Day 75 Sami musicians

Today at Finnish language and culture class, we were introduced to the Sami people.

The Sami people are quite mysterious actually, no one can really say for sure where they originate from. My teacher actually said that it was believed that the Sami people has some Asian genes in them. They have lived in the Northernmost Swedish region (really chilly there) for almost 7000 years. They are nomadic and follow reindeer up into the mountains and live with these animals together in the summer months. But from what I heard from class, the Sami people now is divided between Finland, Norway, Russia and Sweden.

What's interesting about the Sami people, is that their music is actually quite easy on the ears! It greatly resembles Mongolian songs and those nomadic songs. The music is, I would describe, quite raw, and most of the songs describe the nature, how wonderful it is, and how we should protect it.

There is this Sami musician that I quite like, called Mari Boine. She has been quite active since the 80s, but is still popular among the Fins. She mixes the traditional sounds of Sami into modern Techno.



The song praises the nature and warns people not to destroy it. Above is the music video of "Gula Gula".
Lyrics translation: Gula Gula (Hear the Voices of the Foremothers)

Hear the voices of the foremothers
Hear
They ask you why you let the earth become polluted
Poisoned
Exhausted
They remind you where you come from
Do you hear?
Again they want to remind you
That the earth is our mother
If we take her life
We die with her