Pete’s ‘salinawit’
March 26, 2007 | 12:00am
Following through on my recent column-pieces, readers have continued writing in to send me their own lists of favorite movies and to comment on the lists I’ve been posting these past couple of weeks. But before I go to some of those comments, let me just acknowledge a couple of corrections and clarifications from sharper-eyed and more knowledgeable correspondents.
As it turns out, for example, Death in Venice wasn’t shot in black and white  as I’d thought I remembered it  but in full color, according to reader Robin Pigue, who adds that "I’m not a big fan of the film. I prefer Visconti’s underrated movie version of Camus’ The Stranger, which was released internationally in 1967. It starred Marcello Mastroianni as Meurseult and the beautiful Anna Karina as the mistress. I’ve seen local VCD copies of Death in Venice in Odyssey and National Bookstore." I hadn’t seen the movie in more than 15 years, where it was shown in a film class I was a teaching assistant for in the US, so my mind was playing a trick on me, encouraged perhaps by the promotional materials for the movie, which were all in black and white.
Poet Gelo Suarez also sent in an interesting backgrounder on Un Chien Andalou, directed in 1929 by Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali. Gelo says that "Among that awesome circle of artist-friends was also Federico Garcia Lorca, and Un Chien Andalou was made around the time he had a falling-out with them. According to one theory, the film’s title is an allusive insult to the pseudo-Surrealist (and I do not mean "pseudo" to be derogatory here) poet from Andalusia, and as such furthered the divide between him and Bunuel and Dali. Oh, and Dali happens to be a really fantastic poet too."
My former student Gina Verdolaga  who reports that she’s "actually a movie critic these days, at least for a monthly teen Catholic zine called Fish"  says she "can’t resist mentioning David Lean’s last film A Passage to India; Noel Coward’s 1945 Brief Encounter; and Hiroshi Inagaki’s samurai trilogy Miyamoto Musashi with Toshiro Mifune. Such grace in love and war films of the ‘50s and ‘60s, a far cry from the present Spartan ode 300." (I thoroughly enjoyed 300, incidentally, and its powerful, one-track depiction of "Spartans good, Persians bad"  well, except for one or two rotten Spartans outside of the 300.) She adds that "the owners of Que Rico are actually classmates of mine, Rico and Susan Sevilla… I do recall that the late Doreen Fernandez used to drop by their place for a fish dish that she particularly enjoyed for the homey appeal and wrote about it in her food column."
Theater director Freddie Santos was moved to recall "Barry Lyndon... as Thomas Hoving put it, not one minute more or less than what was needed. And it ran for 3 hours. Imitation of Life... who knew we could cry that much? Gone With the Wind... will never be. It Happened One Night... and stayed forever. One Night of Love, Song Without End, The Red Shoes... the best classic films on, uh, classics. Cover Girl... because Busby Berkeley wasn’t God. An American in Paris... because Busby Berkeley really was just a man. The Courtship of Eddie’s Father... you just knew Ron Howard would get somewhere. West Side Story, Oliver, and Cabaret... better than the stage musical versions. The Sound of Music... waaaaayyyyy better than the stage musical! Jesus Christ, Superstar... either way, He is God."
Film critic Noel Bote Vera weighs in on my choices and with his own on his blog, here: http://criticafterdark.blogspot.com/2007/03/butch-dalisays-favorite-films-and-mine.html. (If that link’s too long for you to type, go to my blog at www.penmanila.net and look for the link to "Noel Vera.") Noel also gently corrects my usage of "cineaste" (which means filmmaker) to "cinephile" (lover of film)  thanks for that, Noel!
So the people have spoken. Thanks, all, for your responses.
For quite some time now, poet-journalist-karaoke fiend Jose "Pete" Lacaba has been undertaking a personal project to translate the best vintage songs into Filipino  not just to provide their equivalent meanings, but also to create stylishly singable alternatives to their English originals.
He calls these versions "salinawit"  literally, translated songs  and he’s come up with about 45 of them so far, covering mostly standards that should be familiar to anyone over 50. (Where were you when Look to Your Heart, I Wish You Love, and You Don’t Know Me were No. 1?) Pete’s selections display his unfailingly good taste in lounge music (some of us prefer couches and cocktails to burning guitars and baseball caps, boys and girls) and his translations a poet’s refinement.
For starters, here’s part of his take on Where Is Your Heart? (lots of you’s and heart’s in these old songs, huh?):
Whenever we kiss,
I worry and wonder.
Your lips may be near,
But where is your heart?
It’s always like this,
I worry and wonder.
You’re close to me here,
But where is your heart?
Ang bawat halik,
May halong ligalig.
Kayakap kita,
Ngunit nasaan ka?
Palagi na lang
Ay may agam-agam.
Kapiling kita,
Ngunit nasaan ka?
And here’s part of All My Tomorrows:
Today I may not have a thing at all
Except for just a dream or two,
But I’ve got lots of plans for tomorrow,
And all my tomorrows belong to you.
Right now it may not seem like spring at all.
We’re drifting and the laughs are few.
But I’ve got rainbows planned for tomorrow,
And all my tomorrows belong to you.
Ngayon, wala akong kahit ano
Maliban sa pangarap ko,
Subalit bukas liligaya tayo.
Lahat ng aking bukas, para sa ‘yo.
Ngayon ay parang laging tag-ulan,
Naghahari ang karimlan.
May bahaghari sa aking plano.
Lahat ng aking bukas, para sa ‘yo.
I’m reminded of the late Rolando Tinio’s exquisite translations for Celeste Legaspi in the 1970s, the most memorable of which for me was Langit Mo, Ulap Ko, Tinio’s take on Michel Legrand’s Summer Me, Winter Me. He also spun The Lady Is a Tramp into Ako’y Bakyang-Bakya. Tinio adapted rather than directly translated, drawing on the sense and the sensibility of the song to locate resonant chords in the Filipino spirit. That Celeste Legaspi album  which I last had a copy of as a cassette tape, long since vanished or disintegrated  is something I’ve been desperately seeking for ages, and I’d be glad to pay a premium for a CD of it.
My favorite salinawit has to be that of the song I’ve asked people to play at my deathbed and during my wake  at least the original bossa nova instrumental  Antonio Carlos Jobim’s Desafinado, which Pete’s been kind enough to allow me to reprint in its entirety:
Music: Antonio Carlos Jobim
Original Portuguese lyrics: Newton Mendonça, 1962
English lyrics: Jon Hendricks and Jessie Cavanaugh
Pagsinta ay awit na walang-hanggan,
Tila ba harana sa kalangitan,
Isang haranang gigising sa puso’t diwa mo,
Pero tayo’y medyo wala sa tono.
Dati ang halik mo ay bumibirit,
Ngayon ay tila tinig na naiipit.
Ibang tugtog na ba ang nasa labi mo,
Nilimot ang kundiman ko sa ‘yo?
Noon ang tiyempo natin ay akmang-akma,
Ngayon ang mga letra ay hindi nagtutugma.
Hindi na maalala’ng himig na kinakanta,
Wala sa tono tayong dalawa.
Pagtugmain muli ang ating damdamin,
Indayog ng duweto ay muli nating buhayin.
Babalik na tayo sa wastong tono,
At di na disintunado
Ang kundimang ating inaawit,
Magiging awit ng anghel
Ang ating pag-ibig!
And for those of us who never quite memorized the original French lyrics (by Edith Piaf herself) nor its English adaptation by Mack David, here’s Pete Lacaba’s version of the immortal La Vie en Rose:
Music: Louiguy (Louis Guglielmi)
French lyrics: Edith Piaf
English adaptation: Mack David
Intro:
Akala ko, sa awit lang
Ang tunay na pagmamahal.
Iyon pala ay totoo.
Nadama ko sa halik mo.
Nang ibigin mo ako,
Nagbago ang mundo.
Ito’y nagkulay-rosas.
Sa init ng ‘yong halik,
Yakap na mahigpit,
Mundo’y nagkulay-rosas.
Puso ko’y umaawit,
Pag-ibig ang himig,
Sa tuwing maririnig...
Ang tinig mong
Katulad sa anghel
Na may timyas
Ng tunay na dalangin.
Dahil sa pag-ibig mo,
Ngayon ang buhay ko:
Kulay-rosas.
While looking forward to a full-blown concert of these songs as interpreted by some of our finest vocalists (beyond the tasty patikim that was offered on a recent segment of Tina Monzon-Palma’s TV show), I’ve thrown Pete a challenge to translate another of my favorite songs, Sabor a Mi, of which I have five cover versions on my iTunes (Luis Miguel, Lila Downs, Laura Fygi, Javier Solis, and Eydie Gorme & Trio Los Panchos). Pete sent me several English versions of it that I didn’t even know existed.
But whatever Pete does with them, I’m sure it’ll be miles better than the best a pedestrian prose-monger like me can muster, which would be something like Tikman Mo Ako. (Or maybe, when the spirit moves me or poet-translators and after-hours crooners like Marne Kilates, we can do the reverse and translate some of our best OPM songs into English.)
E-mail me at penmanila@yahoo.com and visit my blog at http://www.penmanila.net.
As it turns out, for example, Death in Venice wasn’t shot in black and white  as I’d thought I remembered it  but in full color, according to reader Robin Pigue, who adds that "I’m not a big fan of the film. I prefer Visconti’s underrated movie version of Camus’ The Stranger, which was released internationally in 1967. It starred Marcello Mastroianni as Meurseult and the beautiful Anna Karina as the mistress. I’ve seen local VCD copies of Death in Venice in Odyssey and National Bookstore." I hadn’t seen the movie in more than 15 years, where it was shown in a film class I was a teaching assistant for in the US, so my mind was playing a trick on me, encouraged perhaps by the promotional materials for the movie, which were all in black and white.
Poet Gelo Suarez also sent in an interesting backgrounder on Un Chien Andalou, directed in 1929 by Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali. Gelo says that "Among that awesome circle of artist-friends was also Federico Garcia Lorca, and Un Chien Andalou was made around the time he had a falling-out with them. According to one theory, the film’s title is an allusive insult to the pseudo-Surrealist (and I do not mean "pseudo" to be derogatory here) poet from Andalusia, and as such furthered the divide between him and Bunuel and Dali. Oh, and Dali happens to be a really fantastic poet too."
My former student Gina Verdolaga  who reports that she’s "actually a movie critic these days, at least for a monthly teen Catholic zine called Fish"  says she "can’t resist mentioning David Lean’s last film A Passage to India; Noel Coward’s 1945 Brief Encounter; and Hiroshi Inagaki’s samurai trilogy Miyamoto Musashi with Toshiro Mifune. Such grace in love and war films of the ‘50s and ‘60s, a far cry from the present Spartan ode 300." (I thoroughly enjoyed 300, incidentally, and its powerful, one-track depiction of "Spartans good, Persians bad"  well, except for one or two rotten Spartans outside of the 300.) She adds that "the owners of Que Rico are actually classmates of mine, Rico and Susan Sevilla… I do recall that the late Doreen Fernandez used to drop by their place for a fish dish that she particularly enjoyed for the homey appeal and wrote about it in her food column."
Theater director Freddie Santos was moved to recall "Barry Lyndon... as Thomas Hoving put it, not one minute more or less than what was needed. And it ran for 3 hours. Imitation of Life... who knew we could cry that much? Gone With the Wind... will never be. It Happened One Night... and stayed forever. One Night of Love, Song Without End, The Red Shoes... the best classic films on, uh, classics. Cover Girl... because Busby Berkeley wasn’t God. An American in Paris... because Busby Berkeley really was just a man. The Courtship of Eddie’s Father... you just knew Ron Howard would get somewhere. West Side Story, Oliver, and Cabaret... better than the stage musical versions. The Sound of Music... waaaaayyyyy better than the stage musical! Jesus Christ, Superstar... either way, He is God."
Film critic Noel Bote Vera weighs in on my choices and with his own on his blog, here: http://criticafterdark.blogspot.com/2007/03/butch-dalisays-favorite-films-and-mine.html. (If that link’s too long for you to type, go to my blog at www.penmanila.net and look for the link to "Noel Vera.") Noel also gently corrects my usage of "cineaste" (which means filmmaker) to "cinephile" (lover of film)  thanks for that, Noel!
So the people have spoken. Thanks, all, for your responses.
He calls these versions "salinawit"  literally, translated songs  and he’s come up with about 45 of them so far, covering mostly standards that should be familiar to anyone over 50. (Where were you when Look to Your Heart, I Wish You Love, and You Don’t Know Me were No. 1?) Pete’s selections display his unfailingly good taste in lounge music (some of us prefer couches and cocktails to burning guitars and baseball caps, boys and girls) and his translations a poet’s refinement.
For starters, here’s part of his take on Where Is Your Heart? (lots of you’s and heart’s in these old songs, huh?):
Whenever we kiss,
I worry and wonder.
Your lips may be near,
But where is your heart?
It’s always like this,
I worry and wonder.
You’re close to me here,
But where is your heart?
Ang bawat halik,
May halong ligalig.
Kayakap kita,
Ngunit nasaan ka?
Palagi na lang
Ay may agam-agam.
Kapiling kita,
Ngunit nasaan ka?
And here’s part of All My Tomorrows:
Today I may not have a thing at all
Except for just a dream or two,
But I’ve got lots of plans for tomorrow,
And all my tomorrows belong to you.
Right now it may not seem like spring at all.
We’re drifting and the laughs are few.
But I’ve got rainbows planned for tomorrow,
And all my tomorrows belong to you.
Ngayon, wala akong kahit ano
Maliban sa pangarap ko,
Subalit bukas liligaya tayo.
Lahat ng aking bukas, para sa ‘yo.
Ngayon ay parang laging tag-ulan,
Naghahari ang karimlan.
May bahaghari sa aking plano.
Lahat ng aking bukas, para sa ‘yo.
I’m reminded of the late Rolando Tinio’s exquisite translations for Celeste Legaspi in the 1970s, the most memorable of which for me was Langit Mo, Ulap Ko, Tinio’s take on Michel Legrand’s Summer Me, Winter Me. He also spun The Lady Is a Tramp into Ako’y Bakyang-Bakya. Tinio adapted rather than directly translated, drawing on the sense and the sensibility of the song to locate resonant chords in the Filipino spirit. That Celeste Legaspi album  which I last had a copy of as a cassette tape, long since vanished or disintegrated  is something I’ve been desperately seeking for ages, and I’d be glad to pay a premium for a CD of it.
My favorite salinawit has to be that of the song I’ve asked people to play at my deathbed and during my wake  at least the original bossa nova instrumental  Antonio Carlos Jobim’s Desafinado, which Pete’s been kind enough to allow me to reprint in its entirety:
Original Portuguese lyrics: Newton Mendonça, 1962
English lyrics: Jon Hendricks and Jessie Cavanaugh
Pagsinta ay awit na walang-hanggan,
Tila ba harana sa kalangitan,
Isang haranang gigising sa puso’t diwa mo,
Pero tayo’y medyo wala sa tono.
Dati ang halik mo ay bumibirit,
Ngayon ay tila tinig na naiipit.
Ibang tugtog na ba ang nasa labi mo,
Nilimot ang kundiman ko sa ‘yo?
Noon ang tiyempo natin ay akmang-akma,
Ngayon ang mga letra ay hindi nagtutugma.
Hindi na maalala’ng himig na kinakanta,
Wala sa tono tayong dalawa.
Pagtugmain muli ang ating damdamin,
Indayog ng duweto ay muli nating buhayin.
Babalik na tayo sa wastong tono,
At di na disintunado
Ang kundimang ating inaawit,
Magiging awit ng anghel
Ang ating pag-ibig!
And for those of us who never quite memorized the original French lyrics (by Edith Piaf herself) nor its English adaptation by Mack David, here’s Pete Lacaba’s version of the immortal La Vie en Rose:
French lyrics: Edith Piaf
English adaptation: Mack David
Intro:
Akala ko, sa awit lang
Ang tunay na pagmamahal.
Iyon pala ay totoo.
Nadama ko sa halik mo.
Nang ibigin mo ako,
Nagbago ang mundo.
Ito’y nagkulay-rosas.
Sa init ng ‘yong halik,
Yakap na mahigpit,
Mundo’y nagkulay-rosas.
Puso ko’y umaawit,
Pag-ibig ang himig,
Sa tuwing maririnig...
Ang tinig mong
Katulad sa anghel
Na may timyas
Ng tunay na dalangin.
Dahil sa pag-ibig mo,
Ngayon ang buhay ko:
Kulay-rosas.
While looking forward to a full-blown concert of these songs as interpreted by some of our finest vocalists (beyond the tasty patikim that was offered on a recent segment of Tina Monzon-Palma’s TV show), I’ve thrown Pete a challenge to translate another of my favorite songs, Sabor a Mi, of which I have five cover versions on my iTunes (Luis Miguel, Lila Downs, Laura Fygi, Javier Solis, and Eydie Gorme & Trio Los Panchos). Pete sent me several English versions of it that I didn’t even know existed.
But whatever Pete does with them, I’m sure it’ll be miles better than the best a pedestrian prose-monger like me can muster, which would be something like Tikman Mo Ako. (Or maybe, when the spirit moves me or poet-translators and after-hours crooners like Marne Kilates, we can do the reverse and translate some of our best OPM songs into English.)
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