deoopew的部落格

A while vertebrae I was dynamic along the Jerusalem route photography the radio stations of the cross. On one frequency, a remarkably unabated jazz batter was increasing out of the speakers. I was something like to cut the dial more than a few more in rummage of a Jewish melody once the vocalist started in. Shock of shocks, he was a heavily Hassidic singer, full with eastern European enunciation. And what was he singing? "Kumee oy'ree ki va oy-reich.." from 16th period Rabbi Shlomo Alkavetz' classical Sabbath poem, L'cha Dodi. Before he had began his rendition I had been expecting something similar to "Oh baby, the way you duck near me ..."!

I had to ask the old question, "Is this angelic for the Jews?" And I had to elasticity the old answer, "Does curls push on the palm of your hand?"

Of course of instruction it's not swell for the Jews, I fabric. Poor, misfortunate L'cha Dodi, dragged from the comedian of Tsfat on the Sabbath eve and contaminated beside Saturday Night Fever! Lovingly through with by a Hassid, no less!

Speaking of Tsfat, I recall rambling in the order of their Klezmer time period former and hearing a recent scene of Psalm 126. It was to a funk rhythm, and the libretto did not fit. The musician had to incision speech in two, which rendered them much or less pointless. Good for the Jews? Nah.

What daunted me in the region of this so-called Jewish music? To put it briefly, besides the words, it merely wasn't. It was dance, trance, shmantz. It was hip, driving, suggestive. If this music was asked wherever it loved to play, the house of prayer or the sin-skin club, the answer was unhindered. If Jewish music is to be circumscribed as such, it essential have authentic Jewish condition. And so overmuch up to date auditory communication only does not. Where was the foundation of this tradition? Nowhere. That's what daunted me.

But, as Tevye reminds us, there's different mitt. After all, go listen in to classical Hassidic nigunim (melodies). Then go comprehend to Russian common people songs. Eerie, no? Weren't those common people songs the "dance" of their day?

Even stronger, go view the spiritual kids. They admire simultaneous touristy music and all its villains. What these new Jewish groups do is rob what's hip and put Jewish happy into it. Isn't that what the imaginative Hassidic nigunim were all about? If we don't impoverishment to misplace our teenage society in the nation war, we have to oppose. Didn't Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch transport the musical organization works of Lewandowsky and Japhet in to the house of god service, even on the other hand they were lock, stock and barrel in the mode of the German composers of the age, such as Schubert and Mendelssohn (he inevitably an grapheme because he was halakhically Jewish)? So possibly I should not single level-headed down, I should gesture this development.

Hold on. We're some right, I acknowledge. Here's how I reconcile the difference, and my serious request to all who compose Jewish music. The best key situation is to ask, "To be or not to be?" That is the cross-examine.

Every limerick has a purpose, a message. It can be joy, faith, pensiveness, determination, anything. The phone call is in the melodic phrase and rhythm, which concoct the heavens. It's in the text, which gives pronunciation to the communication. And it's in the performance, which makes the statement of our own involving the actor and the hearer. If the communication is congruent, if the music and the singing part are a correct federation that inspires the performer, then you have a extreme hunk of auditory communication. If the communication is mixed, if there's a contest going on involving the pulsation and the words, then we are annoyed. That was why that "kumee oy'ree" was so positively hideous. It was a intermingled communication of unchaste music near revered texts.

We fondness to set verses from the sacrament to music, and that's excellent. Composers have a special guilt to make convinced that the auditory communication conveys the message and colors the voice communication with deeper meanings. Do that, and I'm fascinated, I'm inspired, even if it's a at the same time stylishness.

But be very, really reliable beside verses. We incline to ask, "Do you come up with Adon Olam goes to this?", once we would do finer to ask, "What is this melodic line saying?". If it says Adon Olam, apt. If it does not, later WRITE YOUR OWN WORDS. To bread and butter next to the notion of message, if you have a severe line that can say thing worthwhile (something human and real, not pessimistic or immodest), say it your way. That satisfies.

The basic knowledge of Jewish music has e'er been expressing what's in our long whist as a worship to God. That face must be congruent, pure, heartfelt. There is room in the Jewish music worldwide for severe innovation, if it comes from our hearts, not from the charts.