Folk Music As Anti-Anxiety

Soul Lift

“Though the storms of life can cause us strife,
Freedom finally does win out.”

—Lännen Lokari

In the first era of Covid terrorism, 2020, we all found ways to self-distract.

When my nerves froze up, I turned to this most famous of Finnish immigrant songs, Lännen Lokari, by Karelian Folk Music Ensemble, listening to it over and over and over. I also listened to every other version of it on the internet too. I was out in the country, alone, in Northwestern Connecticut. Incidentally, this is also one of my favorite bands, from Karelia, (but this song is sung in Finnish.)

From a website, Nordic Folklife, I learned more about this enchanting song.

Turns out it’s about a Finnish Don Juan lumberack:

”First recorded for Columbia Records in 1930, Hiski Salomaa’s “Lännen Lokari” [Logger of the West], also describes the working conditions that many Finnish migrants faced in the United States, though much less stridently than “Kaivantomiehen laulu.” Instead of the coal-covered miner, we are introduced to the experiences of an itinerant lumber jack, traveling the country to find work, while ensuring that he has (or at least claims to have) a woman in every town. The lumberjack, with wandering eyes and wandering ways, boasts his way from Alaska to Florida and everywhere in between, but Salomaa’s recognition of the difficulties of that type of lifestyle are hinted at in the song’s final stanza:

“Now Frisco I’ve seen, Oregon I have been
Where there’s summer and mountains cold.
To Dakota I’ve come, at Palm Beach I’ve swum,
Greeting friends both young and old.
When you build your house, settle ‘neath the pine,
That day for joy you’ll shout.
Though the storms of life can cause us strife,
Freedom finally does win out.”

In addition, I’ve found a new international folk music channel on YouTube that I just love, called Folk Songs International. I’ll be posting songs from there, hoping people don’t mind. Here’s a sample song, Russian, called Oy Dusya, Oy Marusya: