Music Anna Morottaja from the Inari Sámi knew nothing about her own family, but then she found mind-boggling recordings: Such is the livđe song, which was thought to have already disappeared.

Millennium at the turn of a musicologist Marko Jouste began to study old yoiku archives in which folklore collectors had recorded Sámi vocal music in the 20th century.

Jouste, who was proficient in the Northern Sámi language, ran into yogis whose language he did not understand. He gathered the songs together and realized that they differed from the Northern Sámi river not only in their language but also in their expression.

“Jouste went with the recordings to my dad’s cousin Matti Morottajan and asked what these are, to which Matti replied that these are the livđe, ”the Inari Sámi musician Anna Morottaja says.

Livđe slept in oblivion for more than fifty years. It was long thought that the Inari Sámi did not have their own musical tradition.

Now Anna Morottaja, from the Inari Sámi name Kuobžâ-Piäká Ánnáhas released the world’s first livđe album called Livđe.

Inari Sámi There are many reasons for the loss of musical memory.

The Spanish flu struck Inari at the turn of the 1920s. As many as ten percent of the population died. According to Anna Morottaja, the Sámi population was severely punished by the virus. Many children were orphaned and did not have time to learn to live.

At the same time, the proportion of Finns in the population of Inari exceeded that of the Sámi. Mixed Marriages increased.

Inari Sámi musician and musician Heli Aikio has evaluatedthat Christianity’s idea of ​​the sinfulness of Sámi music may also have contributed to the break with tradition.

After the war came modernization, a new era that revolutionized everything.

The disappearance of Livđe may have been accelerated by the Inari Sámi culture itself. In the north, the Inari Sámi are described by the word modest anarâš. The people of Inari do not make themselves a number.

According to Anna Morottaja, adaptation has been an ingenious means of coping with the pressures of larger cultures.

“It’s bent, but not broken. We have only lived that own life. ”

Inari Sámi music thus looks like its culture in a certain way.

“Livđe does not show off, does not present anything. Let’s be what we are. In one dictionary, livđe is described as a sophisticated joi, Morottaja says.

When a lyricist loves his relative, he does not tell the story of that person but draws his entire portrait in words, tone, rhythm, tempo and melody.

“When I live with a relative, I think he is there with me,” Morottaja describes.

Anna Morottaja became acquainted with livði in 2016. He studied at the Sámi Academy of Music in Utsjoki and was given a school assignment to look for drunks of his own family.

Mormtaja began wading in the livs found by Jouste and was startled. Many of his relatives had livđe. The main publisher of the archives was born in 1884 Anna Briitta MattusAnna Morottaja’s grandfather’s sister.

“It was shocking to realize how close the animals came. There were no objects or photographs left in Dad’s home. Now I have got to know my relatives through livjee. ”

The livđe tradition of Morottaja’s own branch was tragically broken when his birth on the shores of Inari Pekka-father, Kuobžâ-Piäkká, was orphaned only at the age of eight. He became an auctioneer until he reached Riutula’s orphanage. He became a Sámi, but the heritage, stories and goods of his own family disappeared.

The farthest relative found by Livðen Morottaja is his father’s grandfather, born in 1852 Menes-Antti.

His life is Antti-äijih, Meniš-Anttithe first track on the album.

With a certain in a way the record is a family album, as much of the songs tell of Morottaja’s relatives. Twelve of Livđe are old and three are Morottaja’s own productions.

Anna Morottaja hopes that the record will act as a reminder in the community. That an old Inari Sámi would listen to the record and say that the mother also sang. Maybe I would remember someone living, or even some words.

Livđe slept so long that every memory is gold.

Correction 21.2. at 13.18: The name of the album is not Meniš-Antti, as the article read earlier, but Livđe.