Throatsinging in Finland

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Permalink Reply by Sauli Heikkilä on March 23, 2011 at 6:40pm

It is longo ago, I saw it. Can´t really remember. Robbers were singing int he party? Don´t think it was joik. Have to check it out. It is nice film anyway.



Dan Zimmermann said:

If I'm not mistaken, there is a duo of bards featured in the movie "Ronja, Robber's Daughter" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088015/ that sing a neat style. I always think of these guys when I hear the term Joik, but I'm probably far off, eh?

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Permalink Reply by Sauli Heikkilä on March 23, 2011 at 6:46pm

Guttural yes but throatsinging? I don´t think so but depends how you describe throatsinging... Monotonous? Well, some people say that rock is monotonus and some people say that classical music is monotonous...

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Permalink Reply by Stacey on March 25, 2011 at 6:38am

Wolfgang Saus said:

Hi Stacey,
thanks for your post. Do you have a recording of joik with overtones?

Yea, somewhere around here... Try this: http://shub.zuul.org/~zuul/zuul.org/jojk/ These are from Sverige Radio's Musica Sveciae series and was recorded around 1953 to 1954. I don't have the bear jojk there... Here's what the accompanying book says:

Mention has already been made of the inadequacy of our conventional notation in providing a somewhat faithful image of both melodic and rhythmical characteristics of the yoik. And notation tells us hardly anything at all about the actual manner of singing. Yet the style of singing is one of the yoik's most important features ... ... it may be of use to some listeners to indicate some of the most characteristic features that clearly distinguish the way in which the yoik is sung from that which is normal in Western music and which we willingly believe to be "natural". The most obvious feature is the compressed voice resulting from greatly tensed vocal chords and a narrow throat. This technique gives a fairly coarse sound and very little deep resonance. Inhalation is often completely independent of the musical phrases and in many cases the great tension in the vocal chords is maintained while a breath is being taken, given a strange effect of the melody being cut into pieces and the note being forced out under great strain. There is also an impression of the rear of the tongue being pressed almost completely against the palate, preventing the air from passing. (Examples: Olof Blind [10:1,2], Jonas Ponga [10:4,5], Nils Anders Ponga [10:6].) Many of our contributors also commented on several occasions that it was highly strenuous to yoik, both physically and mentally. ... A further manifest result of the great tension in the vocal chords is that the note ends abruptly when there is no breath left. The melody is cut off sharply, as with the bagpipes

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