Getting friends in to musicals is hard because when they ask what itâs about you have to be like â15 year olds having sexâ or âa plant from outer space that takes over the worldâ or âteenagers killing people for funâ or âAlexander Hamiltonâ
Preislamic iraqi prince falls in love with a conmanâs daughter because he likes shiny objects, this leads to a major political figure being drowned at a party.
Shakespeare, but with a lot of secret gay pining songs thrown in.
Vanilla kids accidentally crash a BDSM party
The entire works of the Grimm Brothers, happening at the same time.
Lovestruck idiots on a boat
Conman thinks he can scam a librarian. Failing that, he attempts to teach Iowans music.
âŠand thatâs not even getting into the stuff thatâs actually for kids, which is even weirder.
This is an English translation of the DVD-released Chess pÄ svenska, Chess in Swedish, which will hopefully be the basis of actual subtitles to said DVD.
The translator (solrosan) is native in Swedish and fluent in English but not, in any way, a professional translator, nor has she any knowledge of how to write or structure lyrics. The lyrics are therefore merely translated and not melody fitted. (And what would be the point of that since there is the entire original musical for that.) Since Swedish and English have different sentence structures the line breaks are placed to hopefully help convey the tone of the original Swedish lyrics. This might makes it look strange from time to time.
There are eleven footnotes in the document to explain Swedish cultural things that have been impossible for me to convey with English translation (e.g. Norse mythology references picked up by the early Swedish workersâ movement) or ambiguous Swedish words Iâm not comfortable translating without at least giving you the possible second translation (e.g. Is Florence and Freddie actually married in Chess pĂ„ svenska?).
Feel free to contact me for questions, comments and/or discussions.
I hope you will enjoy it.
Update: Link updated 2017-10-14. Let me know if it breaks again.
Update: Link updated 2020-12-09. Let me know if it breaks again.
At the bottom you see the âDownload English SubtitleâŠâ button.
Click the button.
This will download a zip-file called chess_english-909360.zip.
Open the zip-file.
Extract the Chess 2003 DVD En.srt file to the same folder as where you have your version of the DVD. Change name on one of them so that they are called the same thing.Â
Play and enjoy :)
If you have other issues, feel free to get back to me.
Well, yes, having the movie will make it easier to use the subs ;) I donât know how well the subs work with a physical copy though, Iâve never managed to get that to work, but that doesnât say much. It will be easier if youâll be able to obtain a digital one.
In the mean time, here is a transcript of it in English.
At the bottom you see the âDownload English Subtitle...â button.
Click the button.
This will download a zip-file called chess_english-909360.zip.
Open the zip-file.
Extract the Chess 2003 DVD En.srt file to the same folder as where you have your version of the DVD. Change name on one of them so that they are called the same thing.Â
Play and enjoy :)
If you have other issues, feel free to get back to me.
The Russian: Philip Jalmelid
Florence: Gunilla Backman
Svetlana: Sarah Dawn Finer
The American: Anders Glenmark
Molokov: Johan Schinkler
The Arbiter: Stefan Nykvist
Orchestra: Stockholm Concert Orchestra
Choir: Stockholms Musikgymnasiums Kammarkör and Helene Stureborgs kammarkör
The 2015 Chess in Concert tour started on Friday, 10 April, in Ericsson Globe, Stockholm. Iâve tried to find some official reviews of the show, but didnât find much at all. Just this one (Swedish), and as to be expected of the journalistic standards of Aftonbladet the only picture they have is of the old pop icon who happened to be the weakest on stage.
When there are more of them, and if there is an interest, Iâll translate the reviews. In the meantime, here is my review of the show.
First, let me say that I had a lovely, lovely evening, and I really enjoyed the concert. I canât say it was disappointing, even if it had some disappointments.
To kick it off with the boring, but oh so important venue. The concert took place in Ericsson Globe, âGlobenâ, which is the worldâs largest spherical arena. It makes for beautiful acoustics for concerts (and is amazing to get a supporter feel for sporting events), so for a concert version of a musical itâs a good location. In general, though, I wouldnât say it was the best venue for it. The connection between the performers and the audience got lost due to the huge space, and the plot was poorly held together. The plot-problem might be a cross concert versions have to bear, I donât. This was my first one. Chess doesnât have the strongest plots in the history of musicals (Iâm sorry, but it doesnât), and it wasnât helped by Johan Schinklerâs narrations in a faked Russian accent. It didnât really help that the narration was in Swedish and the songs in English. That said, Johan Schinkler is my hero, but Iâll get to that.
Moving on.
It kicked off with Merano, and in true Merano spirit, I couldnât make out a single word. So it wasnât until Anders Glenmark came on stage and rasped into the mic that I could confirm that it was in English. Anders Glenmark was one of the disappointments throughout the entire concert. Not only doesnât he have the voice for it â it doesnât carry â but he messed up the lines in Pity the Child. According to me (but not the aforementioned review in Aftonbladet) his best achievement was One Night in Bangkok, because thatâs the type of pop, glam, jumping around nonsense songs heâs made for.
The others were amazing. (Even if Iâm pretty sure Gunilla Backman messed up a line in I know him so well.) Judging by the crowd alone, there is no doubt that Sarah Dawn Finer was the pre-selected star of the show, and she was fantastic. She is truly one of the best voices in Sweden right now and her voice carries to every corner of every room she sings in. Even if that room is a sphere and has no corners. She is also the one who carries the most feeling to her character, but I think that has a lot to do with the passion she has when she sings in general. To my great disappointment, there are no pictures of her as Svetlana (the picture below shows the dress she wore at least). For some reason she has been left out of the photographs from Friday night. Iâm hoping that other cities make up for this.
As in Dalhalla she performed He is a Man, He is a Child in English. Svetlana is far more bitter in this English translation than she is in the Swedish version, asking to be able to hate him and wishing that heâd never been created. Still she wants everything to stay the same, that heâll come back to their âlittle Moscow flatâ where there âson who bears his nameâ is, because she still remembers the way he smiled at the Red Square and it makes her cry.
Since I spent a good deal of time trying to translate Han Ă€r en man, han Ă€r ett barn to English for the subtitling, I was really interested to see how they had dealt with the crying of swords â a metaphore no one seems to have heard outside these lyrics every. It was not addressed and changed to âI still recall the way he smiled at meâ, which was disappointing.
Johan Schinkler, and his wonderful base, moved easily (but sadly) between Swedish in the narration and the English songs. The Soviet Machine -- which has been stuck in my head since Friday â ended with Anders Eljas picking up an accordion, leaving the orchestra to its own and playing as Johan Schinkler (with his enormous body mass) danced a ridiculous excuse of Russian folk dance. All while still singing, and I will swear that the last times he repeated from âBit by bit the pieces fitâ he didnât sing âthe Soviet machine advancesâ, but âthe Soviet machine dancesâ. The recording and my mother say Iâm wrong, but I still swear it! After that he was so out of breath that he didnât quite manage to do the following narration. Good thing Anders Eljas was there to hug him.
Gunilla Backman did what she was supposed to do, and no one had expected otherwise. She was good, had two (and a half) changes of clothes, and, well, delivered. There isnât much more to say about her. She disappeared beside the others, and didnât stand out in a bad way as Anders Glenmark.
I wish I could write about Philip Jalmelid without mentioning Tommy Körberg (because Philip Jalmelid was fantastic and deserves more than forever being compared to someone who hogged the role of the Russian for ages) but I went to the concert with my mum, who has seen Tommy Körberg in Chess three times, so his name sort of came up. Constantly. My mum said that Philip Jalmelid was âjust as good as Tommy Körbergâ and that his Anthem gave her goose bumps all over. Personally, as someone who first and foremost associates Tommy Körberg with drug abuse and alcoholism, I think Philip Jalmelid was better.
Philip Jalmelid sounds a lot like Tommy Körberg, though. It wasnât a brave, new, out-of-the-box performance. It was, more or less, someone singing as if he pretended to be Tommy Körberg. So perhaps the comparison is in place, after all? Either way, he was all he should be, and more. I think a lot of people were surprised by him, because he is the least famous name (at least for the general population).
One last note from my mum: Stefan Nykvist sounded a lot like Björn Skifs âback in the dayâ.
With that I will end the review. Again, it was a lovely night. If there is something in particular youâre wondering, send me an ask over at solrosan (I wonât publish the asks, so donât do it anonymously).
So, Tommy Körberg singing the National Anthem tonight at the football match where Zlatan Ibrahimovic scores his 50th goal. (and got undressed... just saying.)
