Somewhere Over The Rainbow – 30 Days 30 Songs

Posted bySarahPosted inShare Your Music - 30 Days 30 SongsTags:, , , , , , ,

Day 23 of my new blog challenge –

Share Your Music! 30 Days 30 Songs!

Please feel free to join my anytime you want – casual players welcome! 😉

 

Some songs simply don’t need any explaining, don’t you agree?

Enjoy!

 

Published by Sarah

Artist & Illustrator

42 thoughts on “Somewhere Over The Rainbow – 30 Days 30 Songs”

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  4. I love this song by Israel Kamakawiwo-ole. It is also in my Sarah’s challenge playlist.2 on Spotify. How wonderful that we have so many songs that we like in common.

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  6. I love this song!!!

    I really like this version by Israel Kamakawiwo-ole, and am grateful to Sharon for her comment here. I would never have known that.

    My favourite cover of the song (and I’m not biased at all 🙂 ) is by my ex-sister in law. And I love how there can be such very different takes on a song.

    I’m not sure this link will work; but just in case https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFbt5CpJRA8

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    1. Me too, Su!! 😀
      And your link did work – what a beautiful cover indeed! So very dreamy and she has such a wonderful voice! Ah – I wish I could sing like that! 😀

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  7. This is a beautiful version of the song, but I wonder if listeners/readers understand the particular longing expressed by Israel Kamakawiwo-ole. He was proud of his Native Hawaiian heritage, and he represented the indigenous people who resent the changes brought to their islands by early missionaries and current tourism. Understood in this context, this song tells of the yearning to honor the land itself and Hawaiian ancestry.

    The paddle out for IZ’s funeral (he died very young) was one of the largest ever attended. Thousands of people stood on the shore, swam or boated into the sea for the scattering of his ashes, and thousands more paid allegiance to him throughout the islands.

    “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” is not just a longing to return home, but a hymn for the ancient Hawaiian traditions that are forever lost to modernity, and the fact that so much of Hawaii is today a gilded manifestation of its original natural beauty. I guess this is true of nearly every place in the world, but Hawaii is close enough that millions of people see it every day, yet almost none of them really see it at all.

    I’m not Native Hawaiian, but I lived there twice as a child (1952-53; 1959-61.) I had the honor to see it close to its natural splendor but I also was witness to terrible injustice, similar to what was happening all over the world. We moved back to the mainland on my 13th birthday. I’ve never returned but am hoping to take my sons and their families to Hawaii in the summer of 2020.

    Sorry for this long comment, Sarah; you’re welcome to delete it, of course.

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    2. Thank you so much for your wonderful comment, Shari – and I would never dare to delete anything you write except you would wish for it to be deleted, my friend. Having said that, I hope you don’t want me to do this here, because I think it’s so important for people to read this and understand Israel Kamakawiwo’ ole and his work better.
      I remember having watched the paddle out on the TV a couple of years ago in a documentary – what a beautiful ceremony it was.
      You can’t know it but I’ve always wanted to learn Hawaiian one day, having fallen in love with the sound when I first heard it being sung by him. Also I’m a big believer in preserving and treasuring native languages all over the world. As nice as it is to be able to converse with so many people in English, this kind of heritage really needs to be protected. Language is culture and in fact the soul of the people who speak it.
      I hope you get to visit Hawaii next year with your family! Who knows, I might meet you there. 😉

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    1. You’re very welcome, Liz! I think it’s my favorite rendition as well, there’s just so much soul in his voice, a longing and yearning too. He was truly one of the best.

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