Goodby Corinne

The woman who composed the haunting melody to “Ain Li Eretz Acheret” (I Have No Other Country), is no more, her voice quelled, but not silenced. Corine Allal went out with a bang on her guitar, playing the song in her trademark rasp on a kibbutz in the county’s south, just months before she died.

The song that has become something of an anthem to the war is a lament. It was born of wars – the lyrics written by Ehud Manor at the outset of a war that led, directly and indirectly to the current one. In just a few eloquent words, it describes the complicated relationship many of us have with our county, with our identity:

I have no other country,

Even when my land is burning….

I won’t be silent because my country
has changed her face.
I will not give up reminding her
And sing in her ears
until she will open her eyes

For Allal, Hebrew was the perfect language to sing about human frailty. Consider “Antarctica”:

There aren’t any horses that speak Hebrew

There aren’t any humans that don’t die

Go search in Antarctica…

Or the lyrics to “Zan Nadir” (Rare Species), once an anthem for a young rocker generation, a beat behind that in America. Her words are prescient and chilling:

We flee from a crazy party,

Forced into rowboats.

Each continent is a drowning ship

When you dig shelters

Allal’s onstage persona – raspy, slightly off-kilter – was famously in contrast with her offstage personality (yes, I met her once). She was gracious, generous, private, a loving mother and partner. Her struggles were what made her human, and if she embraced them in public, it was to remind us of our common humanity.

Corrine did not have time to become a grand dame of Israeli rock. She was too busy being an icon for today, relevant as ever to every generation. She went out singing to the end, loud as ever but with amazing grace.

Her last tour – done with a chair so she could sit, with blood transfusions so she could belt out the music – was defiant. The music raw, a purposefully discordant finale to the plaintive Ain Li Eretz Acheret. There was pain in her voice. No one could sing in that place without pain. But there was also hope.

Yes, we are all human; we all die. Yes, our country has changed its face. Yes, we’re on a drowning ship digging shelters. Yes, we are a rare species, living with all of the above knowledge, singing our own songs until the end. There are no fairy tales here; the best we can do is hold onto the love we have, decline to relinquish our beliefs, refuse to be silenced.

All death is loss, and Allal’s, for many, was the loss of a voice of a generation. But she has not yet been silenced. When we sing “I have no other country,” we’ll remember it is a song for those who not only cry for the only country they know, one that is barely recognizable; it is a song for those who mean to keep reminding the country of the values it has lost, to keep loudly protesting, each in our own way, until it can open its eyes to injustice, until its face is able to once again turn towards peace. Like Corinne’s voice, it’s rough and melodic, uncomfortable and comforting all at once.

Allal, in her life, in her death, showed us the way.