Songs and music

[Magda Hassan]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UW3IgDs-NnA
Web Oficial : http://www.violetaparra.cl
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ENGLISH BIOGRAPHY
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Violeta del Carmen Parra Sandoval (October 14, 1917 - February 5, 1967) was a notable Chilean folklorist. She set the basis for "The New Song" (La Nueva Canción chilena), a renewal of Chilean folk music. Parra was born in San Carlos, province of Ñuble, a small town in southern Chile. She was involved in the leftist movement and the Chilean Socialist Party. She established the first Peña, (now known as la Peña de los Parra). A peña is a social and political community center. The word is Spanish for "hard rock." There are now many peñas throughout Chile, Latin America, and in North America, Europe, and Australia. They serve the expat communities that fled Chile after the CIA-backed coup of 1973 that overthrew Salvador Allende's democratically elected socialist administration.
Violeta Parra is a member of the prolific Parra family. Her brother is the notable modern poet, Nicanor Parra. Her son, Ángel Parra, and her daughter, Isabel Parra, are also important figures in the development of Nueva Canción in Chile.
She committed suicide at the age of fifty.
Her most famous song, Gracias A la Vida, was popularized in the US by Joan Baez. It remains one of the most covered Latin American songs in history.

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LYRIC : Thanks to life
( Violeta Parra)

Thanks to life, which has given me so much
It has given me two eyes, and when I open them

I clearly distinguish black from white
And in the high sky, its starry depths,
And from the crowds, the man that I love.

Thanks to life, which has given me so much
It has given me hearing, which in all its breadth Day and night records crickets and canaries,Hammers, turbines, barking, dark clouds,And the tender voice of my beloved one.

Thanks to life, which has given me so much
It has given me sound and the alphabet
And with it the words to think and speak
Mother, friend, brother, and the light that brightens The path of the soul of my loved one.

Thanks to life, which has given me so much
It has kept my tired feet walking
With them I walked through cities and puddles,Beaches and deserts, mountains and plains And your house, your street and your courtyard.

Thanks to life, which has given me so much
It gave me my heart, which shakes its frame
When I look at the fruit of the human brain
When I look at good ones so far from bad ones
When I look at the bottom of your light-color eyes.

Thanks to life, which has given me so much
It has given me laughter and it has given me tears Thus I distinguish between joy and pain,
They are all elements of my song
and of all your songs, which is the same song and of everyone's song, which is my own song.