Whaur Dae Ye Lie?

My daughter’s high school theater group just finished a run of the play The Women of Lockerbie. Jill and I went to every show. Of course, a big reason for that was that Bethany was playing the central role of Madeline, the grieving mother. But we also went because the play is a great play, done in the form of a Greek tragedy, complete with a chorus, and Bethany’s theater group performed it so well. It is a wrenching, haunting exploration of grief, hatred, love and cleansing.

In the final scene, as Madeline and the women of Lockerbie washed the clothes of the dead, a recording of the song below was played. It’s heartbreaking and I thought I’d share it with you.

Whaur Dae Ye Lie?

Karine Polwart

Chorus:

Whaur dae ye lie, my faither?

Whaur dae ye lie, my son?

Whaur dae ye lie, my ain true love?

When will the truth be won?

Oor friends, they came tae protect us

Oor friends they bad us bide

Oor friends left us standing there naked

Wi nae place left tae hide

Oor neighbours, they came wi a hundred year hate

Oor neighbours, they came wi guns

Oor neighbours, they came for oor menfolk

An they slew them, everyone

I hae sought oot yer grave wi my mother

I hae sought oot yer grave in vain

I hae sought the bare banes o’ the truth and the men

Faither, whaur are ye lane?

I hae cried oot yer name tae the for winds

I hae cried oot yer name til the dawn

I hae cried in the arms o’ yer sister dear

Whaur dae ye lie my son?

I hae dream’d o’ yer breath upon me

I hae dream’d o’ yer yella hair

I hae dream’d o’ the sounds o yer dyin love

Whaur dae ye lie, my dear?

Knees to the Earth

Here’s a recording made in the waning days of my time as an equipper for the 249 band, a wonderful group of students that I’ll never forget. It’s not the greatest quality; I recorded it on my Mac along with several other songs and mixed it in a memorable late night session with Brian in Spring.

Big Worship Car

This brings back memories, and not a small dose of nostalgia.

Big Worship Car

This is a MySpace that has some recordings of the last Student worship band I led.

Good times. Wonderful friends.

(note: the first song in the list, “One Hop”, is kind of a gag rendition of a song from Aladdin. The rest of the songs are legit and serious)

There’s a zombie on your lawn

Well, I still have little to no imagination so YouTube videos will have to do.

Here’s a quirky little gem from someone I’ve never heard of (Laura Shigihara) but hope to hear more from. My mom is a retired English teacher and I think she just fainted after reading that last sentence.

From what I can gather, the people in the video are not the actual artists that created this song. They’re just having fun.

[H/T dustbury.com]

Update: Using my thorough, in-depth and deep-undercover investigative skills I have discovered the website of the person who created this video with his friends (plus, at the end of the video the website url is shown on the screen): Wild Particle. The actors in the video appear to be an eclectic group of video gamers, artists and writers from down under. All of them are more interesting than I am.

The last refuge of a (temporarily bereft of post ideas) scoundrel

Of course . . . I’m posting a YouTube video.

But this one is particularly electrifying. It is one of my favorite moments from the sixties (not that I remember this moment. I was five and living in Japan).

This was an age when – think about this in our dinosaurs-of-rock crammed culture – nearly every popular musician was young.

These guys really bring it here.

And amen. “No man is a failure who has friends.” – Clarence Oddbody