Soul Music

Antonin Dvorak wrote his Gypsy Songs in 1880. He was passionate about the folk music of his native Bohemia and set a poem by Czech poet Adolf Heyduk to music. Songs My Mother Taught Me is the fourth song in the cycle. Songs my Mother taught me In the days long vanished Seldom from her eyelids Were the teardrops banished.... It's a wistful melancholic piece evoking memory and loss. Soul Music hears the stories of musicians, poets and singers from around the world of why they are so drawn to it. The poet Raine Geoghegan is the daughter of a Romany woman whose life was weighed down with the loss of her father at a young age. Raine identifies with the sadness of the music because it not only represents grief at the loss of her father but also for the loss of a way of life for the gypsy people. For Emily MacGregor it's all about the music we inherit from our parents. She is writing a book about music and grief and says this piece perfectly represents the bittersweet feeling of listening to music associated wi