Irish rebel songs in the GDR
Popular culture and anti-imperialist resistance
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/pomh.21644Keywords:
GDR, Ireland, Irish Folk Music, Rebel Songs, Nationalism, Postcolonialism, Nostalgia, TranslocalityAbstract
Drawing upon ethnographic and historical research, this article explores the performance of Irish rebel songs among former members of the GDR folk-scene (1976–1990). It proposes that the political and nostalgic alignment of East German revivalists with folk songs in which Irishness is inscribed as a longue durée of oppression and anti-colonial rebellion constitutes a powerful discourse that has recursively shaped performance practices. The article argues that this top-down imaginary, circulated through popular culture, could be harnessed by GDR artists from the bottom up. Simultaneously, this adaptation of Irish Republican leanings resonated with the official socialist rhetoric of anti-imperialist resistance.
References
Bohlman, P. V. 2004. The Music of European Nationalism: Cultural Identity and Modern History. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO.
Bohlman, P. V. 2010. ‘600 Jahre DDR-Musikgeschichte am Beispiel deutscher Volkslieder demokratischen Charakters’. In Musikwissenschaft und kalter Krieg—Das Beispiel DDR, ed. Nina Noeske and Matthias Tischer, 79–95. Cologne: Böhlau. https://doi.org/10.7788/boehlau.9783412213039.79
Boym, S. 2001. The Future of Nostalgia. New York: Basic Books.
Breathnach, B. 1971. Folk Music and Dances of Ireland. Cork: Mercier Press.
Chapman, M. 1992. The Celts: The Construction of a Myth. London: St. Martin’s Press. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230378650
Eyerman, R., and A. Jamison. 1998. Music and Social Movements: Mobilizing Traditions in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511628139
Herron, T., and J. Lynch. 2007. After Bloody Sunday: Representation, Ethics and Justice. Cork: Cork University Press.
Hutchinson, J. 1987. The Dynamics of Cultural Nationalism: The Gaelic Revival and the Creation of the Irish Nation State. London: Allen & Unwin.
Kirchenwitz, L. 1993. Folk, Chanson und Liedermacher in der DDR: Chronisten, Kritiker, Kaisergeburtstagssänger. Berlin: Dietz Verlag.
Kretzschmar, E. 2018. Interview with Felix Morgenstern, 13 November.
Lammel, I. 1957. Das Lied im Kampf geboren. Heft 1: Lieder der Revolution von 1848. Leipzig: VEB Friedrich Hofmeister.
Leyn, W. 2017. Interview with Felix Morgenstern, 12 April.
Leyn, W. 2016. Volkes Lied und Vater Staat: Die DDR-Folkszene (1976–1990). Berlin: Ch. Links.
Liebert, T. 2018. Interview with Felix Morgenstern, 14 November.
Millar, S. R. 2020. Sounding Dissent: Rebel Songs, Resistance, and Irish Republicanism. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.11393212
Morgenstern, F. 2018. ‘Voices of Ambiguity—The GDR Folk Music Revival Movement (1976–1990): Exploring Lived Musical Experience and Post-War German Folk Music Discourses’. Folk Life: Journal of Ethnological Studies 56/2: 116–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/04308778.2018.1501956
Riordan, S. 2018. ‘Politics, Economy, Society: Northern Ireland, 1920–1939’. In The Cambridge History of Ireland. Volume IV, 1880 to the Present, ed. Thomas Bartlett, 296–322. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316286470.014
Robb, D., ed. 2007. Protest Song in East and West Germany since the 1960s. Rochester: Camden House.
Robb, D. 2009. ‘A Common European Song Heritage in the Nineteenth Century Songs of Ireland and Germany’. Traditiones 38/1: 141–60. https://doi.org/10.3986/Traditio2009380110
Robb, D. 2010. ‘Playing with the “Erbe”: Songs of the 1848 Revolution in the GDR’. German Life & Letters 63/3: 295–310. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0483.2010.01500.x
Robb, D. 2016. ‘The Mobilising of the German 1848 Protest Song Tradition in the Context of International Twentieth-Century Folk Revivals’. Popular Music 35/3: 338–59. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261143016000532
Ständer, R. 2017. Interview with Felix Morgenstern, 12 April.
Steinbiß, F. 1984. Deutsch-Folk: Auf der Suche nach der verlorenen Tradition. Frankfurt am Main: Fischer.
Steinitz, W. 1954–61. Deutsche Volkslieder demokratischen Charakters aus sechs Jahrhunderten. 2 vols. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag.
Stokes, M., and P. V. Bohlman, eds. 2003. Celtic Modern: Music at the Global Fringe. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press.
Sweers, B. 2019. ‘Germany: History, Culture, and Geography of Music’. In The SAGE International Encyclopedia of Music and Culture, ed. Janet Sturman. Vol. 3, 995–1002. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
White, H. 1998. The Keeper’s Recital: Music and Cultural History in Ireland, 1770–1970. Cork: Cork University Press.
Wolff, J. 2017. Interview with Felix Morgenstern, 12 April.
