The Many Lives and Meanings of “Bella Ciao”

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Whether or not music is a language—and whether or not music is a universal language—is a perennial discussion among music makers, music listeners, and music scholars.

Here’s what Grammy-winning bassist Victor Wooten tell us about music as a language:

Both music and verbal languages serve the same purpose. They are both forms of expression. They can be used as a way to communicate with others. They can be read and written.

In this short video for TED-Ed, Wooten talks primarily about how music can be learned much the same way that languages can—with a lot of practice, patience, and room for creativity.

However, when it comes to that communicative element, does music really function the same way that a language does? And does its meaning translate universally?

Sean Peuquet, Chair of Music Production at the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design (RMCAD), argues that there are limits to the universality of music’s meaning:

Songs, sounds, patterns, performances—all the things involved in music making—mean different things to different people. Musical performance and experience only means something consistent, something denotative, within very, very tight social and cultural confines. The idea that music might be a universal language reflects an elevation of a particular culture’s music (historically concert music of the European Classical tradition) over and above the variety of musical expressions reflected across all of the world’s cultures. Anthropologists and ethnomusicologists have never identified a society that does NOT have some form of musical practice— but music as both an idea [sic] and functions differently within each cultural mode of musical expression.

In short, understanding music as a language is complicated.

Music certainly is unique among art forms that occasionally make use of words to convey meaning, because a song can be enjoyed even when its lyrics aren’t understood. If you’ve ever misheard a song’s lyrics and gone on to sing it one way for years before learning the actual words you were mishearing, you’ll understand how easy it is to make meaning from music without understanding these words.

One reason I love studying music as a PhD student focusing on narrative and conflict transformation is because music opens up space for what Simon McKerrell and Lyndon Way (2017) call “semantic ambiguity” (p. 15). That is, music stretches the limits of narrative as a function of story and language.

Think about it this way: there is no universal way to communicate the word “love,” or even the word “hate,” through purely musical sounds without the help of lyrics. Music might give you an idea, but it’s only ever a suggestion. That’s the ambiguity at play.

While certain types of music might come to be understood as establishing a certain mood, especially based on cultural contexts, music is still only, at best, a “communicative mode” (McKerrell and Way, 2017, p. 15).

As a student of narrative, I find music fascinating precisely because of its position somewhere between language and mood. Music can tell a story—but it does so in ways that are distinct from novels, from paintings, and from films (and even the latter gets some help from music along the way).

In trying to understand how music is bound up in conflict transformation, I find it interesting to think about the story / mood split in music. How much of a song is a story with characters and plot, with a beginning-middle-end? And how much of a song is mood, felt in the body, still connected to the story, but sometimes transcending it as well—or taking it in a direction that the lyrics might never have allowed otherwise?

Even more important for peace and conflict resolution practitioners—including musicians with peace and justice aims—is the question of how the story / mood mix of a song might impact conflict transformation. What does a particular story / mood mix make possible? And what does it make impossible?

Let’s take “Bella Ciao” as a brief case study to see what we might find out about this story / mood mix.

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Let’s start with the original versions of “Bella Ciao”— the mondine version, which narrates the work of 19^th-century women in Italian rice paddies, and the partisan version, which narrates WWII-era resistance to fascism.

Here are the lyrics to the mondine version:

What’s the story here? We can begin to understand it by breaking it out into its component parts:

• Hero: The women working in the rice paddies.
• Villain: The boss who oversees their hard work and is ready to strike the women if they fall behind.
• Conflict: The women are trapped in harsh work conditions, and hope that a “day will come when [they] all will work in freedom.”

If this information is all you have, without any of the historical context behind the song, you might not be able to understand exactly what historical or political undercurrents lay beneath the surface. However, you will begin to get a sense of an injustice that touches the lives of the women who are at the center of the story.

Now let’s look at the partisan version:

Here, we have a different story altogether. Let’s look at our component parts:

• Hero: The narrator, who is joining a partisan militia against the “invader.”
• Villain: The otherwise unnamed “invader.”
• Conflict: The narrator’s homeland has been invaded, and he must join the fight for freedom, even if it costs him his life.

This is a story centered on men rather than on women, given the WWII context. But just like the mondine version, there is a struggle that undergirds the song, and a resolve to resist the injustice plaguing the narrator(s).

However, the context of these conflicts is very different, even if we remove the place-based understandings of these stories.

The mondine version is focused on intra-community conflict dynamics—the villain of that song, the boss, is not from a different community. The partisan version, in contrast, deals with inter-community conflict dynamics—the invader is immediately an Other who must be pushed out.

However, how might this story change when the lyrics themselves change slightly?

Here, we can return to the Grup Yorum version that set the scene for this rabbit hole. Here are the full lyrics:

At first glance, these lyrics are not too different from the original Italian. However, with a few small changes, the story too begins to change:

• Hero: The narrator, who is joining the partisans—not against an invader, but against an occupier.
• Villain: The occupier—which is not actually identified as an “occupier” but rather as a system of “occupation.”
• Conflict: The narrator has decided to join the partisans, because he cannot “endure this captivity.” However, at the end of this song, there is only death, rather than a promise of freedom.

That lack of the word “freedom” at the end of the Grup Yorum version is striking. Both the mondine and partisan versions in the original Italian end on the word “freedom.” It’s absence here suggests that not only is our narrator’s death a foregone conclusion, it’s even possible that the occupation will persist despite our hero’s best efforts.

In addition, the lack of identification of the flower as the “flower of the partisan” also changes the meaning of this version. Are we to believe that not only will our partisan’s community not achieve freedom, the very nature of that freedom struggle may itself be lost? Passers-by might see a beautiful flower—but will they know it’s planted on a grave of a freedom fighter?

Let’s also remind ourselves that it isn’t only changes to the lyrics that can change the story. The sonic interpretation of the song—the melody, the harmony, the tempo, the choice of instruments, etc.—also has a role to play in establishing the story.

Take a listen to this recording of the partisan version (in Italian) by Fonola Band:

Here, we have a very regular tempo and rhythm. From the beginning to the end, the song follows our narrators, an ensemble of voices—men, but women as well. It’s almost as if we are with them on their march, following them for a while as they head off to their fight against the invaders. As their voices fade, we get the sense that they are getting further and further away, continuing on a journey where we as listeners can no longer follow.

How does this song make you feel? Do you think our protagonists will meet victory, or will they meet defeat?

Now let’s listen to Grup Yorum’s version:

Like the Fonola Band version, it’s the lyrics and the vocals that take center stage. The instruments help us along, but always in a supporting role.

However, unlike the Fonola Band version, the Grup Yorum version starts with a single (male) voice. The whole of the first stanza is sung out by this sole narrator—this hero out at the front of the story. It is only partway through the second stanza that we hear other voices—women, men—join in. Our hero has found his fellow partisans. While we stay with him, our hearts tied to his fate, his voice steadily becomes one with the group, and in so doing, our hearts go out to them all as they meet their fate.

And what is that fate? This is where the story of the song starts to become tied up with the mood of the song.

This mood is established primarily by its sonic elements: the instruments used, the vocal quality of the singers, the rhythm, tempo, volume. The lyrics can also add to the mood, of course—for example, the use of the symbol of the flower on our hero’s grave is poignant, both hopeful and sorrowful at the same time.

However, we must again remember that the lyrics aren’t the only part of the song—and aren’t even the most understandable part. Even if you don’t know Italian or Turkish, you can listen to each of these songs and make some meaning from them.

And that meaning—the kind that is wrapped up in the music, not the lyrics—is deeply tied to mood.

So, how does the Grup Yorum version make you feel? And how does it make you feel compared to the Fonola Band version?

For me, both are hopeful where their sonic elements are concerned. Their upbeat tempo and their ensemble voices make me feel that these partisans really have a shot.

However, the Grup Yorum version also is laced with longing and resolve. At the beginning of the song, our sole narrator is slow and reflective; I feel as if we are meeting him right at the moment he leaves his old life behind. Then, as the second stanza builds, so does our narrator’s voice. The other singers—his fellow partisans—join in, and their singing speeds up and gets louder. Whatever is waiting out there for them on the battlefield, they are ready to face it and die for it.

Of course, maybe I’m better able to feel the depth of emotion in the Grup Yorum version because I speak Turkish—and because I have loved ones from southeast Turkey, where war, the struggle for freedom, and all of the complicated impacts both have on communities large and small are a feature of everyday life, whether in the foreground or in the background.

Now, let’s consider a different version of “Bella Ciao” altogether. Here is the 2018 version by Marc Ribot and Tom Waits. First, the lyrics:

Like the Grup Yorum version, this English-language adaptation does not veer too far from the original lyrics. The heart of the story, you could say, stays the same. And yet, we still have some key differences:

• Hero: The narrator, who is joining the partisans against the “fascist.”
• Villain: The otherwise unspecified “fascist.”
• Conflict: The narrator’s life has been upended by the arrival of the fascist, and he has decided to join the fight for freedom, because he is “not afraid anymore.”

Here, our villain is not an “invader,” nor an “oppressor,” but rather a “fascist”—something at once more specific, and still quite broad. But the political undertones, at least, cannot be denied.

What is interesting about all of these versions is their lack of concrete references to identifiable settings or characters. We have no mention of Italy, no mention of Turkey, no mention of the United States. Instead, we must infer. The setting is Italy, because it is in Italian. The setting is Turkey, because it is in Turkish. The setting is the United States, because Tom Waits is American (though I can’t help but wonder if that’s really enough info to go by…).

And we really can’t determine who our heroes and villains are beyond these broad categories of partisan, invader, oppressor, fascist.

Which leads back to the power of this song, at least as concerns its ability to travel across times and places. With so few identifying elements, any listener might be able to see themselves in this struggle.

However, how might this struggle turn out in the Marc Ribot and the Tom Waits version? We know what the lyrics say, but what does the music say?

Take a listen.

How different our story now seems, thanks to the mood of this music.

Slow, mournful, sorrowful. So much hinges on Waits’s characteristically gruff voice. The instrumentals start in the background, but then they get to take center stage by way of interludes between the verses. Made up of strings—Ribot’s meandering guitar—these instrumentals are as slow, as deliberate as Waits’s voice.

This is all we have of this story. The dialogue between our narrator and the instruments. No other voices. If our hero found his fellow partisans, they are now gone. Our narrator is the only one left. We don’t get the sense that our narrator is off to battle, but rather that the battle is over—and he and his comrades have lost.

What might these three versions of “Bella Ciao” help us to understand about the fight against injustice and for peace? What might they help us do in that fight?

Have they shone a light on that debate between violent and nonviolent resistance?

Have they energized us to take up the struggle against invaders, oppressors, fascists, however that might look?

Have they told us how to identify invaders, oppressors, fascists in the first place?

Have they left us feeling defeated or doubtful, unsure of whether we might prevail—or at least, of whether our lives might be given to a greater cause?

Have they given us the resolve we need to take a firm stand against injustice?

And have they given us space to breathe and consider how we might ensure that it is peace—and not further injustice—that follows?

The answers to the above will be different for each one of us.

And so much, of course, depends on where we hear it, when we hear it, and which version.

A solo listening experience—much like the one you are having when you hit play on the above videos—is very different than hearing the song in a group.

Take, for example, Grup Yorum singing “Bella Ciao” at their 25th anniversary concert in Istanbul in 2010, the stage packed not only with musicians but also with concert goers.

How different it is to hear this version—to see it!

How different it must have been to be there—on the stage, or in the crowd.

I don’t know what it was like—but interestingly enough, my husband does. He was there at that concert in June 2010—a fact I only learned after I chose to include this concert in this rabbit hole.

And even beyond the lyrics and the music, knowing the context of each version of the song is apt to impact the meaning we draw from our listening experience—and perhaps even transform it.

How might it change your experience of Grup Yorum’s version, for example, when you find out that the band has faced harsh government reprisals—including a full-out ban in 2016—for its socially and politically conscious music? When you find out that many of its members have been imprisoned in the decades they have been making music? When you learn that two of the group’s imprisoned members, İbrahim Gökçek and Helin Bölek, died while on hunger strike?

How, then, might knowing this change your experience of a song that has been popularized by Money Heist, a hit Netflix TV show?

How might knowing this help you make sense of the ways this popularization might be shifting the meaning of the song in the 21st century?

Which of these versions feels closer to its origins in anti-fascist and anti-capitalist resistance? Which feel farther?

Is it the lyrics that change the meaning, or is it the music?

When we listen to “Bella Ciao,” when do we need to dance? When do we need to cry? When do we need to rage? And when do we need to join in and sing?

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WHERE TO NEXT?

TO THE CONCLUSION

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