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~ 칠 색 밭 ~

눈 내린 마을 (A Little Village After Snow)

1. 눈 내린 마을에 어둠이 내리면

파란 별들 모여모여 파란 꿈을 꾼다

밤 깊어 갈수록 고운꿈 빛난다

누가 누가 잠 못 들고 편지를 쓰는지

날이 밝아올 때까지 깜빡 거린다

2. 소리 없이 눈 내린 산골 마을 이른 아침

산도 집도 눈에 덮여 하얀 꿈을 꾼다

길도 끊긴 마을에 한 줄기 연기

누가 누가 일어나 아침을 짓는지

따스한 사랑이 피어 오른다

Composer 김애경 / Lyricist 박수진 (朴水鎮)

Listen (Singer 최유진, 1993 release)

Approximate pronunciation & meaning

1. nun ne-rin ma-eu-re eo-du-mi ne-ri-myeon

Dusk falls at the little village after snowfall,

pa-ran byeol-deul mo-yeo-mo-yeo pa-ran kku-meul kkun-da

and blue stars are clustering together, dreaming a blue dream.

bam gi-peo kal su-rok go-un-kkum pin-nan-da

The beautiful dream unfolds as the night deepens,

nu-ga nu-ga jam mot deul-kko pyeon-ji-leul sseu-neun-ji

(but) I wonder if someone is staying up writing a letter (using the reflection of the starry sky off the snow as a light source).

na-ri bar-ga-ol tte-kka-ji kkam-ppak keo-rin-da

(The stars) twinkle (all the way through the night,) until the dawn breaks.

2. so-ri eop-si nun ne-rin san-gol ma-eul i-reun a-chim

As morning arrives at the noiseless mountain village after snowfall,

san-do jip-do nu-ne deo-pyeo ha-yan kku-meul kkun-da

the mountains and the houses are all covered in snow, dreaming a white dream.

kil-do kkeun-kin ma-eu-re han jul-gi yeon-gi

With its road to outside cut off, A streak of smoke (rises from) the village.

nu-ga nu-ga i-reo-na a-chi-meul jin-neun-ji

I wonder if that's someone getting up early to prepare breakfast.

tta-seu-han sa-rangi pi-eo o-reun-da

(The smoke brings) a warmth of love, as it diffuses into the sky.

Pointless comments

First, allow me to emphasize that this song is about a village AFTER snow, not during snow. (Otherwise the title would be 눈 내리는 마을.) The sky is clear with no cloud coverage, the wind has probably stopped, and the winter constellations are twinkling brightly in the clear deep-blue sky. The reflection of starlight off the white snow is bright enough to give you an undisturbed chance of writing a secret letter during the night. You would be recollecting your thoughts effortlessly as the porous sound-absorbing new snow creates exceptional quietness, and the refreshing scenery induces a lucid mind...

This song was first presented at the 11th MBC children's song festival in 1993. It did not win any prize, but it is my favorite. I sometimes feel guilty for loving this song, and I will explain later. The singer was 5th-grade 최유진 from 경기초 (京畿初, name of primary school), Seoul. She was a beautiful girl wearing a white dress with fluffy decorations, and her dream was to become a dancer in the future. More than anything else I love her genuine style of singing. Despite being a little bit childish and lacking any special technique, there was a sense of emphatic and unadulterated truthfulness that touched my heart, so much so that I sometimes feel sad that this is the only recording of her. There is also a clip on Youtube but unfortunately, it is incomplete.

Incomplete clip of this song from the 11th MBC children's song festival.

There seems to be very few people who like this song, and that's the reason why I feel guilty for loving it. In one way or another, I feel that I do see how one can find "problems" with this song, but these "problems" turn out to be exactly the reasons why I love it. Sounds weird huh?

Well, actually there is a "problem" right at the beginning: 눈 내린 마을에 어둠이 내리면. The word 내리다 (to fall) appears twice, first for the snow, and then for the dusk. I guess this is a big no-no for many, as short-distance repetition of words is typically not considered "beautiful", especially in poetry. This was my immediate reaction when I first heard this line, but then my mind completely changed, because in the second line, 파란 별들 모여모여 파란 꿈을 꾼다, the word 파랗다 (blue) was also used twice! At that moment I began to feel as if the repetition was a deliberate choice or some new kind of rhetorical device, and I thought it was beautiful. I have a feeling that most people won't agree with me on this. With two repetitions right in their face, they would probably be pissed off, and I totally would not blame them. But still, I find this beautiful for some weird reason.

There is perhaps another "problem" with word choice in the second part: 길도 끊긴 마을에 한 줄기 연기. I reckon that in our modern society it is not a good thing to say that a village is "cut off" (끊기다) from the rest of the world. It does not evoke a sense of relaxedness as is meant to be perceived in this song. Quite to the contrary, being cut off from the world would bring much anxiety. But again, for some weird reason, I feel that for a small self-sufficient mountain village to be temporarily cut off from the rest of the world, keeping the quietness of a morning in white snow all to itself, is a rare kind of blessing. Sometimes I even see this very sentence as a proclamation that the world of children's songs has its own order of beauty not necessarily complying with what the society thinks, even though I know I am probably reading too much into it here.

If you can get over these two points, then perhaps you are also going to enjoy this song as I do. The clear and serene scenery would certainly stir up your imagination.

Recordings of this song are scarce, but not entirely rare. Besides the one by the original singer 최유진 from the official LP of the 11th MBC children's song festival, I only know of four other recordings: (1) One by 이빛나, included in 파랑새 창작동요 6집; (2) one by 사공빈 in her personal album; (3) one by 김민지 in the composer's album; (4) one by 박상희 in her personal album. Besides these, there is one further recording that can be found at koreadongyo.net by 이빛나. I think it is slightly different from (1), so I guess it might come from her personal album. But this is just my speculation as I don't have that particular album at hand.