Our Beloved Godfather must make the Google algorithm wet its pants. We don't know what search terms he uses, but he does find the darndest stuff. Lately, he's gotten us hooked on the music of Bobby Aro. A native Minnesotan (and we can only assume a Lutheran), Aro is the author of such classic tunes as "Highway No. 7" and "I'm Not Finnish (But My English Teacher Was)."
How to describe this music? Our first thought was "the bastard child of Sven, Ole and the Limeliters." The fan site linked above compares him to Bob Dylan, another Rust Belt boy with a musical gift, but that's a bit like comparing Hendrix with the Klezmatics -- hey, they both work creatively with the music of oppressed peoples, but ....
Anyway. Click up top and listen. There are two albums, the latter of which contains a track called "The Moose." OBG proposes that this is the archetype of all Finnish humor. We trust his judgment on this, although we ourselves had been sure it was Canto 20 of the Kalevala (you remember, the one about beer).
1 comment:
I wouldn't assume that a Finn in Northeastern Minnesota was/is Lutheran. Many of the Finns were Unitarians. They were also instrumental in getting the Co-ops started, as they trended toward socialism. There is still a co-op park in the area. But, yes, there are Finn-Lutherans, including one on the Bishop's staff, and some years ago, he would travel around to various churches so that there could be Finish language church services occassionally.
Post a Comment