En Whatever

I had one of those moments when I suddenly realized, in one small area, at least, how incredibly parochial I can be. It came while watching this clip of Eric Clapton playing Big Bill Broonzy's Key to the Highway:



Did you notice the Japanese subtitles? I realized that although the words could explain approximately what he was singing, they could never get close to the style. Little slurs, bends in the language itself, regional deliveries, accents - there's no way you can get any of that from letters scrolled at the bottom of the screen. And then I realized how little I get from performances by foreign musicians. Beyond the words, you get into delivery, idiom, and a host of other things that fall into a context when you're from that culture. For example, I'll have different associations for delta blues and Chicago electric. I know how something about how they're related and how they differ. But unless you've learned about this one way or the other, the resonance of experience, like overtones from your own life, simply don't exist.

Labels: music, translation

posted by Erik Sherman @ 3:58 AM