Re: Mandy Patinkin's Yiddish album

[Seth Rogovoy <rogovoy...>]

Far be it from me to want or need to defend Mandy Patinkin or those who
like his Yiddish album -- which I haven't heard, and which I'm just
guessing I probably wouldn't like -- but a few recent messages to this
list that argue the point that Patinkin's album is "inauthentic," I think,
belabor the obvious, maybe even call "blue" "blue."

Patinkin, as I understand him, is a pop singer, in the tradition of
classic pop singers, who apply their "instrument" (pop voice) to the work
of an "other" -- a songwriter, say, or a style, not of their own creation.

This, in opposition to the singer-songwriter (the Bob Dylans) or the likes
of Hank Williams or Muddy Waters, who wrote much of their own material OR
performed, for the vast part, solely in one "authentic" style or
tradition, in which they were expert (by virtue of originality or
technique or other connection to the style).

A pop singer is just that, a voice. I suppose one might argue that Frank
Sinatra's "authenticity" -- if he had any, and I'm not sure he did, at
least in the sense that Ingemar uses the term (and I might agree) --  was
grounded in some emotional truth he was able to convey, as opposed to any
"literal" authenticity vis-a-vis his relationship to the song itself
(written by an other, a songwriter).

SO, to fault Patinkin's Yiddish album with "inauthenticity" would seem to
be at best a redundant argument, no?

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Seth Rogovoy                        
rogovoy (at) berkshire(dot)net
http://www.berkshireweb.com/rogovoy
music news, interviews, reviews, et al.
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