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Hallelujah - Cover of the Leonard Cohen song

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Mudcat

Mudcat

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Wally put out the request/challenge to do this and - though I think we can all agree that a Robyn version would be the ultimate - this is what I have come up with.

Unfortunately the piano kind of overpowers - which makes me crazy because I was playing ridiculously quietly here - but I guess that's what my camera likes to pick up.

I'll post the lyrics as well.






"Hallelujah"

I've heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don't really care for music, do you?
It goes like this
The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty in the moonlight overthrew you
She tied you to a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Baby I have been here before
I know this room, I've walked this floor
I used to live alone before I knew you.
I've seen your flag on the marble arch
Love is not a victory march
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

There was a time when you let me know
What's really going on below
But now you never show it to me, do you?
And remember when I moved in you
The holy dove was moving too
And every breath we drew was Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Maybe theres a God above
But all Ive ever learned from love
Was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you
Its not a cry you can hear at night
Its not somebody who has seen the light
Its a cold and its a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
 
Muddy. if you were to perform this and your other songs live I swear I would wear panties to your concert just to throw them on stage at you.



Muddy, in all seriousness that was everything and more than I already was hearing in my head. I actually got a little choked up listening to it. You have a gift sir and I am so very glad you choose to share it with us.
 
Coug's, don't sweat a follow-up. This wasn't intended to be a competition between posters. I just really like the song and it lends itself to various vocal types and you, Reno and Muddy could all do it justice in your own unique ways.

I really wish you would have given it a go but I guess I will just have to listen to my minds ear as to how your rendition would have sounded.
 
Ooh.

It's a hell of an unusual song though. I heard it for years without really listening and I had a vague idea it was some kind of celebration.

But it's not that at all, is it?

I haven't looked up any interpretations yet but I feel like there is something very subversive going on with that song. Something cynical and jaded and even a bit dirty. Lovey dovey stuff, this is not.

I sent a link of this to my mum but I felt weird about it. Now she emailed me back saying the song is a special favorite - so that's good - but I wonder if she is where I used to be, just hearing a pseudo-religious celebration. I don't know. I believe I am just going to leave that be and not question it as far as my mum's position is concerned.

But I would like to know more about Cohen's intent.
 
The "secret chord" I think is just a reference to David who (as a boy) played the harp and pleased the king Saul with it, and the Lord was also pleased with him, as he was annointed by Samuel (this is all in I Samuel Chapter 16). Not a reference to a "secret chord" but I always assumed it was just an extrapolation on this story.

Obviously the second verse is a reference to Samson and Delilah (I once wanted this girl named Delilah-she was a check out girl at the grocery store...moving on).

Also chords such as the diminished seventh were strictly forbidden in early sacred music as they contained the tritone interval; the mathematical halfway point in the octave which allegedly sounded Satanic. I personally love diminished seventh chords. Perhaps I am evil.
 
I get all that. I mean I didn't know every detail of that but I got the religious imagery. But what is he saying about himself and love?

A lot of the time it seems like he's saying it is a disappointment, a perversion, a lie.

With the one verse the hallelujah seems pretty sincere and on the level, but most of them seem more sarcastic to me.



Also, there are more verses than I did here.

It ends on an optimistic note. Sort of?


I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though it all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah
 
Yeah that verse sounds like he "did his best" not to sin but "couldn't feel" the faith of the Lord so he "tried to touch" to me meaning some kind of carnal lust and now he has "told the truth/didn't come to fool you" by singing the song and "even though it all went wrong" he still believes in God and hopes when he stands before him that he will accept him for what he is, IMO flawed, but by nature. Big time run on sentence there but hopefully that made sense.
 
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