A lullaby

Isaiah should have been sleeping, and the music should have been helping. But I was listening to the lullabies more than Isaiah.
"This makes ME tired!" I remember saying.
Breanna smiled. She felt the same way, I know.
Looking at her I confessed "I actually love this remake ... It's really soothing."
"The CD cover said it's based on a South Pacific lullaby. Can you tell what the language is? Maybe we can figure out where it is from."
I was surprised, "South Pacific? I thought it was from Africa."
I said it might be Melanesian though. Those sounds sounded a lot like Nasioi. Definitely not Polynesian. It was more ... complex.
Didn't Deep Forest "record" that album from samples in Central Africa? Wasn't it from a pygmy tribe?
I just recently did some internet digging, and the story is fascinating and slightly scandalous. Our lullaby CD liner notes were correct. The song originated as "Rorogwela" and sung by Afunakwa in the Baegu language. She is from northern Malaita in the Solomon Islands.
I was ecstatic. That is about 300 miles from Bougainville Island, where I grew up.
The Deep Forest song actually overlays African voices over this Solomon Island melody. My blood is now pumping. The thought that this mix of something from my yesterday and tomorrow were together in a song I knew for over 10 years. A song used on commercials, movies, and who knows how many compilation CDs. Amazing. I had no idea ...
I guess it's always jolting to receive the surprise memory from home. Like a pat on the back from almost forgotten friend I never expected to see again. A whisper to keep going. The journey isn't over, and the destination will have something that sounds familiar.



The Deep Forest version and the lyrics with translation can be found here.