Elf Queen’s new album Requiem is available for preorder now at Bandcamp
Hauk Heimdallsman gave me a preview of this gem, and the vocals of Kelsy make work what ought to have been a tough stretch, bringing the poetry of the Voluspa into modern English and a musical shape that both calls to those just discovering it, and echoes with the traditions it springs from.
For those who do not know Norse Mythology, these are the sagas sung by the peoples that founded the nations of northern and western Europe, whose history shaped lands as far away as England, Ireland and Iceland to Russia and the Byzantine Empire. The Voluspa is perhaps the most sweeping of all those poems as it takes the form of a disguised god, Odin, seeking out the hall of the most wise and most ancient seeress of the giants. He asks her to tell the tale of the beginning of all things, how the world came to be, and how it will fall. To speak the shaping of the world, the setting of order, and the rise of the conflict that would shatter both that order and the whole of the nine worlds.
A poem that sings of the hope of the worlds forming, the sorrows of the mistakes that sink it into conflict, and the rage of its fall, the twilight of gods and men, cannot be anything but an emotional journey. To attempt to take such a powerful and important work and bring it into the language that is accessible to the casual listener, as well as those who both know the lore, and revere it still, is no small challenge. To weave it into music that carries the listener along through the heights of rapture, the sorrow and fear of the oncoming storm, the howling fury of the battle of Ragnarok, and the very thin strand of hope found in the echoes of its aftermath is not a challenge, it is magic.
Elf Queen has woven this magic. I received a copy of it as a sample, but even having it already, I pre ordered my paid copy today. I was taken by its magic so strongly I could not accept it as a gift, and must instead treat it as the work of art it is, and offer fair price. A gift for a gift is our way, and this is without a doubt a very great gift indeed.
The album itself can be listened to as individual tracks, but it is most powerfully and deeply experienced as an album, as that allows you to follow the unfolding of the whole Voluspa poem, to see the Nine Worlds take shape, the rise and fall of gods and men, the coming doom, in all its majesty and tragedy.
Track by track here is my experience of the album.
Track Overture: Haunting and mediative moving into introspective. Moves you into a headspace to truly be open to experience something that unfolds on more levels of your mind than simply the analytical.
Track Voluspa 1:
Opening soars with both rock and opera elements to build the emotional depth, stirring the body and mind for what will stir the soul.
Ah to hear the poetry sung! This is not the language it was written in, nor the music of the folk who first spoke them, but they are the words that ring in our ears, and the music that moves those of us who dance those ancient paths to modern ends.
Roughly covering 1-16 Voluspa with decent fidelity. Don’t worry, they didn’t go overly dwarfy and lose a few minutes testing everyone’s memory for Durin’s sons.
Track Voluspa 2:
More somber, more layered, more confrontational. The truth that the old witch knows it is Odin who asks is hinted at in the hostility of her answers when she speaks of his own deeds. The first war is sung in tones of discord and strife. Haunting and doomful, yet the music lilts with the rushing tide of a history that cannot be denied, a fate that cannot be escaped, a storm that carries the listener along into the world of conflict that begins. There is hope woven in the bitterness, an eagerness that is not fully hidden in the spite.
Roughly covering Voluspa16-26
Track Voluspa 3:
Ethereal and somewhat sad, the old witch sings her sadness. She curses Odin for forcing her to sing of this, to remember this. She asks him why he stirs such doom filled visions, and sings of his own secrets, that he may suffer for what he asks her to see.
The music turns dark and evocative, a rising tension of emotion and rage. The Valkyries mass to ride the winds for the dead of the field, the doom of Baldur is woven in deceit, the tragedy of vengeance and destruction is spun. Mothers weep, wives weep, brother kills brother, children are murdered for crimes of their fathers, and the tragedy is only beginning.
You can feel the sorrow, the pain, the rage in the seeress towards Odin who bids her see this, to live this, to sing this darkness into being.
Track Taking up the Runes.
This is sung not in the voice of the seeress, but the harsh tones of the Tree Hanger, the Gallows Lord. Father of magical songs as his sacrifice of himself to himself on the world tree steals for gods and men the knowledge of runes. It is easy to sink into, easy to lose yourself. Close your eyes and feel you heart hammer to its beat, feel your soul come loose. Feel the harsh bark of the tree upon your skin, feel the hunger and thirst of the tree hanger, feel his madness flow through you, feel his inspiration take you to places the sane dare not go. This is music that is not for the weak, this is music that is not for those who must hold onto self and sanity, to remain inside their head to listen. This is madness, this is the storm. Follow it, flow with it. There is truth here, but you will not find it inside your comfort zone.
Track Hymn to Heimdall.
Song of hope, song of redemption, the song of Heimdall reminds us that through storm and war, through treachery and despair, there is one who holds true. The prayer offered to him is heart breaking, for what comes is not fair, and prices are paid a hundredfold by others than who made the choice.
Track Voluspa 4 Ragnarok
It is the doom of mankind that the most powerful, most stirring of all passages are these, the song of the twilight, the sound of the endings. Sword age, wind age, axe age, wolf age, the world tree trembles, Fenrir snaps his fetters, the wolf courses the sun, and the song sings in the blood.
Heart hammering, the mind on fire, the song carries you to a vision of the ending of gods and men, the hand fumbles for the hilt, what say the alfar, what say the alfs? The doom of men sings in the bright soaring voice of the seeress voice, and the gates of hell swing open as your own teeth bare in the barely contained ecstasy of the song.
Voluspa Chapters 35-58
Track Voluspa 5
In the aftermath of the storm, in the wreckage of war, and a world swept clean of the order that was, the gods and horrors that framed it, the music stirs softly as the wind upon new grass, gentle as the opening of the first flower.
The land is renewed, the animals return, the gods return to rebuild, Baldur the bright returns from Hel’s cold halls to the shining lands. Hoenir casts the lots in Odin’s place, the sons of Thor raise halls where their fathers had stood.
The song rises in hope, voice soaring and music swelling slowly from the soft and quiet promise of new life, to the defiant song of glory. The corpse dragon flies, for no age is without shadow, but the seeress will sing no more. The song ends with the soft warning that while the future will dawn bright, it too will have shadows and strife. The song ends, but not history.
Chapter 59-to end of Voluspa.
Track Cattle die (drawn from the Havamal, another of the more important sacred poems of the North)
The warning of the Havamal, the counting of the costs, the warning to remember those lost, to be worthy of what was paid for those who remain or follow. The music soars, a mix of classic and rock because the truths are ancient and timeless. There is hope in the pain, promise in the price, of brighter days if you learned from the sacrifices that got you here.
Overall impressions:
This album I could listen to a hundred times, well that is a lie. I will probably listen to it a hundred times this month, but I could listen to it for twenty years and still feel it carry me away. Rarely can you find someone who can take the ancient poetry of our faith and set it to modern music.
This was not the language of the original spoken lore, this is not the language it was first written in. This is not the music of the folk who spoke or sung it in ancient times, but neither are we that people.
There are probably going to be purists who argue this is sacred lore and shouldn’t be treated like a rock opera. I respectfully direct those people to read the lore, if they can say that again with a straight face they never read the lore; they cherry picked it.
There is a spirit to the lore. This is the living lore of a living people, a people who believed with every fiber of their being that their soul lived in their breath, that the spoken word, the song, was more than simply sound, it was magic, and it was sacred.
I am a poet, that is the only part of the skald that is mine. I can know that the words Odin has inspired should be sung, but I cannot put them to music, nor should anyone who has not had a few horns be subjected to my singing them. What I can tell is when a true skald has taken the poetry that we accept was inspired by Odin and put it into a song, woven into it the music, that make it live, make it soar, and let it carry us away to the places words alone can never take us.
Poetry does more than prose, for it weaves messages between the words; meaning not just in what is said, but in the silences. Song can do more, it can take the truth of the words and weave them into a tapestry that evokes what was, weaving the emotions of all that strove to bring it to the events the poet speaks of, and leaves echoes of the costs, hints of the hope, or shadows of despair only hinted at in the bare words of the poem itself.
Requiem has taken one of the most powerful poems in the Poetic Edda, and set it to music that not only brings it to life, but builds heights of inspiration and depths of despair that will leave your soul flying to the heights of the World Tree, and down the roots to Hel’s own gates as the poetry at last achieves the fullness translation to a new language and new culture had lost it.
mainer74 