Review: Kielletyt laulut
Forbidden songs passed from hand to hand in the Soviet Union
SONGS FOR FATHER IN THE SHADOW OF THE SUN
Forbidden Songs, which premiered at the Helsinki City Theatre’s studio Elsa, is a collection of songs secretly performed and listened to during the Soviet era, which criticised those in power or told the underworld in its own slang about the reality behind the scenes. The performance also sings about the war in Chechnya and the murders of journalists. The Forbidden Songs has been dramatized and directed by Pirkko Saisio, who has also translated most of the songs into Finnish. Alongside Pirkko Saisio, they are interpreted by Jonna Järnefelt andJanne Marja-aho.
Dangerous poetry
The performance sarcastically states that poetry was only truly appreciated in the Soviet Union, as a poet could end up in a prison camp and death because of his words. The poet Juz Aleshkovsky, the author of the song Comrade Stalin, was sent to a prison camp for a couple of years in the early 1950s, where he learned the slang of the underworld. In the song, he reminds Stalin of the coincidence that comrade Stalin was also exiled to the swamps of Siberia before he came to power, where he later sent his political enemies.
Aleshkovsky’s songs Comrade Stalin and Lesbian Wedding were known throughout the country, but the author did not dare to take them up until twenty years later. The forbidden songs were circulated from hand to hand as tape recorders. Arkady Severny’s songs were listened to as rattling home recordings all over the country, but only one album was released by him, and that too in Turkey.
During the Soviet era, the songs of the underworld developed their own poetics and slang. For example, the saying “to write with a Finnish pen” meant to stab (finka also means knife). The songs told about topics that did not fit into the official Soviet reality, such as prostitutes, prison life, vagabonds and clashes in the underworld. In the song, love is a strange land that you can’t say no to.
Longing for freedom
Vladimir Vysotsky, one of the most famous poets and artists of the Soviet Union, was also a “forbidden artist” during his lifetime, and his recordings were also made with primitive equipment. Jukka Malinen writes in the play’s programme that the poet Vysotki sees what attracted the intellectuals to the songs of the underworld: the longing for freedom. Vysotsky sometimes appeared to be a product of the underworld himself, although in reality the poet came from the Soviet middle class. Vysotsky died at the age of 42 of cardiac arrest as a result of the use of alcohol and morphine.
In modern Russia, however, the meaning of songs from the underworld has changed to the opposite, according to Malinen. The intellectuals oppose them as a sign of predatory capitalism and the cruel spirit of the new Russia. PresidentPutin has also used underworld sayings in his campaigns.
Forbidden songs now
The most impressive interpretations of the performance are made by actress Jonna Järnefelt. Her version of a young girl who ended up as a prostitute in Odessa (Institutka) is captivatingly intense. According to Malinen, the port city of Odessa was known for its gamblers, pickpockets, smuggling and brothels.
At times, however, the performance loses its tension, as some songs do not open up to the viewer as they are, and they remain without context on stage as well. Pirkko Saisio’s lyrics based on Danil Harmis’s text and the irony of the song Emme rehabilitoi composed by Jussi Tuurna is apt. The songs often refer to the murders of Anna Politkovskaya and other journalists, as well as to the war in Chechnya.
The forbidden songs originated in prison camps and still reverberate in Russia in the 2000s. The performance ties the songs to modern Russia and asks whether anything has changed after all.