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A day late and a ruble short
May. 2nd, 2012 06:35 pmI hope y'all had a happy May Day!
It's been much too cold to sing about outdoor sex, so here is a different aspect of the day:
The song is called "Moscow in May", but "May Day in Moscow" would be more accurate, as that's what it describes.
I have never encountered a recording that includes all six verses; this one includes the rarely sung second verse but omits the third, fourth, and sixth (my favorite, alas). The video claims to be from 1937, but that can't be; Stalin is in military uniform, which he never wore before World War II, and a soldier is shown heavily decorated with medals from the war. Toward the end a placard reads "Eesti NSV" ("Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic"), which status that country held only from 1940 (and really from 1944, when it was reconquered from the Germans). My guess is the video is from the late 1940's.
The tune "Moscow in May" is yet another work of the Pokrass brothers, Dan and Dmitri; the words are by Vasily Lebedev-Kumach.
It's been much too cold to sing about outdoor sex, so here is a different aspect of the day:
The song is called "Moscow in May", but "May Day in Moscow" would be more accurate, as that's what it describes.
I have never encountered a recording that includes all six verses; this one includes the rarely sung second verse but omits the third, fourth, and sixth (my favorite, alas). The video claims to be from 1937, but that can't be; Stalin is in military uniform, which he never wore before World War II, and a soldier is shown heavily decorated with medals from the war. Toward the end a placard reads "Eesti NSV" ("Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic"), which status that country held only from 1940 (and really from 1944, when it was reconquered from the Germans). My guess is the video is from the late 1940's.
The tune "Moscow in May" is yet another work of the Pokrass brothers, Dan and Dmitri; the words are by Vasily Lebedev-Kumach.
