Posted on 08/10/2012 11:23:42 AM PDT by Renfield
The dreams of dozens of Norwegian girls ended in disenchantment on Saturday when organizers axed part of their show at the UN General Assembly in New York, citing concerns over lyrics listing some of history’s worst tyrants.
The 46 members of the Norwegian Girls Choir had long looked forward to performing their song about war and peace at the General Assembly Hall, newspaper Aftenposten reports.
But the girls, aged 12 to 19, never got to realize their ambition after the organizers of the Rhythms of One World Festival took fright on hearing the choir sound-check.
As conductor Anne Karin Sundal-Ask worked out some of the details for the stage show with a lighting technician, the choir shrieked out the names of infamous tyrants from Hitler and Mussolini to Quisling, Stalin, Lenin, Castro, Tito, Maria Antoinette and Papa Doc.
“The mood changed quickly at that point and they wanted a list of all the names,” Sundal Ask told the newspaper.
The choir leader said she was willing to compromise and remove some of the names but the organizers at the Friendship Ambassadors Foundation eventually told her the girls were not going to be allowed to perform the piece.
“They said the UN wouldn’t sanction it,” said Sundal Ask.
The choir instead sang its folk music repertoire, but having to resort to the fallback plan left a bitter taste for the girls, the composer and the conductor.
“This is freedom of speech, and the piece is about war and peace,” said Sundal Ask.
“It’s a very unifying piece. It doesn’t feel good to be censored or to not be allowed express oneself artistically.”
With its ultimate message of peace, the conductor said it was “absurd” for the piece to be to be kept out of the UN headquarters.
Written specifically for the Norwegian Girls Choir, the piece has been performed all over the world since winning a competition in Japan five years ago.
Composer Maja Ratkje said she was shocked that the piece had been struck off the programme in New York.
“As far as I’m aware, this is the first time my art has been censored,” she said.
I'm not sure what to make of this.
You can see the girls performing this banned work on YouTube here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Q7bKtYo3qSg#!
The girls sing well when they actually sing, but this is one of the stranger performances I've seen.
They were going to sing the names of “They who must not be named.”
Half the world frightened not to be politically correct to the other half.
They left out Bush.
Perhaps the girls were being critical of “Hitler and Mussolini to Quisling, Stalin, Lenin, Castro, Tito, Maria Antoinette and Papa Doc.”
This is the UN, after all.
If your dream is to sing in front of the UN, then you really need to dream a little bigger.
“Quisling” was the Norwegian equal of Benedict Arnold.
They certainly know about traitors.
I haven’t checked it out yet, but the moment I saw “award winning” I knew it would be weird.
Nowadays if it’s pretty or nice, it’s mundane. To be “award winning” in the arts nowadays, you have to be elitist, strange, and usually self-serving. (It’s my ART!)
They were singing a list of famous Left Wing democidal maniacs, and the UN censored it. Wow.
Don’t know what Marie Antoinette is doing on that list though. Where’s Robespierre and the architects of the Vendee massacre?
The flea infested underbelly of Dystopia of progressofascist creation coming to a city near you.
I'm just shocked they didn't throw Bush into that list.
That is just what I was thinking. What in the world is Marie Antoinette doing on that list. I doubt if she ever had a single person executed. She might have been ignorant of what was going on but I doubt she had the power to do anything about it even if she was not.
She was just the icing on a cake.
The UN should be included in any list of the world’s worst tyrants.
I am.
Many of the despots named are actually revered at the United Nations.
I could not understand most of what they were saying but in the middle the girl says something about the tyrant erasing the past and making the humans androgynous. At the end when they turn their backs and start calling out names, I could only recognize pol pot and stalin.
LOL.
I can see why the French Revolution needed to make her out to be everything she was not - but do we still need to buy their propaganda.
I am as anti-Royalist as they come - but really.
And she never did say “let them eat cake” - that particular smear was used before she ever came to France on a different target.
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