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From WWR

Trivia, story behind the song, etc.

I first learned of this song while reading Slavidir Rawicz’s “The Long Walk”, a harrowing tale of a Polish man’s escape from a Siberian prison during World War II. In the book, Rawicz describes an enforced march over many weeks in the dead of winter, where 5,000 men walked in a chain gang and slept huddled together in the snow at night. He recalls this poignant moment on Christmas Eve: “The news went up and down the line like leaping flames in a forest fire. It’s Christmas Eve, went the whisper from man to man….Away back behind us there was suddenly a thin, wavering sound. It was odd and startling. It grew in volume and swept toward us…it was the sound of men singing. I thought the soldiers would have ordered to shout us down, but the mounting sound reached us unchecked and engulfed us all. Everybody who had a voice left was joining in. A marching choir of nearly five thousand male voices drowning their despair in a song of praise…. Then a few voices started the Polish carol ‘Jesu’s Lullaby’, and I choked on it and fell silent. And half way through it, others broke down and wept quietly. The Lullaby died abruptly and there was no more singing.” After reading this passage, I embarked on a month-long quest to find a recording of this song, in part because of my Polish heritage. I have since learned that this is one of the most beloved and well-known carols in Poland; almost every Polish Christmas collection includes it. I finally received invaluable assistance from the Polish Art Center in Hamtramck, Michigan (www.polartcenter.com), where the owner even went so far as to play it for me over the phone. After I came up with a guitar arrangement I played it for my father, who teared up at the memory of singing this song at Our Lady of Czestochowa Grade School as a boy in New Jersey. The photo on the inside tray card of this CD was taken around 1920; it is my grandmother Marion Wisniewski at the age of about 16 with her extended family around a Christmas Eve dinner table in New Jersey. (She is the one standing right underneath the photo of the Polish Madonna.) Her family emigrated from Poland when she was four years old. [1]

Lyrics

Lulajze, Jezuniu, moja perelko, 
Lulaj, ulubione me piescidelko.
Lulajze, Jezuniu, lulajze, lulaj!
A ty Go, Matulu, w placzu utulaj.

Lullaby, Jesus, oh cease from your crying
Here on your mother’s warm breast softly lying
Lullaby, Jesus, oh sleep now my treasure
Mother is watching with love none can measure.

Zig- guitar 

Listener comments about Lulajze, Jezuniu (Lullaby, Jesus) (83460)

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