Covers – René Kälin

Even before we could speak, we listened. Even before we understood, we felt. Our mother's heartbeat was our first song.

For me, music is a language that needs no translation. It travels across borders, continents and generations and yet always finds the direct way into the heart.

Some songs accompany us for a whole lifetime. They were there in moments of happiness and in nights of sadness. They comforted us, lifted us up, shook us awake. And sometimes they put into words something we could never have said ourselves.

These covers are my thanks to such songs. An expression of my appreciation for music that has deeply touched and inspired me. I don't sing them to copy them, but to answer them with my own voice. Like an echo that comes back from the valley – familiar and yet a little different.

For every song that is sung on stays alive. It wanders from heart to heart, like a fire from which ever new lights are kindled.

Bob Marley – Redemption Song (Cover)

«Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery; none but ourselves can free our minds.»

This is said to come almost word for word from a speech by the Jamaican civil rights activist and pan-Africanist Marcus Garvey. Garvey called on people to free themselves from oppression not only politically, but also mentally.

Bob Marley wrote the song in 1979, when he was already seriously ill.

The lyrics speak of freedom, liberation and dignity for people of African descent – and for all the oppressed.

It is quite astonishing how well this fits current events. And how important it is to recognise the self-woven stories and thought patterns and to break out of them. To loosen the shackles that, in the end, we tie for ourselves again and again.

I like this song. Thank you, Bob Marley, for your sharp eye, your observations and for sharing your insights.