In the late afternoon I treat myself to a musical interlude
via YouTube videos. This is sort of a
warmup (or meltdown?) to that time when I amble down the hall to the place in
the house where the relaxing beverages are kept.
On YouTube, I listen to just about any kind of music so long
as it has a melody and is devoid of spectacle that some people today are fascinated with. One of my current favorites is l'Orchestre de
Christophe Demerson performing two catchy, popular tunes. The vocals are in French and English.
One song is “Paloma Blanca,” often called “Una Paloma Blanca”
(literally “One White Dove”)—a song about freedom. It was written by George Baker and released
in 1975.
That number is followed on the same video by “Comment ça va”—for
which I could find no guaranteed universal translation. It generally means "How are you doing?"
or "How is it going?" The song
provides the answer: “comme ci, comme ci, comme ca”—"so, so” in English.
According to Wikipedia, the song
started out as a 1983 pop piece by a Dutch boy band The Shorts. It was originally written in English by Dutch
composer Eddy de Heer; that was followed by a Dutch version which was written
by Jack Jersey.
All that aside, Demerson and his band are playing for a
dance-hall group of nicely dressed pre-geriatrics who seem to be doing a sort
of low-impact disco shuffle. My favorites
in the crowd are a couple of men near the stage who perform a somewhat synchronized
pirouette and a short red-haired woman who is totally into it; she’s not seen
until the camera locks onto her toward the end of the video.
Just keep in mind when you watch this video that, hey, I’m
easy to please.
The link to this entertainment is here. The video lasts seven minutes and has just
under 6 million views.
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