Needles & Grooves AotM /// Vol. 25 - July 2021 // Dota - Kaleko
- Thread starter Jan
- Start date
Jan
Well-Known Member
It's named " einem kinde im dunklen" which means " to a child in the dark" and it is a lullaby
German lyrics are in this link
EdiT: rough translation
" Give me your little hand,
So' you are not alone. Child , you should not be alone with the shadow on the wall.
If evening falls upon the world, sun is slowly cooling down,
The cloud is sleeping behind the house, the flower slumbers on the field.
The stars are slowly starting to shine, a wind is aiming for our window,
The evening angel plays with the pale moon balloon.
Quietly the tree rustles, little tree sinks, now you are resting well-behaved.
May you be blessed by a good sleep. May you be blessed by a nice dream"
Last edited:
duke86fan
Well-Known Member
this was a sudden surprise.. seems a little on the weirder side for me... its a possibility, as I like her voice and the almost cabaret like sound of this top song on qobuz... but its hard to obtain that isn't in a specific german site and it I dunno how bad the shipping cost (though apparently JPC is only 5 euros.. so maybe)
Jan
Well-Known Member
Thanks for trying. You shouldn't feel obliged to buy , but I'll share links to her labels site and her bandcamp, as well. Jpc is also in my experience a reliable shipper
Jan
Well-Known Member
So' i added Spotify links in the first post of the Kaleko Album and the Mascha Bonus LP. As with all of Dotas last Vinyl releases, vinyl always contains a second LP with the bonus tracks that are only available at the first edition of the cd and will come to streaming much later because she wants to emphasize physical media. She can do this because she is fiercely independent and owns her own record label Kleingeldprinzessin records. ( more in my write up after the weekend) If you want to support her directly, that's the best way to buy. Transatlantic shipping is 10€ and the double lp is 24€. I'll make a playlist today of personal favorites from her career in case someone wants to pick up more 
Link to label shop: Mascha Kaléko
If you prefer bandcamp, that works as well and for similar prices : Dota
Jpc was linked above thanks to @Poly-Rythmo . If someone finds other ways that serve the non-Europeans better, feel free to link
Link to label shop: Mascha Kaléko
If you prefer bandcamp, that works as well and for similar prices : Dota
Jpc was linked above thanks to @Poly-Rythmo . If someone finds other ways that serve the non-Europeans better, feel free to link
Jan
Well-Known Member
So, as promised i made a playlist with personal highlights from Dotas records ( except Kaléko) that is set chronologically . If you rather listen to fullalbums my recommendations would be her great live album "überall konfetti" or if you want to hear her in a more pop oriented sound, her latest " Wir rufen dich Galaktika " is great as well.
WhiteDahlias
Active Member
This month has been crazy for me so far and I wasn't really able to follow along with this thread, but I am listening on Spotify and really enjoying it! I'll probably pick it up from Bandcamp next week when I get paid.
My German is very rusty, but every once in a while I can follow the lyrics
.
My German is very rusty, but every once in a while I can follow the lyrics
.
Jan
Well-Known Member
Sorry folks, i´m a little slow with the write-up because of work and kids ( and watching soccer in the evenings) , so i´m shooting for thursday for that.
But Dota agreed to do an AMA via e-mail, so if you already have questions, just post them here. I will collect them and send them on and hopefully post the answers here when i receive them.
But Dota agreed to do an AMA via e-mail, so if you already have questions, just post them here. I will collect them and send them on and hopefully post the answers here when i receive them.
Jan
Well-Known Member
Write-up Part I
So when i signed up fort he N&G ROTM i had a lot of artists in mind that i could feature from obviously Vic Chesnutt to Leatherface, Weakerthans, Hochzeitskapelle or even Midnight Oil, but at one point i decided that the best thing to contribute to the outstanding variety that these rotm choices have been would be an album sung in German. I do not really like the Teutonic rock like Rammstein it is first associated with or the cool efficiency of Kraftwerk. So i gravitated to the German language album that touched me the most in the last years, Dotas Kaléko.
So who is Dota?
Dorothea (short Dota) Kehr grew up in West-Berlin and her first musical instrument was saxophone and picked up the guitar with 21. Musically she was inspired a lot by Brazilian music since a babysitter gave her a tape of Elis & Tom by Elis Regina & Antonio Carlos Jobim. During a trip busking through italy and France with a friend, that friend gave her the nickname „Principesse degli Spiccioli“ (pocket change princess) which in German translates to Kleingeldprinzessin. So she had her first stage name ( which she shed cause it sounded too cutesy a couple of years ago, but her record company is still called that way) and the name of her first album in 2003. In parallel to music she started studying medicine (which she finished with the approbation). But medicine did not seemed the right thing, so during a study she got an internship with the WHO in ecuador and there got the chance to do a little touring with two jazz-guitarists she met there. In 2003 she got a stipend for a research project in Brazil, which she used to learn Portuguese and record her second album „Mittelinselurlaub“ with Danilo Guilherme. Since no one wanted to release it she started „Kleingeldprinzessin Records“ without any money, copying covers and burning the first cds on her computer to have something to sell at her concerts. Back in Germany a band started to nucleate under the „Dota und die Stadtpiraten“ which today just goes under the name DOTA for the whole band ( which are Dota, . They played about 100 concerts a year and grew a growing following. In 2016 „Rennrad“ became a little radio hit in Germany and her 12th album “Keine Gefahr “ hit the top 20 in Germany but she declined all major label offers that came with that wanting to stay in creative control of her work. Her music is certainly influenced by latin American sounds, but also classic singer-songwriters, pop and rock music. Her songs range from melancholic love-songs to observations of everyday situations to strong political stances, but often paired with a sense of irony and self-deprecating humor. But she and the band are very active supporting social causes like playing for Fridays for future or climate activists that occupied a forest that is supposed to be cut down to access the coal below or a strong support for seawatch, an organization manning rescue ships for African refugees drowning in the Mediterranean. In this way I see this as a good continuation to @bfly pick of @calliopemusicals
So at one of her concerts an unknown audience member gave her ab book of poems by masha Kaleko. She enjoyed those poems and started to hear them set to melodies.
So who was Masha Kaleko?
Kaléko was born Golda Malka Aufen in Chrzanów, Galicia (now Poland). With the commencement of World War I, her mother moved with her and her sister Lea to Germany; first to Frankfurt, then to Marburg, and in 1918 to Berlin In 1928, she married the Hebrew teacher Saul Aaron Kaléko. From 1929 on, she published poetry presenting the daily life of the common people in newspapers such as Vossische Zeitung and Berliner Tageblatt.
In her poetry, Kaléko captured the atmosphere of Berlin in the 1930s. She attained fame and frequented places like the "Romanisches Café", where the literary world met, among them Erich Kästner and Kurt Tucholsky. In January 1933, she published her first book with poetry Lyrisches Stenogrammheft, which was soon subjected to Nazi censorship.
In 1938, Kaléko emigrated to the United States with her second husband, the composer Chemjo Vinaver, and their one-year-old son Steven.While in the U.S., Kaléko lived in several places (New York City and a few months in California) until settling on Minetta Street in New York City's Greenwich Village in 1942. Her fifth-floor walkup apartment Minetta Street was a safe haven she always remembered fondly. Kaléko became the family's breadwinner with odd jobs, including some writing copy for advertisements The family's hope of a possible career for Chemjo in the film industry was crushed, and they returned to New York after a brief stint in Hollywood. The Schoenhof Verlag in Cambridge, Massachusetts published Kaléko's third book "Verse für Zeitgenossen" in 1945.In 1956, Kaléko returned to Berlin for the first time. Three years later she was supposed to receive the Fontane prize, which she declined since the former Nazi and member of the Waffen-SS, Hans Egon Holthusen, was a member of the jury. In 1959, Kaléko moved to West Jerusalem, Israel, since her husband, who was conducting research on Hassidic singing, had better working conditions there. She lacked knowledge of Hebrew and was thus somewhat isolated.
Kaléko died in January 1975 in Zürich, where she fell ill en route back to Jerusalem from a final visit in Berlin.
So while she started out writing poems about observations of daily life in Berlin with a slightly ironic, slighly melancholic tone, after having to emigrate from Germany during the Nazi dictatorship you´ll find more darker tones in her poetry. She wrote about being forced to flee, about anti-semitiscm and her struggles as a poet writing in german being forced to be outside of german speaking countries, as well her spiritualism and religion.
So when i signed up fort he N&G ROTM i had a lot of artists in mind that i could feature from obviously Vic Chesnutt to Leatherface, Weakerthans, Hochzeitskapelle or even Midnight Oil, but at one point i decided that the best thing to contribute to the outstanding variety that these rotm choices have been would be an album sung in German. I do not really like the Teutonic rock like Rammstein it is first associated with or the cool efficiency of Kraftwerk. So i gravitated to the German language album that touched me the most in the last years, Dotas Kaléko.
So who is Dota?
Dorothea (short Dota) Kehr grew up in West-Berlin and her first musical instrument was saxophone and picked up the guitar with 21. Musically she was inspired a lot by Brazilian music since a babysitter gave her a tape of Elis & Tom by Elis Regina & Antonio Carlos Jobim. During a trip busking through italy and France with a friend, that friend gave her the nickname „Principesse degli Spiccioli“ (pocket change princess) which in German translates to Kleingeldprinzessin. So she had her first stage name ( which she shed cause it sounded too cutesy a couple of years ago, but her record company is still called that way) and the name of her first album in 2003. In parallel to music she started studying medicine (which she finished with the approbation). But medicine did not seemed the right thing, so during a study she got an internship with the WHO in ecuador and there got the chance to do a little touring with two jazz-guitarists she met there. In 2003 she got a stipend for a research project in Brazil, which she used to learn Portuguese and record her second album „Mittelinselurlaub“ with Danilo Guilherme. Since no one wanted to release it she started „Kleingeldprinzessin Records“ without any money, copying covers and burning the first cds on her computer to have something to sell at her concerts. Back in Germany a band started to nucleate under the „Dota und die Stadtpiraten“ which today just goes under the name DOTA for the whole band ( which are Dota, . They played about 100 concerts a year and grew a growing following. In 2016 „Rennrad“ became a little radio hit in Germany and her 12th album “Keine Gefahr “ hit the top 20 in Germany but she declined all major label offers that came with that wanting to stay in creative control of her work. Her music is certainly influenced by latin American sounds, but also classic singer-songwriters, pop and rock music. Her songs range from melancholic love-songs to observations of everyday situations to strong political stances, but often paired with a sense of irony and self-deprecating humor. But she and the band are very active supporting social causes like playing for Fridays for future or climate activists that occupied a forest that is supposed to be cut down to access the coal below or a strong support for seawatch, an organization manning rescue ships for African refugees drowning in the Mediterranean. In this way I see this as a good continuation to @bfly pick of @calliopemusicals
So at one of her concerts an unknown audience member gave her ab book of poems by masha Kaleko. She enjoyed those poems and started to hear them set to melodies.
So who was Masha Kaleko?
Kaléko was born Golda Malka Aufen in Chrzanów, Galicia (now Poland). With the commencement of World War I, her mother moved with her and her sister Lea to Germany; first to Frankfurt, then to Marburg, and in 1918 to Berlin In 1928, she married the Hebrew teacher Saul Aaron Kaléko. From 1929 on, she published poetry presenting the daily life of the common people in newspapers such as Vossische Zeitung and Berliner Tageblatt.
In her poetry, Kaléko captured the atmosphere of Berlin in the 1930s. She attained fame and frequented places like the "Romanisches Café", where the literary world met, among them Erich Kästner and Kurt Tucholsky. In January 1933, she published her first book with poetry Lyrisches Stenogrammheft, which was soon subjected to Nazi censorship.
In 1938, Kaléko emigrated to the United States with her second husband, the composer Chemjo Vinaver, and their one-year-old son Steven.While in the U.S., Kaléko lived in several places (New York City and a few months in California) until settling on Minetta Street in New York City's Greenwich Village in 1942. Her fifth-floor walkup apartment Minetta Street was a safe haven she always remembered fondly. Kaléko became the family's breadwinner with odd jobs, including some writing copy for advertisements The family's hope of a possible career for Chemjo in the film industry was crushed, and they returned to New York after a brief stint in Hollywood. The Schoenhof Verlag in Cambridge, Massachusetts published Kaléko's third book "Verse für Zeitgenossen" in 1945.In 1956, Kaléko returned to Berlin for the first time. Three years later she was supposed to receive the Fontane prize, which she declined since the former Nazi and member of the Waffen-SS, Hans Egon Holthusen, was a member of the jury. In 1959, Kaléko moved to West Jerusalem, Israel, since her husband, who was conducting research on Hassidic singing, had better working conditions there. She lacked knowledge of Hebrew and was thus somewhat isolated.
Kaléko died in January 1975 in Zürich, where she fell ill en route back to Jerusalem from a final visit in Berlin.
So while she started out writing poems about observations of daily life in Berlin with a slightly ironic, slighly melancholic tone, after having to emigrate from Germany during the Nazi dictatorship you´ll find more darker tones in her poetry. She wrote about being forced to flee, about anti-semitiscm and her struggles as a poet writing in german being forced to be outside of german speaking countries, as well her spiritualism and religion.
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Jan
Well-Known Member
It got so lengthy i had to split it, here is part II
Kaléko – the album
So after Dota received the Kaleko Book, an album setting lyrics from the different phases of Mascha Kalekos life started to form. The Band with Dota on vocals and electric guitar, Janis Görlich on drums, Jan Rohrbach on electric guitar and bass, Jonas hour on keys opted for a little more classic sound than on their more recent releases with more electric piano and fender Rhodes instead of synth sounds and some added jazz flourishes by Christian Magnusson on trumpet and flugelhorn and Matthew Bookert on tuba. You often find slow melancholic interpretations of her Kalekos more somber lyrics and a more swinging sound inspired by European and latin American sounds on the songs that describe scenes of everyday live in berlin. Drummer Janis Görlich who has a background in jazz also wrote a couple of jazzy instrumentals as interludes. Also The band decided to make this album a kind of intergenerational german singer-songwriters project ranging from younger artists like Francesco Wilking (from band Die Höchste Eisenbahn, Max Prosa, Alin Coen or Karl die Große) to older statesman Hannes Wader or Konstantin Wecker. They had to travel to 78yo german leftist songwriter-icon HannesWader to record him in his living room because he retired from music in 2018 due to health problems.
The record starts with “Resignation für Anfänger / Resignation for beginners” that have the thoughtful lyrics acompanied by a lighter instrumentation “ Don´t search. There is nothing to find, nothing to fathom , put up with it. Comes the time, there will be linden blossoming over the freshly dug grave” to end with “Don´t go under trying to find sense, Don´t search, and you may find”
Second more somber song is “ Ein sogenannter schoner Tod / a so-called beautiful death” :” One morning yu´ll wake up and are not alive anymore, it happened over night like snow and frost . you´re now deposed of all sorrows of this world” afterwards offering images of a new coast and sunny light but ending with the doubtful “ If only one knew for sure”.
“Kein Kindelied / No childrens song” deals with the feelings of displacement after emigration starting with “Wherever I go, I go to nowhereland”.” Für einen/ for one” is one of the most beautiful love songs I know of in the nice duet with singer Max Prosa. : “ The others are the wide ocean, but you are the harbor. So believe me, you can rest easy, i´ll always steer back.”
“ Chanson von der Fremde / Song of foreign lands” “ This foreign land is a cold dress with a tight collar” describes again the feelings coming with being forced to flee and live away from home and on the mercy of others. “ i´d rather live in a small chamber under the roof than in someone elses palace”
“Julinacht an der Gedächtniskirche” is the pre-war description of busy street-life at night in Berlin near the “Gedächtniskirche” which is right next to “Romanische Café” where Mascha Kaleko used to hang out with the other artists and you can hear the busy streets in the swinging 30s style music. It´s getting more somber with a song “For Chemjo on passover 1944” opening with “We unlearned to float, we stick to the road. Far away from the glow of the stars, our wings downcast and languid. Our feet are plodding surrender.My love, before it´s to late, let´s try to rise”
“Was man so braucht / what you need” shows how elegant Mascha Kaleko couls work with just a few words with all the lyrics translate to “ You only need an island alone at sea, you only need one person, but that person you really need.”
“auf eine Leierkastenmelodie/ on a hand organ melodie” has Dotas voice duet with the worn voice of 78yo Hannes Wader for a song about missed opportunities in Love “ You only came several years too late,And I couldn't wait such a long time, All the flowers that I sowed to greet you Are now shrivelled in my garden“ and ends with „See now my love is dead and weary Like the sun in autumn, which only shines and no longer glows And it silvers my golden hair. Leave your boat on the bank, where it is now Because now you have come several years too late And it will never again be the same“
„Kompliziertes Innenleben / Complicated Inner life“ is a beautiful song about relation with a lover who is sometimes there and sometimes gone, „ When you come here, everyday is a garden, but when you´re gone i love you.“ Ending with „ Are there dreams that aren´t shattered, is there a happines that holds, what it promises. Oh, we stupid people will never know, and the clever ones are researching other things“.
After this more somber fare it gets swinging again with a song about beeing drunk „Ganz kleiner Schwips / A very little tipsiness“ I tell the dinner partner what I think of him and conclude therefore, the booze was good. When others tumble, I just get a little tipsy. Unfortunately I can never get completely drunk. And when the other brains are softly sinking, mine will stay plaster.” But it ends on a more somber thought of a lost love “I think of last year at this time and want to go to your door secretly, now I am tipsy and have a new dress, but for whom. … the clock tower rings 4am, tomorrow I will be sad again”.
The album ends with the somewhat dark lullaby that @bfly like from the videos. “ Einem Kinde im Dunklen / To a child in the dark” with the wonderful Alin Coen singing duet " Give me your little hand,
So' you are not alone. Child , you should not be alone with the shadow on the wall.
If evening falls upon the world, sun is slowly cooling down,
The cloud is sleeping behind the house, the flower slumbers on the field.
The stars are slowly starting to shine, a wind is aiming for our window,
The evening angel plays with the pale moon balloon.
Quietly the tree rustles, little tree sinks, now you are resting well-behaved.
May you be blessed by a good sleep. May you be blessed by a nice dream"
Sorry for this being overly long, but i hoped that giving you very rough translations of lyrics and telling you something about the meanings behind these songs can make the German a little easier to stomach. Mark Twain wrote about the „awful German language“ and most have pictures of this very hard language from our history of being militaristic dictatorships, and that´s what Rammstein for instance appeal to internationally, but in the right hands it can be a beautiful and tender language and both Dota as well as Mascha Kaleko are such capable Hands, where it can be swinging, funny, tender, melancholic. I hope you giv this album a chance, because it is really beautiful.
Kaléko – the album
So after Dota received the Kaleko Book, an album setting lyrics from the different phases of Mascha Kalekos life started to form. The Band with Dota on vocals and electric guitar, Janis Görlich on drums, Jan Rohrbach on electric guitar and bass, Jonas hour on keys opted for a little more classic sound than on their more recent releases with more electric piano and fender Rhodes instead of synth sounds and some added jazz flourishes by Christian Magnusson on trumpet and flugelhorn and Matthew Bookert on tuba. You often find slow melancholic interpretations of her Kalekos more somber lyrics and a more swinging sound inspired by European and latin American sounds on the songs that describe scenes of everyday live in berlin. Drummer Janis Görlich who has a background in jazz also wrote a couple of jazzy instrumentals as interludes. Also The band decided to make this album a kind of intergenerational german singer-songwriters project ranging from younger artists like Francesco Wilking (from band Die Höchste Eisenbahn, Max Prosa, Alin Coen or Karl die Große) to older statesman Hannes Wader or Konstantin Wecker. They had to travel to 78yo german leftist songwriter-icon HannesWader to record him in his living room because he retired from music in 2018 due to health problems.
The record starts with “Resignation für Anfänger / Resignation for beginners” that have the thoughtful lyrics acompanied by a lighter instrumentation “ Don´t search. There is nothing to find, nothing to fathom , put up with it. Comes the time, there will be linden blossoming over the freshly dug grave” to end with “Don´t go under trying to find sense, Don´t search, and you may find”
Second more somber song is “ Ein sogenannter schoner Tod / a so-called beautiful death” :” One morning yu´ll wake up and are not alive anymore, it happened over night like snow and frost . you´re now deposed of all sorrows of this world” afterwards offering images of a new coast and sunny light but ending with the doubtful “ If only one knew for sure”.
“Kein Kindelied / No childrens song” deals with the feelings of displacement after emigration starting with “Wherever I go, I go to nowhereland”.” Für einen/ for one” is one of the most beautiful love songs I know of in the nice duet with singer Max Prosa. : “ The others are the wide ocean, but you are the harbor. So believe me, you can rest easy, i´ll always steer back.”
“ Chanson von der Fremde / Song of foreign lands” “ This foreign land is a cold dress with a tight collar” describes again the feelings coming with being forced to flee and live away from home and on the mercy of others. “ i´d rather live in a small chamber under the roof than in someone elses palace”
“Julinacht an der Gedächtniskirche” is the pre-war description of busy street-life at night in Berlin near the “Gedächtniskirche” which is right next to “Romanische Café” where Mascha Kaleko used to hang out with the other artists and you can hear the busy streets in the swinging 30s style music. It´s getting more somber with a song “For Chemjo on passover 1944” opening with “We unlearned to float, we stick to the road. Far away from the glow of the stars, our wings downcast and languid. Our feet are plodding surrender.My love, before it´s to late, let´s try to rise”
“Was man so braucht / what you need” shows how elegant Mascha Kaleko couls work with just a few words with all the lyrics translate to “ You only need an island alone at sea, you only need one person, but that person you really need.”
“auf eine Leierkastenmelodie/ on a hand organ melodie” has Dotas voice duet with the worn voice of 78yo Hannes Wader for a song about missed opportunities in Love “ You only came several years too late,And I couldn't wait such a long time, All the flowers that I sowed to greet you Are now shrivelled in my garden“ and ends with „See now my love is dead and weary Like the sun in autumn, which only shines and no longer glows And it silvers my golden hair. Leave your boat on the bank, where it is now Because now you have come several years too late And it will never again be the same“
„Kompliziertes Innenleben / Complicated Inner life“ is a beautiful song about relation with a lover who is sometimes there and sometimes gone, „ When you come here, everyday is a garden, but when you´re gone i love you.“ Ending with „ Are there dreams that aren´t shattered, is there a happines that holds, what it promises. Oh, we stupid people will never know, and the clever ones are researching other things“.
After this more somber fare it gets swinging again with a song about beeing drunk „Ganz kleiner Schwips / A very little tipsiness“ I tell the dinner partner what I think of him and conclude therefore, the booze was good. When others tumble, I just get a little tipsy. Unfortunately I can never get completely drunk. And when the other brains are softly sinking, mine will stay plaster.” But it ends on a more somber thought of a lost love “I think of last year at this time and want to go to your door secretly, now I am tipsy and have a new dress, but for whom. … the clock tower rings 4am, tomorrow I will be sad again”.
The album ends with the somewhat dark lullaby that @bfly like from the videos. “ Einem Kinde im Dunklen / To a child in the dark” with the wonderful Alin Coen singing duet " Give me your little hand,
So' you are not alone. Child , you should not be alone with the shadow on the wall.
If evening falls upon the world, sun is slowly cooling down,
The cloud is sleeping behind the house, the flower slumbers on the field.
The stars are slowly starting to shine, a wind is aiming for our window,
The evening angel plays with the pale moon balloon.
Quietly the tree rustles, little tree sinks, now you are resting well-behaved.
May you be blessed by a good sleep. May you be blessed by a nice dream"
Sorry for this being overly long, but i hoped that giving you very rough translations of lyrics and telling you something about the meanings behind these songs can make the German a little easier to stomach. Mark Twain wrote about the „awful German language“ and most have pictures of this very hard language from our history of being militaristic dictatorships, and that´s what Rammstein for instance appeal to internationally, but in the right hands it can be a beautiful and tender language and both Dota as well as Mascha Kaleko are such capable Hands, where it can be swinging, funny, tender, melancholic. I hope you giv this album a chance, because it is really beautiful.
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duke86fan
Well-Known Member
Jan
Well-Known Member
I'll forward the questions in English ( or Portuguese or german if you want). I bet she speaks enough English to understand them. I'll offer to translate and let her answer in German or English and either post it here directly or translate to English
I wouldn't be surprised if some folks, like myself, are still digesting the album and preparing questions eventually. In the meantime:
Top 5 Personal Fruit Ranking?
(s/o to @TenderLovingKiller® for asking this initially to Khemmis)