Katyusha

[Philippe]

Haven't had a chance to play the demo yet, but it's hard not to like a game that plays the Internationale while loading.

I took a look inside just to see what kind of music selection there was. Nice version of Kalinka, by the way.

Unless the game runs into the 1940's you may have to replace Katyusha with something else. The song was composed in 1938 and is about a girl named Catherine and her fiance who's off serving on the frontier somewhere in the NKVD border guards. The piece has Stalinist associations (post-Lenin and post-Trotsky) and is probably too late by about twenty years for the Russian Civil War.

Katyusha is a great piece of music even though it's anachronistic and a little politically charged. It's a bit like deciding you like Giovinezza -- it's a fun piece of music too, you just have to be careful to use it in the right time period and the right context.

[WallysWorld]

I really like the music in the game as it adds real atmosphere to it. "The Internationale" during the loading screen gets me in the mood.

Ageod has always done a very good job with the music in their games.

Kudos!

[Василеостровск]

Well, it is one of the songs I meant as a "surprise" when i posted in other topic. I don't think it takes away from the mood really. There are a couple other songs that do not fit time frame, but as Clovis(?) stated the money budget and license costs for songs use is factor. Katyusha is certainly 2nd world war song, but music style fits.

Also are you Russian speaker? The song is just about a woman at home while her true love is away in army and she is singing song and hopes the song reaches him and he remembers her, and this helps him do his job well.

I am not understanding what is politically charged about lyrics. It is song about people loving each other while separated. I guess if you really really look into lyrics where it says that her love is 'a soldier on a far away border' you could infer that he was in NKVD, but that is looking too much in to song I think. The only other possible political thing is where it says 'let him preserve motherland and she preserves their love' This isn't political statement, this is just saying when he is away doing his duty she will wait for him because she loves him. It is love song, nothing more, nothing less.

Saying song is about "Catherine" is reading too much into it too. Song is about "Katyusha." Katyusha is pet name for Ekaterina (Katya) (in English Catherine) for some one that is close to you. Having her be 'Katyusha' puts you in the mindset that she is someone close to you. I guess this point is lost on people who don't speak Russian or relate to the culture. Saying song is about woman named Ekaterina (Catherine) defeats the purpose of the song.

In the end this song represents the spirit of soldiers away at war, no matter the era, it fits the game stylistically if not chronologically. Now if the song was Священная война (The Sacred War) it certainly would not fit.

[Philippe]

No one will argue that Katyusha isn't a wonderful song. It's one of my favorites and I'm always on the lookout for different versions of it. It probably sounds enough like a folk song that it isn't too obtrusive. If I ever hear it while playing I'll have to pretend I'm having one of those Boris Pasternak flash forward to the future moments.

The lyrics of Katyusha are well known (even though, to my horror and astonishment, I've seen it described as a song about a rocket launcher -- but that's the web for you). It's a charming love song.

From the little that I remember of the period, if someone is said to be guarding the borders of the Soviet Union in the late 'thirties or early 'forties he is probably in one of the NKVD border guard units (the guys with the green hats and collar tabs). Unless he's guarding the border metaphorically and it's merely a figure of speech, in which case he could be in the regular army, or anything for that matter. The Stalinist context is irrelevant to the basic meaning of the song, but it's probably there. In any case, guarding the border is not the same thing as guarding the gulag. But when playing an historical game or simulation, context is very important.

I agree with you completely that there is nothing in the song per se that should make it politically charged. But some of my sources tell me that those who are nostalgic for the old regime have adopted it (though everyone else seems to have adopted it too). I've always found this rather puzzling, but refuse to stop liking something just because people whose politics I don't happen to agree with are trying to appropriate what has by now become a traditional piece of music. But consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds -- I'm the guy who get's teary-eyed when they play the Internationale. Probably because I like French music.

I'm afraid I'm too much of a musical purist to feel totally comfortable with music played outside of its proper period, no matter how good it is. I get annoyed when I hear late nineteenth century and twentieth century Russian music inserted into a Napoleonic context. I'd probably be a bit more relaxed about it except that I was trained in a school of classical music that made everything sound exactly the same, and spent many years purging my mind and ears of homogeneous mush. When you go from Eugene Ormandy to learning how to make 17th and 18th century music not sound like Toscanini, or playing the domra in a balalaika orchestra, you get a little cranky when you hear something that seems out of place. I'd love to see Sophia Coppola's film about Marie Antoinette which I hear is a wonderful movie, but I wouldn't be able to watch it unless I could turn the sound off.

[Baris]

I agree with you completely that there is nothing in the song per se that should make it politically charged.

Superstructure of the Soviets(party or government) should have changed in 30's. There was "bujdak" in the songs(song of Volga Boatmen;Bulgarian Bass Boris Christoff sings magnificiently! song is losing enthusiasm near the end part.) Where there is collectivizm and joy also suffering. One of the reasons of the revolution. Where love songs less important as it is a struggle of life and death, Apart from timeframe "Katjusha" should have written in a relative prosperity and Status quo times of Soviets.

[Василеостровск]

No one will argue that Katyusha isn't a wonderful song. It's one of my favorites and I'm always on the lookout for different versions of it. It probably sounds enough like a folk song that it isn't too obtrusive. If I ever hear it while playing I'll have to pretend I'm having one of those Boris Pasternak flash forward to the future moments.

The lyrics of Katyusha are well known (even though, to my horror and astonishment, I've seen it described as a song about a rocket launcher -- but that's the web for you). It's a charming love song.

From the little that I remember of the period, if someone is said to be guarding the borders of the Soviet Union in the late 'thirties or early 'forties he is probably in one of the NKVD border guard units (the guys with the green hats and collar tabs). Unless he's guarding the border metaphorically and it's merely a figure of speech, in which case he could be in the regular army, or anything for that matter. The Stalinist context is irrelevant to the basic meaning of the song, but it's probably there. In any case, guarding the border is not the same thing as guarding the gulag. But when playing an historical game or simulation, context is very important.

I agree with you completely that there is nothing in the song per se that should make it politically charged. But some of my sources tell me that those who are nostalgic for the old regime have adopted it (though everyone else seems to have adopted it too). I've always found this rather puzzling, but refuse to stop liking something just because people whose politics I don't happen to agree with are trying to appropriate what has by now become a traditional piece of music. But consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds -- I'm the guy who get's teary-eyed when they play the Internationale. Probably because I like French music.

I'm afraid I'm too much of a musical purist to feel totally comfortable with music played outside of its proper period, no matter how good it is. I get annoyed when I hear late nineteenth century and twentieth century Russian music inserted into a Napoleonic context. I'd probably be a bit more relaxed about it except that I was trained in a school of classical music that made everything sound exactly the same, and spent many years purging my mind and ears of homogeneous mush. When you go from Eugene Ormandy to learning how to make 17th and 18th century music not sound like Toscanini, or playing the domra in a balalaika orchestra, you get a little cranky when you hear something that seems out of place. I'd love to see Sophia Coppola's film about Marie Antoinette which I hear is a wonderful movie, but I wouldn't be able to watch it unless I could turn the sound off.

Well, I think the being on the border part was just a metaphor for being away in the military, this is a bit of over analysis I think. It certainly makes the song sound more 'epic' than say something like 'her song reaches for soldier digging ditch in middle Russia'

I don't know what you mean by 'those who are nostalgic for the old regime have adopted it' Everyone knows and sings this song, especially around 9 May. It has pop versions, techno versions, it was one of the songs sung to open Eurovision contest in Moscow, people who play music for money on street often play it, it is played on hockey and football matches. It is just song everyone knows. If some communist group plays it while flying Soviet flag and trying to hand out poorly written newspapers outside metro stations i hardly think that constitutes them as owning the song.

I understand your feelings about music though, I have seen too many Russian songs used completely out of contexts, simply because they were "Russian" and whatever called for a Russian song.