Lily Henley – Oras Dezaoradas
Lior Éditions – 6 May 2022
Lily Henley wasn’t interested in blazing a trail with her new album Oras Desaoradas. She was trying to interpret a tradition in danger of being extinguished. The Ladino language is spoken by less than 100,000 people today. People who were expelled from Spain under penalty of death during the Spanish Inquisition of the 15th century. Kept alive by the Sephardic people as they moved through North Africa and the Ottoman empire, these songs about independent women provide an indelible record of the times, but what inspired Henley wasn’t the old songs but the new melodies that keep a culture alive. Henley makes it clear, “… doing an album of old melodies, re-recording what people have already heard didn’t make me excited. This feels inspiring because I’m creating music that feels really authentic and original to me and I’m adding to this tradition that is very endangered.”
What makes these songs so compelling has less to do with their age and everything to do with their subject matter. “Duermite Mi Alma”, using guitar, piano, bass and violin, clutches at your heartstrings even before you realise the song reframes the notion of a cheating husband in a way that tells the tale with sadness and resignation along with an enduring beauty. Translated to English, the opening lines set the stage for heartache, “Sleep my darling/ Sleep my sweetheart/ For your father is returning/ From the arms of his new lover.” The melancholy evident in the music suddenly becomes even more understandable and heartbreaking.
Henley’s fiddle playing is incendiary, and “Avre Tu Puerta Serrada” plays out for almost three minutes before a second melody comes in and the lyrics begin telling the tale. A lover appears and begs the woman of his dreams to come away with him. Surprisingly, he also makes a threat at the song’s close, “If you forget me/ Your beauty will be lost,” which is a pretty egoistic statement, one that clearly sees the man attempting to show that he holds power in this situation.
Revolutionary in the ability to ignore stereotypes centuries old, the folk songs on Oras Dezaoradas, with their emphasis on strong females, directly goes against the standard gender roles that still have a certain resonance today. This makes these songs all the more important as a record of these women. These women illustrate how the Sephardic tradition reflected a self-sufficient streak allowing women to display thoughts and feelings that often went against the stereotypical thought process of the time.
Amidst a vaguely sad melody on violin, guitar and bass, “Esta Noche Te Amare” weaves a spell. A woman in bed lets a man into her room. He swears his love to her, yet by the time the morning has come, it’s the woman who holds all the cards, and the hand she plays isn’t the one he expected as she sings, “Now I’ve let you in/ I know you hope I’ll stay/ So long, my love/ Has held you in its sway/ But it’s a love that I knew/ Could never last the night.” The song reverses the usual gender stereotypes and gives the woman the upper hand.
The intrigue of Lily Henley’s Oras Dezaoradas exists on so many different levels simultaneously that one begins to wonder why we are still so far away from the notion of gender equality. Despite that, this is music that deserves your attention and your commitment to ensuring this tradition continues and thrives.
Order via Bandcamp: https://lilyhenley1.bandcamp.com/releases
Website: https://www.lilyhenley.com/