I created this arrangement for a dear friend, Ann Campbell, a wonderful vocal music educator in the Houghton, MI, public schools who premierred it with her high school choir (see video). Motivated by a very moving gesture in which butterflies were released as part of a funeral ceremony, I began looking for instances in other times and cultural traditions where butterflies were connected with the remembrance of loved ones. I stumbled across this wonderful folk song from Papua New Guinea in a cassette recording from the 1980's by the PNG group the Moab String Band, which describes the song as "traditional." The song is in the Kuanuan dialect - one of 800 spoken in PNG. The transliteration in the score is based on the source text, below, in which vowels mostly correspond to those in Latin, Italian, etc. One exception is the word "Warpi," in which the ar sounds more as it would in the English word "care." Many versions of this song have been recorded on many albums in PNG and Australia; any of those can also serve as a guide to pronunciation. To listen to the 1980's version from which I learned the song, use THIS LINK.
ABEBE
Uuu raura bebaik mutar
Pukai Loop Mara Tulungei Dir
Abebe Warpi Lan Eie
Two butterflies representing spirits
of my ancestors fly over me the magic man
Uuu raura bebaik mutar
Pukai Loop Mara Tulungei Dir
Abebe Warpi Lan Eie
Two butterflies representing spirits
of my ancestors fly over me the magic man
Akamana ra valian mur pukai
Ialir abebe warpi lan eie
They fly to the beach and over the sea
so far away they cannot be seen anymore
Uuu raura bebaik mutar
Pukai Loop Mara Tulungei Dir
Abebe Warpi Lan Eie
Two butterflies representing spirits
of my ancestors fly over me the magic man
Uuu raura bebaik mutar
Pukai Loop Mara Tulungei Dir
Abebe Warpi Lan Eie
Two butterflies representing spirits
of my ancestors fly over me the magic man
Akamana ra valian mur pukai
Ialir abebe warpi lan eie
They fly to the beach and over the sea
so far away they cannot be seen anymore