If you like music and translating Finnish song lyrics, you might like this article. I will be analyzing the song Lähtisitkö by Pave Maijanen.

This is one of those songs your Finnish teacher might play for you in class because it’s filled with very nice examples of the conditional: lähtisitkö, avaisitko, lukisitko, etc. The song was released way back in 1984.

1. Song Lyrics – Pave Maijanen – Lähtisitkö

2. Glossary

The following grammar terms have been abbreviated.

I have marked different elements of the analysis using the following symbols.

3. Lähtisitkö kanssani – Pave Maijanen – Finnish Song Analysis

Adjectives are always inflected in the same form as the word they are connected to. That’s why both pieni and kirje appear in the genitive case. The genitive is used because kirje is the object of the sentence: the singer is considering writing one, whole letter to the other person.

The conditional of kirjoittaa: the marker -isi- will be added to the strong stem. For verbtype 1 verbs, this means you can use the basic form of the verb as well as the -vat form of the verb: -vat form of the verb: he kirjoitta-vat > kirjoitta-isi-n.

Usually, we talk about postilaatikko rather than just laatikko, which could mean any kind of box. The context tells us it refers to a mailbox or postbox here.

The verb viedä is used when you want to say you drop something off somewhere or take something somewhere. Two very common uses for this verb are: viedä roskat ulos (to take the trash out) and viedä lapset päiväkotiin (to take the kids to daycare).

The conditional of viedä: for the verb viedä, you will need the same stem you use for the imperfect tense: Eilen minä vei-n > minä veisi-n.

Lukea loppuun means “read completely, read all the way to the end”. The singer isn’t sure that the recipient would bother opening the letter and, if they did, whether they would continue reading the whole letter. If you’re interested, you could read about when to use loppu, lopussa and lopuksi in more detail.

The conditional of avata: this verb doesn’t have consonant gradation at all. Take the present tense’s -vat form of the verb and remove one -a- from the stem before adding the conditional’s -isi- marker: he avaa-vat > ava-isi-t-ko.

The conditional of lukea: the -isi- marker will be added to the strong stem of this verb. For verbtype 1 verbs, this means you can use the basic form of the verb as well as the -vat form of the verb: he luke-vat > luk-isi-t-ko. Note how the -e- from the present tense gets removed when adding -isi-.

Bridge

The object of a sentence will be inflected in the genitive case when it refers to one, whole thing. In this case, the singer is asking a yes-or-no question: Do you, or don’t you, still feel the longing. While “longing” is an abstract noun, in this song it’s a specific thing: the specific longing they felt earlier in their relationship. That’s why we use the genitive case here.

The conditional of tuntea: the -isi- marker will be added to the strong stem. For verbtype 1 verbs, this means you can use the basic form of the verb as well as the -vat form of the verb: he tunte-vat > tunt-isi-t-ko. Note how the -e- from the present tense gets removed when adding -isi-.

The conditional of olla: for verbtype 3 verbs, you will need the consonant stem of the verb: ol– + isi.

When the word valmis “ready” is used in combination with a verb, you will use the -maan form of said verb: Olen valmis lähtemään (I’m ready to leave), Oletko valmis puhumaan asiasta (Are you ready to talk about the thing), Mitä olette valmiita tekemään (What are you ready to do).

The verb kohdata will get a total object: you’re meeting/facing the whole person, thing or situation. When using a personal pronoun, you will use the accusative case: e.g. “Kohtaan sinut” (I face you), “Kohtaamme hänet” (We face him). If the song had had a name rather than a pronoun, it would appear in the genitive case: Olisitko valmis kohtaamaan Liisan?

The conditional of tulla: for verbtype 3 verbs, you will need the consonant stem of the verb: tul– + isi.

The phrase tulla vastaan asemalle is very useful to express that you go pick someone up from the train station: you go and wait for their arrival there. We can also use the missä-form of this phrase: olla vastassa asemalla, i.e. to wait at the train station for someone’s arrival in order to pick them up.

The object of the phrase tulla vastaan will be inflected in the partitive case (e.g. Tulen sinua vastaan, Tuletko meitä vastaan).

Refrain

I find it hard to explain why the verb lähteä is used here rather than mennä or tulla. All three would be possible in this sentence: Lähtisitkö kanssani? Tulisitko kanssani? Menisitkö kanssani?.

The conditional of lähteä: the -isi- marker will be added to the strong stem of this verb. For verbtype 1 verbs, this means you can use the basic form of the verb as well as the -vat form of the verb: he lähte-vät > läht-isi-t-kö. Note how the -e- from the present tense gets removed when adding -isi-.

You might want to check out this article which explains the difference between silloin and sitten.

The word kanssa is usually a postposition, which means it will generally appear in sentences with a word in the genitive case (e.g. äidin kanssa “with mother”, Liisan kanssa “with Liisa”, ystävien kanssa “with friends”). In the song, the genitive is replaced with a possessive suffix. We could say minun kanssa (informal), “minun kanssani” (slightly archaic) or just plain kanssani.

Järvelle is inflected in the allative case here to express that they would be going near the lake; not into the lake. You can read more about this difference in this article.

Neutral word order: Sukeltaisin sulle valkean helmen. The changed word order doesn’t change the meaning in any way; it’s just a stylistic choice.

The conditional of sukeltaa: the -isi- marker is added to the strong stem of the verb. For verbtype 1 verbs, this means you can use the basic form of the verb as well as the -vat form of the verb: he sukelta-vat > sukelta-isi-n.

The words valkea and valkoinen both mean “white”. Adjectives are inflected in the same form as the noun they’re attached to. In this case, the noun is helmi, which is inflected in the genitive case. The word helmi is an old word ending in an -i, so the -i gets replaced with an -e- before the genitive’s -n.

The conditional of istua: this verb doesn’t have consonant gradation at all, so you just add the -isi- marker to the stem of the verb: he istu-vat > istu-isi-n.

The word kanssa is usually a postposition, which means it will generally appear in sentences with a word in the genitive case (e.g. äidin kanssa “with mother”, Liisan kanssa “with Liisa”, ystävien kanssa “with friends”). In the song, the genitive is replaced with a possessive suffix. We could say minun kanssa (informal), “minun kanssani” (slightly archaic) or just plain kanssani.

By keskipenkki, the singer means the middle bench of a rowing boat. The verb istua can have two rections: you can sit on a bench (istua penkillä); or go sit onto the bench (istua penkille).

The conditional of vastata: this verb doesn’t have consonant gradation at all. Take the present tense’s -vat form of the verb and remove one -a- from the stem before adding the conditional’s -isi- marker: he vastaa-vat > vasta-isi-t-ko.

The verb vastata requires the mihin form of the thing you are replying to. Check out the following example sentences: Vastaan kysymykseen “I respond to the question”; Vastaa puhelimeen! “Answer the phone!” Vastasitko kirjeeseen? “Did you reply to the letter?”. If you would be replying to a person, you would use the -lle form: Vastaan opettajalle “I reply to the teacher”. Read more about rections here.

Starting from this line of the song, the questions are no longer conditionals: the singer is wondering if the other person is also noticing the same changes happening in the outside world. That’s why he’s asking tunnetko “do you feel” rather than tuntisitko “would you feel”.

The word ilma can mean both weather and air. Both of these cool down in autumn of course.

The construction in this line is called referatiivirakenne in Finnish. I usually refer to it as the että-participle. We could rephrase this question as “Huomaatko sä, että ilma on viilennyt?“

Some similar example sentences:
Huomaan, että ilma on viilennyt. > Huomaan ilman viilenneen “I notice that the weather has cooled down”.
Huomaan, että aurinko on laskenut. > Huomaan auringon laskenneen “I notice that the sun has set”.
Huomaan, että Liisa on muuttunut. > Huomaan Liisan muuttuneen “I notice that Liisa has changed”.

This line contains the relative pronoun joka, which is used to combine two sentences. We could split the song’s line up in two sentences: 1. Näetkö linnut? “Do you see the birds?” 2. Linnut lentävät pois. “The birds fly away.”
The subject of the second sentence (linnut) is inflected in the T-plural, which is why the joka-pronoun is also inflected in the combined sentences: Näetkö linnut, jotka lentävät pois? “Do you see the birds which fly away?”

To comply with standard language norms, the verb in this line should be inflected in the plural: lentävät rather than lentää. However, this song uses spoken language in several other sections, so the singular form doesn’t feel out of place. It’s common in spoken language to say “ne menee” rather than “ne menevät” (read more here).

The adverb kaukana is usually inflected in one of three cases: the missä-form kaukana “far away”, the mistä-form kaukaa “from far away” or the mihin-form kauas “(towards) far away”. In the song, the birds are migrating to the South, so there’s a movement towards a faraway location.

Bridge + Refrain 1x

La-la-la-la-laa-laa (4x)

Bridge 1x + Refrain 3x

There you have the whole song! Lähtisitkö is a pretty old song, but it’s full of such nice examples of the conditional mood that it makes it worth listening to. Do you have a song suggestion for me to analyze next? Let me know in the comments!

Related posts:

The Conditional Mood – Konditionaali Ei Tippa Tapa – Irwin Goodman – Finnish Songs Analyzed Apulanta – Hei hei mitä kuuluu – Finnish Song Lyrics Analyzed Petteri Punakuono – Finnish Christmas Song Analyzed