Salem State College | Language Resource Center | Spanish Lyrics Collection |
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Lhasa de Sela was born in 1972 in Big Indian, a tiny village in the Catskill Mountains in New York State. Her father is Mexican, but he lived half his life in the US. Her mother is American, but she has spent half her life in Mexico.
Lhasa now lives in Quebec and she just published her first record, called La Llorona, after the famous Mexican fable.
La Llorona, which means "the crying one," is a legendary Mexican character rooted in Aztec mythology which became a popular figure in Mexican culture, but also in the culture of the U.S. South (which was part of Mexico until not too long ago). La Llorona is a folktale about a wailing, hollering, or weeping ghost that haunts men. The ghost is said to be that of a native woman who is searching for her dead children, who she is said to have drowned herself. There are different versions of this tale. In one of them the woman is said to have drowned the children while in a rage after her lover, a Spanish hidalgo, abandoned her and their children when he returned to Spain. After killing her children, the woman then kills herself, but her ghost is punished to look for her children until the end of time.
According to the version mentioned by Lhasa de Sela, La Llorona allures men with sad melodies, bewitches them, gets them to a river bank, and there she turns them to stone by giving them a kiss. According to Lhasa, it appears that she does this in order to avenge her children who were killed because of "the war of men." This legend finds its origins in the Aztec mythological character of Cihuacoalt, the woman of Quetzalcoalt (the snake which represents the unification of the earth and the sky). This woman is the wind which runs between these two elements, sighing and shouting with its melancholic voice. This legend was a great source of inspiration for the album.
In Mexico, La Llorona is sometimes brought up to frighten children children so that they will behave and thus she is the Mexican equivalent of the bogeyman.
(Translated and adapted from the French version in the Album's web site; additional parts and from G. Rosin's site and elsewhere).
"Lhasa De Sela has distinguished herself as a singer and storyteller with her debut album, La Llorona. The 25-year-old Montreal resident, who grew up traveling through Mexico while living on a school bus, sings of her tortured heart with the accompaniment of guitarist-producer-arranger Yves Desrosiers and a cabaret-style band. Already compared to those of Edith Piaf and Billie Holiday, De Sela's haunting voice is memorable on each of the 11 songs (only 3 are nonoriginal) that range in inspiration from Mexican ranchera to Eastern European klezmer." --Cristina Del Sesto
"Half Mexican American, half Jewish American and all rainbow chile, singer Lhasa de Sela's Spanish-language, world music/alt-rock debut shimmers with honest emotionalism, with no trace of the posturing and whining that passes these days for deep, girlish thoughts. The girl's young, but she's equipped with imagination, confidence, and technique enough to take that husky, urgent alto anywhere she wants. And she goes there. Guitarist-producer-arranger Yves Desrosiers cloaks all this splendor in rapturous arrangements that include, among other elements, the sound of rain, flamenco-influenced guitar, and a slide bass of his own design. Even if you don't understand Spanish, you can't miss the point ... the feelings. Lhasa's just begun, but her stranger-than-fiction background and dazzling gifts already place her among music's top-rung storytellers." --Elena Oumano
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La Llorona
Lhasa
UPC: 75678312021
Format: CD
Release Date: Aug 18 1998
Label: Atlantic. (At Barnes&Noble: $12.99; At amazon.com: $.)
[Buy it for the Language Resource Center!: Have it mailed to: LRC Chief, Department of Foreign Languages, Salem State College, 352 Lafayette St., Salem, MA 01970. Thanks!] |
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«Quiere, aborrece, trata bien, maltrata, y es la mujer, al fin, como sangría que a veces da salud y a veces mata.» -- Rimas humanas, CXCE: Lope de Vega
Mi hija, quédate conmigo un rato.
¡Qué amargos son los hechos que adivinas!
Haz de tu puño algo cariñoso,
Mi hija, ¡qué pena me da de verte
Mujer, desnúdate y estate quieta (Back to *) |
"She loves, hates, treats well, mistreats, and women are, in the end, like bloodletting, which sometimes heals and sometimes kills." --Human Rhymes, CXCI, Lope de Vega
Little one, stay with me awhile.
The facts you guess at are so bitter!
With your look of offended beast,
Make something kind out of your fist,
How sad it makes me, little one, to see you
Woman, undress and be still |
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Aunque mi vida esté de sombras llena No necesito amar, no necesito. Yo comprendo que amar es una pena Y que una pena de amor es infinita
Y no necesito amar - Tengo vergüenza
Desdeñosa, semejante a los dioses
No necesito amar - absurdo fuera |
Even if my life is full of shadows, I don't need to love, I don't need to. I understand that love is pain and that pain of love is infinite.
And I don't need to love; I am ashamed
Disdainful, like the gods,
No, I don't need to love; it would be absurd |
(This is a very old Spanish Christmas song. It seems to have a strong Moorish and/or Jewish influence.)
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La vírgen se está peinando Entre cortina y cortina Los cabellos son de oro Y los peines de plata fina
Pero mira como beben
La virgen lleva una rosa
La vírgen va caminando
La vírgen lava pañales |
The Virgin is combing her hair between two curtains her hair is made of gold and the combs of fine silver
But look how they drink,
The Virgin wears a rose
The Virgin is walking
The Virgin washes diapers |
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Mírenme a la vida vuelvo ya La la la Pajarillo, tú me despertaste Enseñame a vivir
En un abismo yo te esperé
Mírenme a la vida vuelvo ya
En un abismo yo te esperé |
Look at me, I'm coming back to life, La, la, la, Little bird you woke me teach me to live.
In an abyss I waited for you,
Look at me, I'm coming back to life,
In an abyss I waited for you, |
Last updated: Dec 2, 1998
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