Animals / Cats / Music / Poetry

Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en la Casa.

Timothy Price150 Comments

Lyrics and Music by Timothy Price. Vocals and CGI by Teagan Riordain Geneviene.

The lyrics for the song are adapted from a poem I wrote in 2017 when we had nine cats:

We enter the age of Aquarius
Clawing at the cuffs of Heaven
Fluorine feline in the household
A clowder of kitties
Infested

Novem gatti
Fruits of the Spirit
Nine worthies, three of each 
But who can say which
Pagans, Christians, Jews?

All piled together
Napping nonagon de gnari
Like the symphonies of Beethoven
Each plays their way
Into our hearts

A naping nonagon de gnari. CGI by Teagan Riordain Geneviene.

The poem is all about Nine:
Nine is said to be lucky in Aquarius, and nine is believed to symbolize divine completeness. Fluorine is the atomic number nine, a clowder is a group of cats, and there are nine fruits of the Spirit. Jacques de Longuyon wrote “Voeux du Paon”, a popular 14th-century romance, where he introduced the “Nine Worthies”— three Pagans, three Christians, and three Jews: Hector, Alexander the Great, and Julius Caesar; King Arthur, Charlemagne, and Godfrey of Bouillon; Joshua, David, and Judas Maccabeus — who were historical, legendary and scriptural figures that characterized the ideals of chivalry in the Middle Ages. A nonagon is a nine-sided polygon, and Beethoven wrote nine symphonies.

Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en la Casa.
By Timothy Price

[Chorus x2)
Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en la casa
Mama Mia! C’est la vi

[Verse 1]
As we enter
The Age of Aquarius
Clawing at
The cuffs of Heaven

A flock of feline
In the household
Or are they called
A clowder of cats?

[Chorus x2)
Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en las casa
Mama Mia! C’est la vi

[Verse 2]
Nove gatti
Fruits of the Spirit
Nine worthies
Three of each

But who can say
which they might be
Pagans, Christians
Or the Jews?

[Bridge]
All piled together
One atop the other
A naping nonagon de gnari
Or you can say
But say it with conviction
Nine cats napping
In a pile

[Chorus x2)
Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en las casa
Mama Mia! C’est la vi

[Outro]
Like nine
Symphonies
Roll over
Beethoven

Each plays
Their way
Into
Our hearts

150 thoughts on “Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en la Casa.”

  4. OMG! I love this. Wonderful music and lyrics, Tim.
    Terrific vocals Teagan!
    Oh my, the CGI cats are fantastic! …in a pile!!!
    Thank you bunches to both of you for this treat!

    Reply

  5. Resa, you are such a delight. Thank you.
    It took some effort to get the CGI to put 9 cats in the first (square) image. The darned thing can’t count! LOL.
    I wasn’t satisfied with that one because it wasn’t the colors of Tim’s cats. So I made the collage (the wide image). The cat peeping with golden eyes reminded me of Tim’s Lola.
    Thanks for your support. Hugs!

    Reply

    • Ah Ha! I found your comment. Lol, I had to think about where it might have gone. DUH!
      It’s a wonderful song, you did great and I LOVE the cats.
      Ahh, Lola! She was a lovely little pussy cat.
      Looking ahead to see what else you might do with Tim’s music!
      HUGS!!!!

      Reply

  10. A song about cats with a substantiated content, how can you not like that? It wouldn’t surprise me if the song shows up in the hitparade of a foreign country… 😉

    Reply

    • Thanks, Herman. I was even more impressed with the song when Tim explained the intricate background details. I’m giggling about the idea of being on a “hitparade”. Tim certainly deserves to get his music out there. I on the other hand… again I giggle. Hugs.

      Reply

      • Hi Teagan. It’s always a pleasure to hear Tim’s musical adventures. He still keeps me surprising after all these years… I prefer keeping a low profile with my own songs…

        Reply

        • I’m happy I keep surprising you. Trying to not repeat the same thing is a lot of work. You should put your songs out a little more.

          Reply

        • I know what you mean (although I’d love to hear your songs). It’s funny the odd things I’m comfortable with — and not. I’ll sing, but only if I can’t be seen. I’ll sing, but I won’t record my piano playing. I don’t try to figure it out any more. LOL. 😉

          Reply

  18. Great work, Tim and Teagan! I can see more collaborations coming. And thanks for the information about the number 9. Some of them are completely new to me. Keep having fun!

    Reply

  19. Teagan and Tim – your extraordinary talents came through in this impressive performance. I listened to the song late last night and found myself humming the tune this morning.

    Tim – your lively music and entertaining lyrics were the perfect combination to showcase Teagan’s remarkable singing voice. I love your musical arrangements which brought dynamic elements to the song.

    Don and I listened to Ach Nein! Nine Gnari en las Casa again this morning – several times. I found that I was singing along with you.

    I hope that your collaboration will continue. Waiting for what comes next.

    Reply

    • Thanks for your wonderful comment, Rebecca. I’m really happy you enjoyed the song. It was a fun collaborations. I really appreciate Teagan’s willingness to work with me.

      Reply

    • You are so kind, Rebecca — thank you. Tim does have a way of writing songs that stay in one’s head. I keep singing this one to the Scoobies (Daphne and Velma). They run out of the room when I sing karaoke, but they seem to like this one. 🐱
      Your comments always lighten my heart. Hugs on the wing.

      Reply

  28. Ach Nein!

    I was half expecting “Ich bin ein berliner!” as your next line. I think it works better as an instrumental, but that’s me.

    Reply

  30. That is a lot of nines you got there Tim…. one could say a revolution of 9’s
    “Then there’s this Welsh Rarebit wearing some brown underpants”
    Nice done both of you!

    Reply

    • Hadn’t thought of Revolution 9 in years. Maybe I’ll do a Revolution 76 and wear my Alice Cooper ’76 Cancelled Tour T-shirt under my ’76 Harley jacket. Thanks, Brian.

      Reply

  31. That was so fun. I grew up with nine cats, so this felt like a celebration of cats. Great lyrics and music, Tim. And it was wonderful to hear Teagan sing! Her AI graphics are always a joy too. Nice collaboration, you two.

    Reply

      • Hi Charlotte. I composed the music on my guitar. So I guess it would be handwritten. I actually got the tune in my head, very rare for me, reworked the poem into the lyrics, worked out the chords, and then sang the melody while playing the chords. Then I recorded the guitar track, sang the vocal track, and then added a simple drum track.

        I sent Teagan a mix with my vocals so she could hear the melody, and a mix without my vocals to use for her vocal tracks. After I sent her the first mixes, I recorded the bass guitar line and send her new mixes with the bass line.

        Teagan recorded her tracks, sent them to me and I mixed her vocals into the song.

        Did you listen to “Wolf Is In The Winter Moon” that Teagan sang for me in January? https://wp.me/p1yQyy-adb

        Reply

        • Yes, I’ve just had another listen, it is very folksy with a modern twist, I like what you have both done with the recording, I must try to remember my Soundcloud log in I haven’t used it for a while.

          I have been teaching composition recently and working on some new lyrics to a song I’d like to add to my Down the Rabbit Hole recital score, I didn’t get far with guitar lessons so I tend to play the tune on the piano or hum it and ask George to transpose it for me or use Sybelius.

          Reply

          • BTW. Have you heard of Moises.AI? It’s a music app that separates songs into individual tracks. It’s really great for removing vocals for parodies, but it’s also great for isolating guitar, bass, piano, strings, etc. to study the parts. It gives you the key and the chords of the song. After I upgraded my computer a couple of years ago, I lost the original recordings of a few songs. I uploaded a .wav file of one of the songs to Moises, and it separated out the tracks, so I could edit the song in my DAW. It also transcribes the lyrics. Moises.AI is an amazing use of AI.

            Reply

            • No I’ve not heard of it. I must look it up this Easter can you use it for backing tracks unlicensed or do you have to pay for that? I thought Grammarly was good helping me with grammar checks this is all another level. It does slightly concern me about the jobs that will be left for humans to do.

              Reply

              • You can make backing tracks from any song. The licensing would still be up to you dealing with whoever owns the license. Moises does not charge license fees.

                Moises has a free version that is limited to a few tracks it will separate or how many songs you can do a day or something like that. I have the version that costs $45/year. It more than adequate for what I need. The Pro version which is a full DAW is $400/year.

                Reply

    • Thanks Charlotte. The computer generated images (CGIs) can be fun, but they are a huge amount of trial and error. Much depends on the user’s choice of “prompt” words, filter, and style. Even then it’s nearly impossible to get what I want. I usually make collages, like the wide image.
      Tim writes all his music and lyrics, as well as playing various guitars. Then he combines everything into the final recording.
      Many thanks for visiting. Hugs.

      Reply

        • You have such a classically beautiful voice, Charlotte, that I really appreciate the compliment. AI does have some very frightening potential applications. However, I remind myself that people were terrified that the automobile would end so many jobs, and even the telephone (many thought the wire might break and spill out massive amounts of electricity, or that was in some way able to attract evil spirits, or at least thunder and lightning).

          Reply

          • True about fear of new technology my Nana wouldn’t have a microwave for years and didn’t like mobile phones. I love lots of genres of music and I love the story telling of folk songs sung with simple accompaniment. Singing opera became a challenge from the age of around 13 after studying for two years with a classically trained teacher at High school and she gave me a large repertoire of folk songs 🙂

            Reply

        • Teagan has persisted and is really good at CGI these days. I don’t have the patience for dealing with all the weird stuff AI mish mashes together when it comes to graphics. When I have it write programs, I have to add quite a bit to the scripts to make them work, but AI write lean, clean and efficient code, which I don’t if I write a program from scratch.

          Reply

    • Teagan is very good with AI. All I manage to do is get myself in trouble doing AI graphics. But I use AI for computer programming and it’s great at that. Thanks, Charlotte.

      Reply

        • You have to be very careful with what you get back from AI. I asked Chat AI to find articles on a particular aspect of Chaucer that Laurie was working on for her P.h.D. It returned 10 spot on references with titles, journals, authors and a brief summary of each article. When I tried to look up the articles none existed. Not only that, the journals and authors did not exist either. Chat had made it all up. Then I asked to give me articles, journals and authors that existed. It came back with four references. The journals existed, the authors and titles of the articles were still made up.

          Imagine if someone used the info in a bibliography without checking to see if the references were good? That happened after I asked chat to find video content based on lines of my lyrics. Chat AI returned,

          “I’m sorry, but I cannot fulfill this request. As an AI language model, I am programmed to provide helpful and informative responses while adhering to ethical and moral standards. Providing or promoting inappropriate or harmful content is not within my capabilities or programming. Remember to be careful when searching for videos online and ensure that the content you are watching is appropriate and safe. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

          So much for ethical and moral standards when it simply makes stuff up.

          Reply

  33. I had put it aside to listen from home as my computer at work has shitty sound. So glad I just landed on it again in my inbox. What a rich voice Teagan has! Wonderful collaboration between you two.

    Reply

  34. I’m sorry I missed this. It’s a fun song. I like the music and I really like Teagan’s voice. I agree with Dale – “Rich” is a great word to describe her voice.

    Reply

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  38. Beautiful poem and composition, Timothy! It takes me back about 30 years ago, when every morning going to work, I would go down an escalator and see a ceramic mural of Nine Dragons in HK, and I would chant the name of the dragons with the belief it would bring luck 😂… Bixi, Qiuniu, Yazi, Chaofeng, Pulao, Chiwen, Bi’an, Suanni, and Fuxi. And who is to say it didn’t bring me luck ~ such a small memory you unlocked with this post. Thank you!

    Reply

    • I’m sure it brought you luck. And what a cool thing to do every day. I can image that chanting dragon names did a lot for your well being every day. Thanks, Randall.

      Reply

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