On Spanish singer Rosalia’s new album, “Lux,” declared by some as possibly the best album of the year, the 33-year-old artist sings in Hebrew.
Well, to be clear, Hebrew is just one of the 13 languages Rosalia sings in on “Lux,” an album that took more than two years to create and is inspired by “feminine mystique, transformation and spirituality.” And the song featuring Hebrew lyrics can, along with three other songs, only be found on the physical copy of the album. Still, Hebrew lovers are rejoicing, as they rightfully should.
In the outro of “Novia Robot,” Rosalia sings in the Jewish tongue: “noladti limrod/ve ani moredet lehivaled mechadash/im lachatz meyatzer yahalomin/lama anachnu kulanu lo mavrikim.”
Translated to English: “I was born to rebel/And I rebel to be born again/If pressure makes diamonds/Then why aren’t we all shining?”
The Hebrew grammar does leave something to be desired in her line, and Rosalia did say she used Google Translate to write the album, which was mostly independently created by her. So I suppose it makes sense that the lines aren’t exactly the most proper Hebrew, but Rosalia’s pronunciation of the words is for the most part spot on, even if she stumbles a little with the Hebrew word for rebelling — “limrod” (to rebel) and “moredet” (female for rebelling or rebel).
You can hear a recording of the outro shared by Havurah:
On the New York Times’s Popcast podcast, Rosalia talked about how she used language to connote her inspirations for certain aspects of the album, which is very much inspired by the idea of women saints, and the ways they are viewed in different cultures.
“In Judaism, the closest thing [to a saint] is Miriam, she was a prophet, a woman that led, and she guided an entire people and [was] very rebellious,” Rosalia muses on the podcast, sharing her interpretation about the prophetess who helped lead the Israelites out of Egypt, which is why it makes sense that the lyrics that she sings in Hebrew are about that idea of rebellion and leadership.
Miriam isn’t the only Jewish woman to have inspired “Lux.” Rosalia talked about finding inspiration in the writing of French Jewish philosopher Simone Weil (not to be confused with Simone Veil, who helped make abortion legal in the country), and in the novels of Jewish Brazilian author Clarice Lispector and American Jewish author Chris Kraus who wrote “I Love Dick.” And Rosalia also solicited an amazing Jewish French celeb, singer and actor Charlotte Gainsbourg, to compose and translate to French on the song “Jeanne,” which can also only be heard on physical copies of “Lux.”
The inspirations for “Lux” stretch far and wide, to almost every religion and to so many languages. It’s a wonderfully ambitious album. And I’m definitely kvelling about the fact that Rosalia took inspiration from so many divine and culture-shifting Jewish women, and that she gave us this little moment of Hebrew joy.
