[English translations of some of Øverli´s songs]

ENGLISH INTRODUCTION:
VLADIMIR VYSOTSKY AND JØRN SIMEN ØVERLI

Jørn Simen Øverli (b.1950) is a norwegian balladsinger who has made two award-winning CDs with his own norwegian versions of Vladimir Vysotsky´s songs. He has had more than 1200 concerts with them, mostly in Norway but also in other, especially slavonic countries since 1986. The concerts have been with his band, alone with his guitar or with a local chorus, in any room suitable, from pubs to cathedrals. Through the years he has made friends with Vysotsky-experts, his family and friends, artists and other important people in Russia and is today an Vysotsky-expert himself. His fascination with the subject resulted in a book in 2000 called: «Vladimir Vysotskij og hans russiske gitarpoesi» («Vladimir Vysotsky and his Russian guitar poetry»). At the end of this book he has made the most comprehensive discography of recordings of Vladimir Vysotski´s songs, listed with Russian original titles and English translations.

An norwegian author; Tomm Kristiansen, a known judge of foreign cultures, writes about Jørn Simen´s retelling of Vysotsky´s art:

«The first time I heard Jørn Simen Øverli singing his Vysotky-songs I didn´t believe my own ears. The Wolf Hunt, No Man´s Land. I expected some classical protest songs, quite political correct manifestations from a soviet dissident. And what was this....Øverli passed on to us a strong russian voice settling things with his countrymen and women, but not only them. Vysotsky´s lyrics also hit those who thought themselves safe, not belonging to the soviet system. Where did you find these songs, I asked him, and Øverli rolled his eyes. The idea that this matter was not known to everyone was for him utterly absurd.

This is what Jørn Simen Øverli has been doing, all his life. His wry world with polish and russian words and music has moved the norwegians, and given them an insight in musical cultures foreign to most of us. And we love it! Nobody thought Øverli would succeed in translating Vysotsky`s songs into norwegian and record them. It´s just not possible, russians said in earnest. The worst part was perhaps that he retold the songs himself , not knowing the russian language. But that´s why he did it so well. He had to ask everybody he met with some knowledge of the language about the meanings and the symbols. This is what he brings to us.»