Re: Why should barbarians get all the poetry....

From: Guy Hoyle <ghoyle1_at_...>
Date: Wed, 7 Mar 2001 08:11:41 -0800 (PST)

Oh, I fully realize this, and I agree, in theory; but I don't think of them as "real" Gloranthan songs (most of which would probably not be very interesting to us 20th-century folk). When I go to renaissance fairs, I realize that the music they play there is mostly much later than the renaissance. I do find songs like "Only Our Rivers Run Free" and "Raise the Tribes for Starbrow" and "And The Band Played 'Dance of the Goddess'" to be very stirring. We have to make some concessions to playability, after all; we don't even know what a lot of the music of the ancient world sounded like. I doubt I could get my gamers very worked up by filking up some Elder Edda selections. Likewise, a lengthy dissertation upon Gloranthan musicality would probably go right over my head, and remained unused by me.

Gloranthans don't speak English, French, Finnish, or any other earthly language that we who buy the game products do; yet I haven't seen a Sartarite dictionary, or lengthy New Pelorian glossaries or Malkioni grammars. I don't think of these tunes as true Gloranthan songs, but as "translations" of Gloranthan tunes into a form that is more meaningful to my players and myself. I just want to capture some of the spirit of the times musically, even if it isn't precisely what would actually be played that way in Glorantha.



Guy Hoyle
Webmaster, http://uncommoncon.com, http://www.hawkwood.org

Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong. - Thomas Jefferson



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