Woody Guthrie’s classic, ‘This Land is Your Land’ – in Yiddish
JVL Introduction
It’s good to see Yiddish flourishing beyond ultra-orthodox communities.
“Few people know [I certainly didn’t – web ed] that Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land” was first written as a critique of Irving Berlin’s “God Bless America,” which the iconic folksinger felt was blindly patriotic and unduly overlooked the flaws in American society.”
This fine reworking of Woody Guthrie’s “This Land is your Land” extends its radical spirit by incorporating Jewish resonances.
It follows in the footsteps of singer Daniel Kahn’s successful Yiddish reworking of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” and Bob Dylan’s “I Shall Be Released”.
As they say, over there: “Enjoy!”
This article was originally published by Forward / Yiddish on Tue 23 Feb 2021. Read the original here.
WATCH: The Forverts premieres Yiddish version of Woody Guthrie’s classic, ‘This Land is Your Land’
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Absolutely wonderful. Far and away the best thing, and most universally Jewish item, ever posted on JVL.
What a beautiful version! I am a great admirer of Woody Guthrie’s work and the sentiments he expressed in his songs at the time of the dust bowl and terrible suffering.
Love it! Reminds me of the skiffle group I was in as a teenager in N. Devon. We reworded it then for ‘home consumption’ too –and upped the tempo a bit for the folks to dance to. Was supposed to be doing a solo spot at a concert last year to raise funds for our community centre and which we hope will happen before long. Am now living in County Durham, so have changed chorus lines to
From the Durham coalfields to the Scilly Islands,
From the Kentish orchards to the rolling Pennines.
Woody also wrote a song about ” Old Man Trump” and the lyrics show ‘like father like son’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jANuVKeYezs&vl=en