Sae Taryeong
Unknown (Jeolla Oral Tradition)
Region
Jeolla
Genre
Southern Folk Song
Usage
Recreational Song
Sae Taryeong, "The Bird Song," is one of the best-loved songs of the southern region, depicting the cheerful chorus of birds on a bright spring day. It calls out the birds one by one — the phoenix, the parrot, the cuckoo — and imitates their calls in its melody, carrying listeners into the middle of a spring forest. This record is archive material collected to organize and preserve the representative lyrics and the transmission context of Sae Taryeong.
Commentary & Notes
Sangogoksim muincheo (山高谷深無人處): A classical phrase meaning "where the mountains are high, the valleys deep, and no one comes," a spring forest that belongs to the birds alone.
Nongchun hwadap (弄春和答): "Delighting in spring and answering one another in song," the calls of birds seeking their mates.
The highlight is the passage where the singer imitates birdcalls such as the cuckoo's in a high falsetto. The melody follows the southern yukjabaegi mode.
Cultural Background
Originally a folk ballad, the song became famous when late-Joseon master singers wove it into the pansori epic Jeokbyeokga, where it turns tragic, voicing the spirits of soldiers who died at the Battle of Red Cliffs. Since the colonial era, a popular version opens with lines borrowed from the Gyeonggi song Yusanga, beginning "On the third day of the third month, the swallows return."
Lyrics
새가 날아든다
왼갖 잡새가 날아든다
새 중에는 봉황새
만수문전에 풍년새
산고곡심 무인처
춘림비조 뭇새들이
농춘화답에 짝을 지어
쌍거쌍래 날아든다
The birds come flying in,
all kinds of birds come flying in
Among the birds, the phoenix,
and at the gate of long life, the bird of plenty
Deep in high mountains and valleys where no one goes,
the many birds of the spring woods
sing to the spring, answer one another, find their mates,
and come flying in pairs, back and forth
