Kalinka

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAT3G-1mdBw[/youtube]

Something for the weekend.  Kalinka, perhaps the best known Russian song.  It was written in 1860 by Iran Larionov.  It quickly achieved a popularity of epic proportions and has been sung with endless variant lyrics among Russians from that day to this.  Here are the original lyrics:

Little snowberry, snowberry, snowberry of mine!

 Little raspberry in the garden, my little raspberry!

  Ah, under the pine, the green one,

 Lay me down to sleep,

 Rock-a-bye, baby, rock-a-bye, baby,

 Lay me down to sleep.

Little snowberry, snowberry, snowberry of mine!

 Little raspberry in the garden, my little raspberry!

  Ah, little pine, little green one,

 Don’t rustle above me,

 Rock-a-bye, baby, rock-a-bye, baby,

 Don’t rustle above me.

  Little snowberry, snowberry, snowberry of mine!

 Little raspberry in the garden, my little raspberry!

  Ah, you beauty, pretty maiden,

 Take a fancy to me,

 Rock-a-bye, baby, rock-a-bye, baby,

 Take a fancy to me.   Little snowberry, snowberry, snowberry of mine!

 Little raspberry in the garden, my little raspberry!

Here is a variant from the movie Taras Bulba (1962) where cossacks in the seventeenth century are anachronistically singing Kalinka as a drinking song:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=823doKkeemI[/youtube]

Of course I cannot pass up the opportunity to post the magnificent “Ride to Dubno” scene from the same film:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8G6S6fQQ4I[/youtube]