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Trying to find an old Polish song


joiceale
25 Jan 2019 #1
Hi,

My grandmother is a centenarian polish descendant and she uses to sing this song (see video bellow). I'm trying to track it down, but its been really hard, because she sings it from memory in a polish that anyone in poland speaks anymore, lenguage evolves with society but in case of immigrants that dont communicate in their mother tongue it freezes in that period of time (probably between 1880-1890), so it been hard for me to find polishes that can fully understand what she is singing. It doesnt help the fact that in Brazil (during Getulio Vargas dictartorship) the foreigners were forbidden to speak in their mother tongues, to write, talk in public and teach their children, so she doesnt know how to write and none of her children knows or speaks polish. Even our surnames were misspelled and because of that we are unable to search for relatives in Poland.

I believe that my grandmother never heard the song through a record. It was probably sang to her in her childhood and now she sings what she remembers of the lyrics or even the rhythm. So, i´m trying to track this song, if someone knows it, or is able to capture some of the lyrics, it would be a big help.

facebook.com/joiceale/videos/10214122805403343/

Best regards,
lul bul - | 48
25 Jan 2019 #2
I can suggest download an app called "Shazam" and try to find it out.
OP joiceale
25 Jan 2019 #3
this was the first thing i tried. No results.
mafketis 36 | 10,708
25 Jan 2019 #4
I googled a couple lines here and there but couldn't find anything... maybe someone here can transcribe what she's singing (mostly fairly clear just a few places are kind of.... blurry)
kaprys 3 | 2,249
26 Jan 2019 #5
There's nothing wrong with her Polish - the song is sung in some sort of regional dialect but it's totally understandable.
I googled some random lines and it's apparently this song bibliotekapiosenki.pl/utwory/Choinka_w_lesie/tekst
The video starts roughly at the fifth line but your grandma obviously knows more lines than you can find in the link.
OP joiceale
27 Jan 2019 #6
thanks! I cant understand polish, but some of the words/versus that she sings really do coincide with the lyrics you found! :D

I googled it but was unable to find this lyrics in other places, or variations, etc: i didnt found musics or videos related also, no songs with this lyrics :(

My grandmother doesnt know how to read or write in any language, so i think she wouldnt be able to identify the song by the written lyrics. You mentioned the regional dialect stuff, do you have any tips on how can I track its roots?

Her parents fled Poland at a very young age (probably as kids) and didnt knew much (or talked much) about their heritage. As a result, we dont know the city they came from, the year they left, if they left any family members in Poland, or even how to write their surnames.


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