Saying Goodbye from Duende by Joe Chindamo

Saying Goodbye is dedicated to my parents and others like them, who bade farewell to their homeland, and ventured to unknown cultures and societies, in search of a better life. This song depicts the sadness which they must have felt in their hearts as they waved ‘goodbye’ to loved ones, not knowing when, or if ever, they would see them again.

In my father’s case, he was 26 when he left Italy in 1956 and never saw his mother again, who died 14 years later. He only returned to visit his father in 1981! I can’t imagine what it must be like to leave one’s father in middle age and return to find him an old man. Similarly, my mother, who left Italy in 1959, never saw her father again and had only brief contact with her mother after an absence of 17 years.

Saying Goodbye is about capturing this melancholy.

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