Roxbury man covers Adele’s ‘Hello’ in Latin

ROXBURY – A Landing man has taken the lyrics of Adele’s smash hit song “Hello” and rerecorded them in Latin to entertain his students and win a contest.

Keith Massey, 49, of Landing, is a Latin teacher at Leonia High School in Bergen County who has made a habit of creating videos translating and performing popular songs into Latin for his students.

“These kind of videos didn’t exist so I decided I’m going to make them for my students,” Massey said.

He’s covered songs ranging from “Jingle Bells” and “Do You Want to Build a Snowman” from the movie “Frozen,” to Beatles songs including “Hello, Goodbye.” His most popular videos have netted tens of thousands of YouTube views.

Massey majored in Latin and Classical Greek at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he also received his PhD in Biblical Hebrew with a minor in Arabic.

Following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Massey served as an Arabic linguist at the National Security Agency, during which time he received the Global War on Terrorism Civilian Service Medal for his service in Iraq in 2004. He’s also the author of Intermediate Arabic for Dummies.

Massey became a Latin teacher at Leonia High School after leaving the NSA in 2006, where he has taught ever since. He credited his training in government service with giving him the skills to create online resources designed to make the study of Latin more interesting.

It was a friend in the NSA, familiar with Massey’s previous videos, who brought the Pop Unplugged Cover Song Video Contest to Massey’s attention. He agreed to submit a video, with a goal of “making Latin language come alive in the modern age.”

For the contest, entrants can choose from one of five pre-licensed songs, The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face,” Taylor Swift’s “Blank Space,” Ed Sheeran’s “Thinking Out Loud,” Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright,” and Adele’s “Hello.”

Massey chose “Hello” because his class would know and enjoy the song, and also because of its use of the titular greeting.

“It’s a basic phrase my students should know,” Massey said.

The contest sponsored by online music producers CD Baby, Illustrated Sound Network, and We are the Hits. It is judged on the quality of the performance, audience engagement – meaning views, likes, shares and comments on the video – and creativity.

While some submissions have included a capella and instrumental performances of the songs, Massey currently has the creativity category locked up as the only translated entry.

Massey said it takes a long time to produce a video like “Hello.”

“It took five hours on the translation alone, because as a teacher you have to be spot-on. My translations are good, not just Google translated,” Massey said. “But it also has to be singable.”

That can be a challenge when taking a song in English, typical a mono-syllabic language, into Latin where the same words can be four syllables.

Music in general is a hobby for Massey, who sings in his church choir and has produced original music using only the Apple GarageBand program and a professional microphone. He said he also produced the music for his Adele cover in GarageBand and provided the original lyrics and Latin translation for the songs.

In all, it took him the better part of the weekend to create the video now live on YouTube.

The video launched March 6 and has more than 2,100 views one week later, more than 1,700 more views than the second most watched video in the competition.

“The Latin language community has really taken to it,” Massey said, adding he had hoped the video might bring continued relevance to the Latin language, but did not expect it to break out like it has.

The top prize is $250, so Massey said he isn’t in the completion for money, though judging by the views collected so far, he thinks he has a shot to win.

“I work hard on these things and I think I do a good job,” Massey said. “So I wanted to see the response it got and so far it’s been good.”

Watch the “Hello” video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPFmY5ur8oA.

Massey said the success of “Hello” indicates he should cover more current popular songs. He’s not sure what he will choose to cover next, but said it should be posted soon.

Search Keith Massey on YouTube or go to www.keithmassey.com to see more covers.

Staff Writer Michael Izzo: 973-428-6636; mizzo@GannettNJ.com