Re: Dona Dona - memories and Smithsonian Folkways

[Sylvia Schildt <creativa...>]

I only know that I accompanied Frank to Arthur Kevess' apartment in
Brooklyn, where we spent several interminable afternoons --  with Frank at
the guitar working on what we were told was Arthur Kevess's translation.
Teddi may have co-translated, in  which case, my humble apologies.

Frank's contributions, as singer and friend, was to suggest alterations to
the unsingable portions of this song, and of the German song, Kommeraden.

For those who don't know about  Dutch-born Frank Schildt -- pardon the
shameless plug - he sang in 20 languages in a rich bass baritone voice. At
one point for about 9 years he was the toast of the Left Bank caves of
Paris, also played for US Special Services after the war. During WWII he was
quietly involved in the rescue of over 45 Jewish families. Here in the
States, he was part of the 60's folk scene, being Monday Night Hootenanny
Director at fabled Gerde's Folk City, along with Brother John Sellers. He
also played at the Cafe Wha, the Bizarre and other such places in New York,
Philly, Chicago (with Odetta at the Gate of Horn), Austen, Texas as well as
tons of schools and universities.

Two of the people he took under his wing during the hootenanny years were a
kid who wrote songs and played guitar and harmonica (uh-huh) and a Native
American singer with a unique wobble in her voice.

His recording would have descended into total oblivion were it not for the
Shared Vision project, which rescued Moe  Asch's Folkways collection, now
housed in perpetuity at the Smithsonian.

In this recording "Songs of Love, Play and Protest" Frank really traverses
the world with songs known and unknown including Oyfn Pripitchuk which he
learned from a little survivor boy named Maxele.

By the way, he had a maddening gift of perfect pitch, could write down
anything he heard in instant solfeggio and sing it from said notes years
later.  I still have notebooks full.

Thanks to the Smithsonian, one can get this and any Folkways recording on CD
along with the original handy-dandy song booklets that came with the
records.


But I ramble ....

Sylvia Schildt

on 10/1/02 3:13 PM, Robert Cohen at rlcm17 (at) hotmail(dot)com :

>> The song also gained folk scene currency through the English >translation,
>>> which was penned by Arthur Kevess....>My late husband, >the Dutch
>> folksinger Frank Schildt (Folkways-Smithsonian -
>> Songs of Love, Play and Protest)  collaborated with him on this and a
>>> German >song "Kommeraden" in several interminable sessions to help >make
>> his translations singable.
> 
> It's wonderful--and I'm grateful--to hear something about a Folkways name I
> didn't know; but I'm puzzled by this posting.
> 
> First, there are, and were, several English translations of Dona around--so
> no "the."  The translation Joan sang was, I was informed, a translation by
> Arthur Kevess and Teddi Schwartz.
> 
> The person who told me--along with some other history--was Teddi Schwartz!
> She even showed me a letter she got from Joan's office thanking her for the
> translation and advising that, as of its writing, the song was Joan's most
> requested song in Europe--which astonished me.
> 
> Perhaps Sylvia's husband collaborated on a different translation of Dona; or
> perhaps only on other numbers; or perhaps I misread Sylvia's posting
> altogether ...
> 
> --Robert Cohen
> 
> 
> 
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