here is a rare (I believe 1900’s) recording of Karelian poem singer Petri Shemeikka singing Tulen synty (The Birth of the Fire)!
Since I believe Finland is getting cold right now, here is a rare (I believe 1900’s) recording of Karelian poem singer Petri Shemeikka singing Tulen synty (The Birth of the Fire)!
3 comments
The more bearded guy looks like Darwin
Needs more bass
I’m glad that Kalevala did keep in the minds of the Finns the old ways of Karelian culture and helps those now from that area who want to look into their own past.
It’s interesting to see, how the Finns will react when Kalevala will be in the center of a lot of debate in the future. During the times when the idea of Finland was forged in the minds of the Finnish elite, it was ok to cut corners for the sake of the end product, like in the case of Kalevala.
Elias Lönnrot, the writer of Kalevala, didn’t preserve the original texts and songs he heard when collecting material in the shores of the lake Laatokka, Karelia and beyond. Lönnrot changed things, characters and thoughts to make Kalevala what it is and he didn’t really preserve the original folklore from those places.
Lönnrot wrote down what he heard people sing and say, rather than what was actually sang and told to him. That process led to Kalevala being a a mishmash of all kinds of stories that originally aren’t connected to each other at all and might not have the characters Kalevala has.