Added: 4 years ago
From: LisaFishman
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  • Thank you. So touching. Where can I find the jiddish lyrics, please?

  • Very emotional version. I have never heard it in Yiddish. I learned the Joan Biaz version as a teenager & the Hebrew version as an adult. Thank you for sharing this original version. Rivi

  • The best, original and meaningful version. Hate the american crappy version.

  • Bikel ( Captain Von Trapp) is coming to Toronto on August 21st at Beth Emeth synagogue! It's Ashkenaz Foundation's greatest Yiddish concert of the year. See you there!

  • crazy good!

  • Lisa, I linked your rendition on my FB page on Israeli Holocaust Remembrance day this week. I was moved by your emotional singing and beautiful voice. Your song touched the hearts of listeners, who were moved to hear that it is a Yiddish song, and learned of its context and meaning.

    Shalom, Hila

  • Superbe interprétation,chantée avec le coeur. Même si je ne comprend pas la langue, l'émotion passe, froissons et poils redressés,voire larmes à l'oeil.

    Merci, de tout coeur, merci.

  • This song is so very beautiful and sad, but when you sing, it sounds totally dramatic and full of emotions. When I heard this song the first time I almost was moved to tears. And even today I still get goose bumps. Wonderful cover!

  • Hi Lisa, I was wondering if I could make one very small, nit-picky suggestion? I love all the emotion you put into this song like I said before about the phrasing, but I don't understand why theatrical singers always do that hiccup thing at the beginning of a line. Do you know what I mean by that? A perfect example is Lea Michelle (Rachel on Glee). I'm not saying you aren't good or anything; all those other comments are truthful and straight from my heart. Just wanted to throw that out there.

  • wonderful *.*

  • You are so awesome!! One of my Favorite Singers in the World!!! I love you!!

    Ilan

  • What a great voice you have, and what marvelous phrasing! This gave me chills!

  • Hermosa interpretación... FELICITACIONES!

  • Rewelacja !

  • The best version l've ever heard

  • This "folk" (sic) song was composed by Aaron Zeitlin and Sholem Secunda in New York City for the 1940 play "Esterke,"

  • @KameaMedia Folk songs are a genre. Many of the folk songs we sing today were written in the twentieth century, and their authors are known. It is a combination of style, context and prevalence that makes a song a "folk song", and I think "Dona Dona" definitely qualifies... BTW it would be interesting to research though if it has its roots in a more ancient song, or was newly invented in 1940.

  • Wow! What a remarkable talent! By far the best version of Dona Dona on YouTube, and even though I'm not of any Jewish background, I completely feel the emotion, distress, religion, persecution and sense of community in such a beautiful performance. Best of luck in your career. I can't get over the power in your voice.

  • Searching for a version of this song that would capture the beauty and passion of the original intent and meaning of this song, I found it here. Thank you, Lisa Fishman.

  • Also Kuunkuiskaajat singing Dona Dona!

  • NICE SONG BUT MUCH TOO MUCH" DONAS"

  • oh my god this is so touching..love it..what for a voice!!!

  • a beautiful song sung by a beautiful voice...

  • Beautiful!

  • Since I was a little child, I have loved the song very much. it's surprise to hear this song in its original language. Your song is beautifu! Thank you~

    As well, maybe the information of this song could add a country. I am a Taiwanese and learn this song in Chinese version.

  • i am german and we have to sing this song in the school.

  • I just read that it is a Yiddish song and searched for it here and I'm glad that I found your interpretation.

    Very soulful

    Thank you

  • Watched for the third time, cried for the fourth.

  • beautiful voice! great song

  • Comment removed

  • Lisa, I have posted this on my Facebook wall. If you'd like to see it, my name there is Mai Harinder Kaur. I'd love to have you drop by for a visit.

  • Finally, a rendition with the emotion the song deserves! Thank you, Lisa, for reaching into yourself. You nailed it.

  • Wonderful version, excellent interpretation, perfect voice, most passionate. Congratulations!

  • @Lisa. With all rescpet and compliments,

    i would like to say:

    If you do it with piano, _cello_ and You, it will be fantastic. Cello could better serve(suite) your wonderful voice and way you express your emotions.

    My best regards.

  • quand je l'entend j'azrrive a aimer la langue allemande!

  • Ce n'est pas de l'allemand mais du Yiddish, c'est vrai que cette langue est basée en grande partie sur l'allemand, mais elle est bien plus douce. (surtout pour des oreilles juives)

  • @jajaf

    quelle importance pour moi que ce soit pas totalement de l'allemand ou que ce soit du juif

  • mon dieu, quelle femme!!! elle était émouvante!

  • Your heartfelt rendition shows us that this is much more than just a nice, little ditty. I knew it was a powerful song about freedom and never giving up, but I had no idea it was written about the Nazis.

    The song was also sung (sort of) as a lullaby to my Sikh son when he was a baby. In fact, his first attempt at singing was, Doda, doda doda sort of gurgling along with me.

    He was martyred in the antiSikh violence in Delhi in 1984.

  • @simayana

    That's a really sad story... ;(

  • @Nyanyinyah Actually, there is more to this than I wrote...My husband, two of my brothers, two cousins and my two unborn daughters (I was pregnant at the time) were also killed. I was badly injured but obviously survived.

    The Sikh spirit cannot be destroyed! (But I wish they'd quit trying.)

  • @simayana

    Wow, so surreal. My sympathize. Glad you made it and move on.

    I know Donna Donna as an anime soundtrack and then my favorite manga "Heart" mention this song in an episode, which lead me from sites to sites and finally brought me here.

    Nice to know you. :)

    PS: Lisa, if I happened to double post this message, it's okay just remove the other one.

  • ths song is about the holocoust

  • @lemonlime301

    Dona, Dona composed in New York City 1940. Given the year, it is highly unlikely it was written with the Holocaust in mind.

    Composed by Aaron Zeitlin and Sholem Secunda for the play "Esterke,"

  • @KameaMedia The Holocaust had not yet started but the deadly persecution had, and Zeitlin, who had just come from Europe, apparently sensed it. His entire family perished in the Holocaust soon after. The song was prophetic, and that is why it has come to symbolize the Holocaust. At the same time, we need to remember that the persecution of Jews in Pogroms and massacres did not begin in the Holocaust, the Holocaust was its culmination. This is the power of the song.

  • 素晴らしいです。

  • nice song

    i like this version better than...other

    Genialne wykonanie:)

  • I have been singing the English translation since Donovan recorded it "back in the day." I knew it was originally Yiddish, but never had the opportunity to hear it in its original language until now.

    Thank you, Lisa Fishman, for a beautiful and powerful rendition--even with the "flub in verse 2," as you so humbly put it. I love hearing you sing this song. Thank you for sharing your beautiful talent in this beautiful song.

  • Thank you so much for your sweet words -- it is so appreciated! :>) lisa

  • it's you who're sweet

  • @LisaFishman

    Wow Lisa - you take me to the core of the music - your passion and wonderful voice are such treasures !!! Thank-you so much for keeping our traditions alive !!!

    .........from a fellow artist.... shalom !!!

  • what a woman, lisa you really rock

  • the lyrics should  remind us:

    free animals.

    animals are more than a product.

  • Comment removed

  • to negotiate and avoid any facts of violence, "doesn´t fit in her",

    miss "marieantoinette".

    even if the text is an interpretation, it is also a text for facing reality.

    inform yourself about peter singer's (holocaust vicitm) point of view: you can avoid any voilence, but if you keep silent, you are part of it.

  • translated from the jiddish origin: On a wagon bound for market There's a calf with a mournful eye. High above him there's a swallow Winging swiftly through the sky. Chorus: How the winds are laughing They laugh with all their might Laugh and laugh the whole day through And half the summer's night. Dona, dona, dona...
  • "Stop complaining," said the farmer,

    "Who told you a calf to be?

    Why don't you have wings to fly with

    Like the swallow so proud and free?"

    Chorus

    Calves are easily bound and slaughtered

    Never knowing the reason why.

    But whoever treasures freedom,

    Like the swallow has learned to fly.

  • I tend to agree, Chaijm.

    In The Creed of Noah is the statement:

    "I will not cause needless harm to any living thing."

    'Needless', I suppose, would be the point of debate here. We're vegetarians, but not everybody thrives on such a diet. But the bound calf is a metaphor for certain painful human thoughts and situations.

    Anyway, WHAT A BEAUTIFUL VERSION OF THAT SONG!!!

  • Amazing beautiful performance! Brava!

  • GREAT PERFORMANCE!!!

  • First time I have heard this song in Yiddish..............Powerful performance

  • I just have to listen to this song because our music teacher in school told us to do =.=

    It's a ... weird language .. that yiddish

  • It is a combination of German and Hebrew

  • Yiddish is way more than just German and Hebrew. But those are the primary components. There's no better language for self-expression, nu?

  • its jewish man

  • Quelle femme passionnée vous êtes..!! Vous m'arrachez les larmes à chaque fois...

  • Comment removed

  • Elle est géniale en Yiddish ! Très belle interprétation bravo

  • I have just listened to a dozen versions of this song and it is the best.

  • Even more goosebumps from horror if one knows the background. The lyrics were written in the Warzawa Shtetl when they knew nobody would survive...and outside, SS troopers accepted facing the firing sqad rather than "mop up" and shoot civilians, including children.

  • The tune Is older than IIWW Isn't it?

  • thats a normal delusion

  • wetten dazu gibts n text?

    schick mir ne nachricht ich schick ihn dir

  • Das Lied heißt nicht Dona Dona sondern dos kelbl. Dona Dona ist nur ein intrumentales Stück..dazu gibt es keinen Text. Tzz.. -.-

  • I'm doing this song as one of the five songs a semester I do as a voice principal at the University of Miami, and I get chills every time I hear this recording.

  • Absolutely magnificant voice G-d Bless You Lisa for bringing your fabulous voice and grand song to a new generation.

  • I've always loved this song but after I've heard Lisa interprete it in Yiddish I do understand. My motherlanguage German is so close to the Yiddish lyrics and the fact that I am sure there is noone in this - nowadays great - country who could sing this song like Lisa does because the German Jews have mostly been murdered shatters me. Lisa, thank you so much for this great song, it will surely accompany me and it has changed my life.

    Gold & love to you from Münster Rock City / Germany, Otto

  • Absolutely BONE CHILLING!! What a BEAUTIFUL voice you have. This song makes me cry but I still listen to it many times.

  • Really beautiful.

  • Wonderful!

  • Maybe Mike Patton should give it a go, I recon he would be able to pull it off nearly as well.....

  • Lovely!

  • WOW!!! Was für eine Stimme und Gesangsvolumen. Ich mag das Lied, aber über Lisa Fishman bin ich vorher noch nie gestolpert. *Asche auf mein Haupt und vielen Dank für die geile Inspiration*

  • Tov m'od, Lisa!!

  • whoa..absolutely great song!!!

  • One of my Favorites Songs, Lisa does A Subpurb Sing! Thank, Lisa! RR

  • que de nostalgie, de tendresse, de sensibilité et de maturité...

  • Beautyful! Where can i find the lyrics(in yiddish) and the notes?

  • very nice voice excellent!!

  • Shalom aleichem! Fabulus in Any Language but especailly done by Yours!

    Thanks for such Tallent! Roger

  • ich habe fast geheult!!!! schluchtz

  • This was beautiful. I only heard this by Joan Baez but had no idea where it originated. What a fantastic voice. Thank you.

  • A sheyn lid in a vunderlekher interpretatsje un a sheyner khinezer malbush - an emese mekhaye far a yid in Peking. A hartsikn dank!

  • I see; you are dre-amer too just like me :)) Forever Peace !!!

  • wery good

  • Lisa, I wish you all the best, you deserve it Poliakov

  • Lisa you are wonderful!!!!

  • You give Adrienne Cooper a run for her money. This is breathtaking.

  • I am weeping...Like a poor calf. Let us be all swallows...

  • Awsome song.... sometimes its a shame to be german...

  • Never shame to be a German! It is not about being a German, it is something else... I know Jews and Russians who lost their families and then fed and comforted German prisoners of war. Even those who suffered most know the difference.

  • shame for being german is the right thing..beause in this case it is ....no shame to be me, just about that part..because it was germany no doubt

  • Yep.... that´s what I mean..... It´s not really a shame.... but if you take take a look at the 1930s...... that´s a time every german should remember and that something like this will never happen again

  • yeah um the "palestinians" are funded lock stock and barrel by the anti jew world ....so if you think "its should never happen again" it has never ended

  • Nowadays, I'm 74, no family left my all life was a desert, is someone volunteer to replace my little sister my two brothers ? They where five, eleven, and thirteen years old...

  • It's a shame to be fascist. And fascism is not a nationality. It can happen anywhere with any people that do not recognise the signs. It happened to be in Germany at that time. It was financed and brought into power by international capital. So, who deserves to be ashamed?

  • 5 stars! warm and beautiful voice!

    Lisa, do you also gives konzerts in Europe (Switzerland)?

  • Donna di grande fascino e con una voce stupenda.

  • Amazing voice! Sweet sad song... Thank you, Lisa.

  • Thanks Lisa. Really enjoyed your performance.

  • Thanks very very much, Lisa. It's the first time I hear the Yiddish version and I am totally taken away!

  • what does this song mean? Your voice is amazing...

  • Danke für die herzliche, starke Interpretation dieses herrlichen Liedes!

  • i feel Blue when heaing this song, /.........

  • AWESOME!!!

  • You made me cry.

  • I hope they were good tears!!!

    my best,

    lisa

  • Lisa- you are beautiful!

  • Bella canción de un pueblo grande, hermosa voz de Lisa.♥

  • Dona-Dona Oyfn furl ligt dos kelbl, Ligt gebundn mit a shtrik, Hoykh in himl hlit dos shvelbl, Freyt zikh, dreyt zikh hin un krik. Refr: Lakht der vint in korn, Lakht un lakht un lakht, Lakht er op a tog a gantsn Mit a halber nakht. Dona, dona, dona....
  • Shrayt dos kelbl, zogt der poyer:

    Ver zhe heyst dikh zayn a kalb?

    Volst gekert tsu zayn a foygl,

    Volt gekert tsu zayn a shvalb.

    Refr.

    Bidne kelber tut men bindn

    Un men shlept zey un men shekht,

    Ver s'hot flihl, flit aroyftsu,

    Iz bay keynem nit keyn knekht.

    Refr. 2x

  • Beautiful voice!

  • Very moving. Never again will the Jewish people be bound!

  • çok güzel bir şarkı

  • Wow, that's really beautiful!

  • Wow this is pretty cool. I thought it was a japanese song. I didn't know it was yiddish. I'm pretty sure I'm singing this on my profile, but its in japanese. Its less soulful, lol. But a great version on the song, the piano is great as well. Keep up the singing.

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