It’s not often you turn up to a university brass band concert to hear a song that’s used as a ‘Rickrolling’ prank.
So when a live audience sat down to listen to third-year music student Jake Muffett perform Eduard Khil’s ‘I am glad, cause I’m finally returning home’, it’s no wonder some were left reeling in their seats.
The undergraduate sang the Russian opera song, which went viral in 2010, to a host of people at St Lawrence’s Church yesterday afternoon.
A clip of the performance, which shows even some of the band struggling to hold back the laughter, has been shared across social media since it was uploaded.
One student who saw the clip said: “This is fantastic.”
And another added: “Only in York would someone perform the trololol song with a brass band to a live audience. Incredible.”
The original track, which has more than 22 million views on YouTube, features a Russian businessman singing different sounds in a variety of pitches.
He is seen in the clip, which is often used as a ‘bait-and-switch’ prank similar to Rick Astley’s ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’, grinning as he performs in front of a brown wall.
The track was recorded in 1976 and the original text was banned by the Soviet government after being deemed ‘inappropriate’. Following this, Khil decided to vocalise it as ‘Tralala’.
Mr. Muffett told Vision: “I am good friends with the conductor Leo Conroy and we discussed performing this piece a while ago and we agreed that I would arrange the piece for solo voice and Brass Band.
“I arranged the piece by aurally transcribing it from the original track and referencing a piano reduction I found online.”
You can watch the hilarious cover below.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlAnYZQJoBg]