Talk:The Carnival Is Over

Untitled
I added the name of the original Russian song. AllenHansen (talk) 07:46, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I am aware of a regional version of this song, known in Rotterdam. It begins with de sentence: Aan de oever van de Rotte en de oude (or ouwe) Schie zat een kikker stil te dromen. Translated: On te bank of the (rivers)Rotte and the old Schie sat a frog in silent dreams. It also contains the sentence Het was de moordenaar van je vader en de .. referring to an oievaar. Translated, It was the killer of your father and the .. (I don't know the rest) referring to a stork. Peter de Lange94.212.51.39 (talk) 21:23, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Nick Cave Version
Should something be included about the Nick Cave version? He is an Australian singer and his version was used at the end of the Underbelly series (based on true events) when the cops finally arrest Carl Anthony Williams, Melbourne's most notorious organized crime leader. It could make an interesting addition to the section that says the song is used in Australia to close off ceremonies sometimes. 150.203.111.211 (talk) 00:33, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

is there any third-party reference to the nick cave version? please include it if there is- for two reasons: nick cave, & secondly, there's a disproportionate amount of the article about the various attempts by boney m, which rather overshadows the seekers' "original" (& arguably the better known version).

duncanrmi (talk) 14:49, 23 March 2021 (UTC)


 * I have found a good reference to support the inclusion of the Nick Cave version - done. Please take a look, you may wish to expand it.
 * Also, I agree that the Boney M sections are disproportionate - and also repetitive. I would support a severe prune. Brymor (talk) 16:13, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Berlioz
There is a remarkable resemblance between this tune and a theme in Berlioz's overture Les francs-juges (only much faster). Does this mean that Berlioz borrowed a Russian theme? --Martin Wyatt (talk) 19:35, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

wouldn't be at all surprised, but needs a citation or else this is just OR. :-/

duncanrmi (talk) 14:50, 23 March 2021 (UTC)

Bellini Norma

 * An even closer precursor of the music for this song than the Berlioz one cited by MWLittleGuy comes from Bellini's opera Norma. This is the duet In mia man towards the end of the opera, and the first four bars are almost identical to Carnival. The music drifts off after that, as it does in the Russian piece cited in the article. The dates of these classical pieces are interesting. Berlioz's overture Les francs-juges was written in 1826, and first performed in Paris in 1828, while Norma was written and performed in Milan in 1831.
 * As Duncanrmi points out, we need a citation to be able to reference these precursors in the article. However the same thing applies to the Russian reference already cited: it is simply stated that Carnival is based on a Russian folk song, without any supporting documentation. So all these suggestions are OR, including the Russian one. Tom Springfield probably did know the folk song, but without a reference, how can we include this in the article? Brymor (talk) 19:00, 25 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Finding something good enough for a citation to support the Russian folk song source is difficult - people keep mentioning it, but without substantiating it. However, the first reference in the article, to the book by Jo & Tim Rice, may be satisfactory:
 * Springfield found a Russian folk tune, adapted the melody, added English lyrics and the result was The Carnival is Over.
 * This is in a published book from 1982, so it's good enough for me. Brymor (talk) 18:19, 30 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Even better, I have found an article in the Financial Times by the Director Tony Cash describing how he and Tom Springfield sang Stenka Razin in Russian as part of a Russian language course run by the military in the 1950s. So Springfield had the melody in his head for over ten years before he wrote Carnival. Brymor (talk) 21:55, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

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The Music
This section isn't really about the music for The Carnival Is Over, it is an extended dissertaion on the song Stenka Razin (largely taken from that page). It makes no mention of what Tom Springfield did to transform the music of the Russian folk tune to give us the song we know today. However, I quite like having the Russian score, and Chaliapin singing it, even though this could have been achieved by a link to the original page.

Things get problematic after the score. The reference to the 1908 film based on the Russian text (not the music), is irrelevant. And do we need to know that the tune is also used in two Dutch songs? The fact is that this tune was well known across Western Europe from before 1883 when Stenka Razin was written - see Arebenti on the Talk page of Stenka Razin who found it in a German drinking song from 1863 (which may therefore have been the source of the Dutch songs). And the section ignores a much more important alternative version of Stenka Razin, Pete Seeger's (English) River of My People from the 1950s.

What to do? If no one objects, I propose removing the reference to the 1908 film, and introducing Pete Seeger in place of the Dutch references. I am also tossing up whether to remove the second paragraph, which is a retelling of the Russian lyrics, at least from "According to the Dutch traveller . . ." Brymor (talk) 19:36, 29 April 2022 (UTC)


 * I have made a first shot at these changes. And note that I have made a minor edit to the description of how the Russian song was written to make it more consistent with the (more detailed) Stenka Razin page. Brymor (talk) 19:47, 30 April 2022 (UTC)

Boney M version
The section on this feeble and deservedly forgotten cover version is completely disproportionate in the article. Ef80 (talk) 17:15, 6 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Agreed. If you look at the Nick Cave section above, you will see this comment "there's a disproportionate amount of the article about the various attempts by boney m, which rather overshadows the seekers' "original" (& arguably the better known version). duncanrmi"
 * to which i responded: "I agree that the Boney M sections are disproportionate - and also repetitive. I would support a severe prune. Brymor" Neither Duncanrmi nor I have got round to doing the required edits - please feel free to do so yourself! Brymor (talk) 19:10, 20 August 2022 (UTC)
 * On second thoughts, I'll do it myself - we owe it to the memory of Tom Springfield to get this balance right Brymor (talk) 18:27, 21 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Pruned version now done, achieved by merging the first two paragraphs of the previous version, removing irrelevancies, and adding a citation. I have left the Infobox for the song, as it doesn't do any harm Brymor (talk) 20:24, 21 August 2022 (UTC)
 * champion, & good shout re TS- I almost missed that in the news this week.
 * duncanrmi (talk) 13:48, 27 August 2022 (UTC)
 * I also took the liberty (& doubtless some wikipedia policeman will be along soon to uncorrect it...) of fixing the credit in the track listing for 'kicking against the pricks', where frank 'boney m' farian had been given a co-writer credit, presumably on account of writing that extra verse for the then-new singer reggie tsiboe.
 * duncanrmi (talk) 14:03, 27 August 2022 (UTC)