Ruedi Rymann

By The Week Staff

last updated 8 January 2015

The Swiss yodeler who was a national icon

Ruedi Rymann

1933–2008

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Ruedi Rymann, who died of liver cancer at 75, was not well known outside of Switzerland. But he was one of his country’s most famous yodelers, and his rendition of the traditional song “Dr Schacher Seppli” was voted “Switzerland’s Greatest Hit” in a national poll last year.

“Rymann was a master of an age-old vocal technique that relies on a quick melodic shift between a falsetto head voice and a deeper chest voice,” said The Washington Post. Usually accompanied by an accordion, he endeared himself to his countrymen with his bell-like tenor, which embodied the melodic calls that herders bellowed off mountain walls to communicate with their cattle. His signature song was the lament of a lonely wanderer; among its lyrics are, “The world is a turbulent place / I’ve observed it many times: People hurt each other just because of that damned money / How beautiful it could be down here.” Rymann was a leading emissary for yodeling, demonstrating his technique to audiences in South Korea, Brazil, Japan and the United States.

“If you put aside the Toblerone and cuckoo-clock clichés, you would be hard pressed to find a more thoroughly Swiss archetype than Rymann,” said the London Independent. “By profession, he was a man of the land; his life revolved around laboring, farming, cheesemaking, and forestry work.” He also ran a local club devoted to swingen, the national form of wrestling, in which the combatants try to toss each other outside a circular bed of sawdust. In retirement, Rymann was a huntsman. “Fittingly, one of his best known songs was ‘Der Gemsjäger’ (‘The Chamois Hunter’).”