Zatmění Romantická Teskná Píseň lidí I. věk

Niënor resembles Ophelia in some ways. I could totally see her, driven mad by the look into the eyes of Glaurung, the dragon, wandering through the forest, picking and scattering flowers around her and singing about the chaotic images from her lost memory. And finally, exhausted, she collapses on the mound of the elven princess Finduilas, where she is eventually found by her brother Túrin, who goes by the name Mormegil at that time. Neither he nor she knows that they have just found the sibling they have been looking for, and in their ignorance they fall in love and later marry and conceive a child, which is never born, as Niënor's life ends not long after.

And this is only one of the many tragedies in the story of the Children of Húrin.

However, the song Eclipse was not meant to be whiny and melancholy – at least not from start to the end. The madness of Niënor should, I imagine, be expressed in a wild dance. And the character of both, the voice and the dance, should be intensifying and gaining strenght.

So once again, my favorite flamenco came to the fore. I presented this idea to Bardě and asked him for some flamenco improvisation to get me in the mood. He then took the guitar and turned on the recorder and, completely without preparation or thought, recorded about six minutes of flamenco variations. I then cut this recording into parts, chose motives that interested me, put them together, added a melody to them, then also a melody for the soprano recorder for the prelude and interlude, and finally the lyrics, and the song was born. Unlike prose text, lyrics don't come easily to me, but this one was easy, I remember. It didn't have to make much sense :-) Crazy characters are satisfying in this regard. But still… it has some hidden meaning.

The song was recorded as part of the recording of the Húrin's Children album in November 2023, but it was not completed until May 2024. The original arrangement was added with a teasing flamenco intro and, of course, the indispensable castanets.

Nienör is sung by me in this version, although I did not play this character at the performance. But it's very difficult not to sing your own song while recording, especially when you have very specific ideas about it. When, in addition, the actress, who played Niënor, refused to participate in the autumn recording phase, I did not hesitate to realize my ideas.

In this form, the song will not appear on the album. You can listen to it only here, at the Songs of Middle Earth website. It is actually here as a first "taste" from the album Húrin's Children.

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English translation of Czech lyrics of the song:

Eclipse

Pennyworts sparkling,

A tear on my cheek,

That’s just the wind

Fiddling with dust.

With leaves and small stones,

Tears flow in streams,

Who’d laugh so much

In front of a dragon?

I laughed a lot

With mourning since I was little,

Sang with joy

spring to spring.

Picked up flowers,

Bound them into bouquets,

Put them in vases,

Both happy and desperate.

Forget-me-nots sparkling

Why do I see

Endless fear and pity

on all faces?

A head can become dizzy,

From the ease of living,

How could I forget

The dragon eyes?

And I ran and ran,

Brisk and sleepy,

Laid on moss,

spring to spring.

Picked up flowers,

Wove them in my hair,

Pretending

I have just met you.