Hello to all

As always corrections, personal insight and suggestions to make this correct
are very welcome. The more I study German grammar the more I realize that I have been very lucky to come as close as I have to being somewhat correct on my translations considering my lack of knowledge. I'm not so great with English grammar either. I think that might be what they call a run-on sentence. My head is spinning with rules on proper structure, usage and sentence construction. My thanks again to all on the forum for your willingness to translate songs and help others as needed. I have a fairly long list of German songs that I have collected over the years, that I like, but haven't quite fully understood. Thanks to your help I am now starting to appreciate them more fully.
here is a link if you want to listen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIx5wUfS9KY

Yvonne Catterfeld - als unser hass noch liebe war
When our hate was still love

Alles liegt in Trümmern
Ein Königreich zerstört
Und niemand ist geblieben
Der meine Tränen hört
Es führen keine Wege
Zurück in diese Zeit
Denn jeder Schritt in deine Richtung
Ist ein Schritt zu weit

Everything lies in ruins
A kingdom is destroyed
and no one is left to
understand/hear my tears
No paths lead back to this time
Because each step in your direction
is a step too far


Und ich sehe einen Spiegel
Und in dem seh ich ein Gesicht
Doch ich kann mich kaum erkennen
Frag mich, bin das wirklich ich!?
Denn der Mensch in diesem Spiegel
Ist nicht mehr so wie er mal war
Ist nicht mehr so wie ich ihn sah
Als unser Hass noch Liebe war

And I see a mirror
And in it I see a face
However I can hardly recognize myself
I ask, is it really me!?
Because the person in this mirror
Is no longer as he was
Is no longer as I saw him
When our hate was still love


Dieser Mond war eine Sonne
Dieser Nebel freies Land
Diese Asche weißer Schnee
Jeder Zweifel unbekannt
Dieser Kerker mein zu Hause
Diese Finsternis ein Licht
Dieses Gitter war ein Fenster
Und diese Narben gab es nicht

This moon was a sun
This fog free land
This ash white snow
Any doubts unknown
This dungeon my home
This darkness a light
This screen was a window
And there were no scars

Und ich sehe einen Spiegel
Und in dem seh ich ein Gesicht
Doch ich kann mich kaum erkennen
Frag mich, bin das wirklich ich!?
Denn der Mensch in diesem Spiegel
Ist nicht mehr so wie er mal war
Ist nicht mehr so wie ich ihn sah
Als unser Hass noch Liebe war

And I see a mirror
And in it I see a face
However I can hardly recognize myself
I ask, is it really me!?
Because the person in this mirror
Is no longer as he was
Is no longer as I saw him
When our hate was still love

Hello,

I was wondering, wouldn't the following be the other way round:

Als unser Hass noch Liebe war
As our love was still hate>>>>>>>>When our hate was still love

Hi MAcbard and ab123,
first of all I would agree with ab123 concerning the title.

Then another thing: This country (was/used to be) fog free
originalieser Nebel freies Land

My suggestions: this fog used to be free land.

Or did I misunderstand the german part?

Hello ab123 & Tahira

Thank you both for your help. Back to the books for me. I corrected my translation. It makes much more sense now. I also took out the (was & used to be) that I added. Does it look OK now?


Thanks again

Yes, its OK.

I am always wondering how you come to listen to german music. You have postet lyrics here from singers I have never heard before like Kira for example.

Die you come across them by accident or do you listen to a german radion station?

Hello Tahira

It's kind of funny how it started. My son was taking a German class at college and the teacher mentioned that listening to German music might help him to learn. He didn't pursue it too much but he found a drinking song "was wollen wir trinken" on Youtube. I thought it was interesting so I started looking on Youtube also. Once you start looking it is hard to stop. I found Kira on there. She is not that easy to get to unless you know the name of the song. Only a couple of her videos were there at first. I think there are a few more now. I found a lot of bands and singers I liked. Some are newer some from the 70s & 80s. I started collecting CDs & DVDs of the ones I liked. Not that easy to find over here but if you look you will be rewarded. I did get some from Amazon.de but the shipping is very high. I am so glad that people put them on Youtube. Otherwise I would never have been exposed to this music that I love so much.

Hope you have a pleasant day

Hi MAcbard,
that´s interesting: when I studied english (many many years ago) I tried to translate english songs into german so I could understand them. And so I learned many vocubulary very easy without having the feeling of "must to know or to learn them".
In Germany many singers and bands sing in english, but since the last few years they found back to their roots and many bands start singing in german.

Have a nice day!
Greetings from warm and sunny Germany

Tahira

Hello Tahira


Attempting song translations does seems to be helping me to some degree. I am not the fastest at learning but it does help me remember some of the words better. It's kind of neat when I can look at a sentence and recognise most of the words. I have the most trouble with the word order and all the changes to the different words and what they mean. I guess if you grow up with it you just do it without thinking. It will take quite a while for me to keep these things straight. I see now why all the nouns are capitalized since so many changes depend on how the noun is used.

My son told me a while back that he heard that if you turn the radio on in Germany you were likely to hear songs being sung in English. He was trying to see if he could find a radio station online that had German programming but I think he gave up after hearing that. I have noticed on Youtube sometimes I find a song with a German title and when I play it they are singing in English. I remember reading that some German singers when they start recording, they make a calculated decision whether it will be better for their career to sing in German or English. I am glad some singers are going back to their roots and using German. I find it a beautiful (and complicated) language with many beautiful songs.

Sorry if I got a little longwinded there. I do enjoy our conversations.
Macbard

Hi MAcbard,
I enjoy our discussions, too.
I think 80% of the music played in german radio stations are in English.

MAybe you like to chek out in youtube for: Herbert Grönemeyer
he sings in german and his songs are very poetical
or maybe Heinz Rudolf Kunze
(he is kind of old school singer and songwriter)

Then you can also look for: JULI or SILBERMOND
These are very new bands with great music.

There was another young band some years ago called: ECHT
they also had very nice music, but I think this band does not exist anymore - what a pitty.

I cannot give you any suggestions for german radio stations. I only listen to the local ones for getting the news and some easy listening music while cooking or driving to word.
HAving time for music I listen to arabic and greek music.

Today we celebrate a religoius day, so I have a day off, and we gonna go to a lake later.

See you
Tahira