Lisa Gerrard, “Sanvean: I Am Your Shadow”, 1995
“Sanvean: I Am Your Shadow” is a song co-written in September 1993 by Lisa Gerrard and composer/multi-instrumentalist Andrew Claxton during rehearsals in Ireland for the 1993 Dead Can Dance international tour. Lisa Gerrard stated she wrote this song as she was missed her family which had remained in Australia.
The song’s first public performance was in Sligo, Ireland. It first recorded on Dead Can Dance’s 1994 live album “Toward the Within”. “Sanvean: I Am Your Shadow” later was included on Gerrard’s 1995 solo album “The Mirror Pool” and the 2007 “The Best of Lisa Gerrard”. Like most of her work, the song is sung in a euphonic and emotional pseudo-language which she developed in her early years.
“I sing in the language of the Heart. Its an invented language that I’ve had for a very long time. I believe I started singing in it when I was about 12. Roughly that time. And I believed that I was speaking to God when I sang in that language.” –Lisa Gerrard