Ulla! min Ulla! Säj får jag dig bjuda
"Ulla! min Ulla! säj får jag dig bjuda" | |
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Art song | |
English | Ulla! my Ulla! say, may I thee offer |
Written | 1790 |
Text | poem by Carl Michael Bellman |
Language | Swedish |
Melody | Unknown origin, probably Bellman himself |
Dedication | Mr Assessor Lundström |
Published | 1790 in Fredman's Epistles |
Scoring | voice and cittern |
Ulla! min Ulla! säj, får jag dig bjuda (Ulla! my Ulla! say, may I thee offer), is one of the Swedish poet and performer Carl Michael Bellman's best-known and best-loved songs,[1] from his 1790 collection, Fredman's Epistles, where it is No. 71. A pastorale, it depicts the Rococo muse Ulla Winblad, as the narrator offers her "reddest strawberries in milk and wine" in the Djurgården countryside north of Stockholm.
The epistle is a serenade, subtitled "Till Ulla i fönstret på Fiskartorpet middagstiden en sommardag. Pastoral dedicerad till Herr Assessor Lundström" (To Ulla in the window in Fiskartorpet at lunchtime one summer's day. Pastorale dedicated to Mr Assessor Lundström). It has been described as the apogee of the bellmansk, and a breezy evocation of Stockholm's Djurgården park in summertime. The serenade form was popular at the time, as seen in Mozart's opera Don Giovanni; Bellman has shifted the setting from evening to midday. In each verse, Fredman speaks to Ulla, describing his love through delicious food and drink; in the refrain, he softly encourages her to admire nature all around, and she replies with a few meditative words. The erotic charge steadily increases from one verse to the next, complete in the last verse with the energy of a horse.
Context
Song
Music and verse form
The song has three verses, each of 8 lines, with a chorus of 10 lines. The verses have the alternating
The song is in
Lyrics
The song is dated 1790, the year of publication, making this one of the last epistles to be written. It is dedicated to the assessor and member of Par Bricole, Carl Jacob Lundström, who helped find enough subscribers to finance the publication of Fredman's Epistles. It is possible that the late epistles, including nos. 80 and 82, were inspired by time spent with Helena Quiding at her summerhouse, Heleneberg, near Fiskartorpet.[15]
The song imagines the Fredman/Bellman narrator, seated on horseback outside Ulla Winblad's window at Fiskartorpet on a fine summer's day. Thirsty in the heat, he invites the heroine to come and eat with him, promising "reddest strawberries in milk and wine". As pastorally, but in
Carl Michael Bellman, 1790[16] | Charles Wharton Stork, 1917[17] | Hendrik Willem van Loon, 1939[18] | Paul Britten Austin, 1977[19] |
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Ulla! min Ulla! säj får jag dig bjuda refrain Ä'ke det gudomligt, Fiskartorpet! Hvad? Gudomligt at beskåda! Än de stolta Stammar som stå rad i rad, Med friska blad! Än den lugna Viken Som går fram? - Åh ja! Än på långt håll mellan diken Åkrarna! Ä'ke det gudomligt? Dessa Ängarna? Gudomliga! Gudomliga! |
Ulla, mine Ulla, to thee may I proffer refrain Isn't it delightful, little Fishertown?[a] "Delightful! Be it spoken." Here the rows of tree-trunks stretching proudly down In brand-new gown; There the quiet reaches Of the inlet flow; And off yonder mid the ditches Ploughed land, lo! Isn't it delightful — all these meadows, though? "Delightful, so delightful, oh!" |
Ulla, my Ulla, say, do you like my offer refrain Isn't it divine, this little fishing town? Divine, divine, and heavenly to see. Row 'pon row of trees there proudly looking down On their new gown. Here the creek enriches, Tho' but calm its flow; There beyond the ditches the ploughed land — not so? Isn't it divine, the way the meadows grow? Divine, divine, divine, divine! |
Ulla, my Ulla, what sayst to my offer? refrain Isn't it divine, say, this our Fisher Cot? Divine, yea, be it spoken! And these solemn oak-trees, proudly row on row All greenly blow! Where the quiet reaches Of the inlet flow, There afar off, between ditches, Meadows, lo! Isn't it divine, say, all this verdant show? Divinely so! Divinely so! |
Reception
Bellman's biographer, Paul Britten Austin, describes the song as "the apogee, perhaps, of all that is typically bellmansk.. the ever-famous Ulla, min Ulla, a breezy evocation of Djurgården on a summer's day."[11]
The scholar of literature
Lönnroth writes that the song is a
Charles Wharton Stork's 1917 anthology calls Bellman a "master of improvisation"[b][21] who "reconciles the opposing elements of style and substance, of form and fire ... we witness the life of Stockholm [including] various idyllic excursions [like Epistle 71] into the neighboring parks and villages. The little world lives and we live in it."[22] Hendrik Willem van Loon's 1939 introduction and sampler names Bellman "the last of the Troubadours, the man who was able to pour all of life into his songs".[23]
Epistle 71 has been recorded by the stage actor Mikael Samuelsson (Sjunger Fredmans Epistlar, Polydor, 1990),[24] the singers and by the noted Bellman interpreters Cornelis Vreeswijk, Evert Taube[25] and Peter Ekberg Pelz.[26] The Epistle has been translated into English by Eva Toller.[27]
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Lithograph for Epistle 71 by Elis Chiewitz, 1827
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A serenade at Fiskartorpet:[12] Coloured postcard of "Ulla! min Ulla!", with Fredman on his horse, and Ulla at her window, 1903
Notes
References
- ^ "Information om Fredman i Bellmans epistlar". Stockholm Gamla Stan. Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 17 June 2021.
- ^ a b c Bellman 1790.
- ^ Bellman Society. Archived from the originalon 10 August 2015. Retrieved 25 April 2015.
- ^ "Bellman in Mariefred". The Royal Palaces [of Sweden]. Archived from the original on 21 June 2022. Retrieved 19 September 2022.
- ISBN 978-0131369207.
- ^ Britten Austin 1967, pp. 60–61.
- ^ Britten Austin 1967, p. 39.
- ^ Britten Austin 1967, pp. 81–83, 108.
- ^ Britten Austin 1967, pp. 71–72 "In a tissue of dramatic antitheses—furious realism and graceful elegance, details of low-life and mythological embellishments, emotional immediacy and ironic detachment, humour and melancholy—the poet presents what might be called a fragmentary chronicle of the seedy fringe of Stockholm life in the 'sixties.".
- ^ Britten Austin 1967, p. 63.
- ^ a b c d Britten Austin 1967, pp. 155–156
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Lönnroth 2005, pp. 320–323.
- ^ Massengale 1979, p. 200.
- ^ Byström, Olof (1966). "Med Bellman Pa Haga Och Norra Djurgarden" (PDF). Stockholmskällan. Retrieved 19 March 2016.
- ^ "N:o 71 (Kommentar tab)". Bellman.net (in Swedish). Retrieved 2 February 2022.
- ^ Hassler & Dahl 1989, p. 165.
- ^ Stork 1917, pp. 16–17.
- ^ Van Loon & Castagnetta 1939, pp. 67–70.
- ^ Britten Austin 1977, p. 77.
- ^ Kleveland & Ehrén, 1984. page 6.
- ^ Stork 1917, p. xvii.
- ^ Stork 1917, p. xix.
- ^ Van Loon, 1939. page 6
- ^ "Mikael Samuelson – Sjunger Fredmans Epistlar". Discogs. Retrieved 12 March 2016.
- ^ "Evert Taube Sjunger Och Berättar Om Carl Michael Bellman". Discogs. Retrieved 27 May 2019.
- ^ Hassler & Dahl 1989, p. 284.
- ^ Toller, Eva. "Glimmande nymf - Epistel Nr 71". Eva Toller. Retrieved 10 March 2016.
Sources
- Bellman, Carl Michael (1790). Fredmans epistlar. Stockholm: By Royal Privilege.
- ISBN 978-3-932759-00-0.
- Britten Austin, Paul (1977). Fredman's Epistles and Songs. Stockholm: Reuter and Reuter. OCLC 5059758.
- Hassler, Göran; ISBN 91-7448-742-6. (contains the most popular Epistles and Songs, in Swedish, with sheet music)
- ISBN 91-7736-059-1. (with facsimiles of sheet music from first editions in 1790, 1791)
- OCLC 61881374.
- ISBN 91-554-0849-4.
- Stork, Charles Wharton (1917). Anthology of Swedish lyrics from 1750 to 1915. New York: The American-Scandinavian Foundation.
- Van Loon, Hendrik Willem; Castagnetta, Grace (1939). The Last of the Troubadours. New York: Simon and Schuster.