Patinkin, etc

[Ingemar Johansson <hebanon...>]

I find it impossible to discuss with Ari Davidow; he's sliding away and
evading the critical matters every time. Now, he has even cooked up some
pseudophilosophical stew of "authenticity" in history and literature and
Israel and God knows what. I find his outburst totally empty: a lot of
words, no substance. I didn't write that to insult him, his mind seems just
confused to me. But I might be wrong, of couse (a good bait here) .
Furthermore, I really don't think any admirer of Patinkin should allow
himself to be insulted by my criticism - only a weak person without much
self-confidence would react in that way. Come on, stand up for your thing
and fight instead.

Now, Ari has hidden most of my arguing behind a smoke-screen of evasions,
so I repeat the essentials. First I wrote ao:


>Leaving the etymology besides, I would like to say that "Shmaltz" as a
>musical term brings a lot of syrup to my ears. If you force me to exemplfy
>it musically I would say - Mandy Patinkin. I think that his recent CD
>should be discussed on this list. In my ears it's all shmaltz. And kitsch.
>The very idea of presenting "White Christmas" in Yiddish makes me vomit.
>Swedish is a minor language too, but the thought of it being presented and
>after (hopefully) years of studies executed by a man ( or woman) who
>originally doesn't know the tongue at all would just be ridiculous, even
if
>the language was threathened - this is the Patinkin case, and I just
cannot
>see the meaning of it, as there are many true Yiddish singers, ranging
>from, say, Jaacov Shapiro to Wolf Krakowski, who could do this better.
>Patinkin, on the other hand,  is a name of course (at least in the US),
but
>he's certainly no Yiddish personality, has nothing to add to Yiddish
>culture, and just seems to make money out of a trend -  his record is
>nothing but  - SHMALTZ.

I think this defines my position pretty good. To this Ari replied (as
usual) with a lot of words. I tried to boil down his arguments into
something essential, ie the quotation within the quotation below:

>I, for sure, cannot judge the inner, national, American worth of
Patinkin's
>CD, but I really don't understand what Ari means when he writes that "it's
>such an amazing tribute to language, to culture, and to our times and the
>times of 75 and 100 years ago". Excuse my use of bodily, or animale
>language, but this sentence is a piece of fly-blows. As to language MP is
>just imitating, as to culture he just pretends to be rooted in the Yiddish
>one, as to "our times and the times of 75 and 100 years ago" this just
open
>an abyss between Yiddish Culture, still alive, and the _contemplators_ of
>its past. That's all.

To this criticism of mine Ari has not yet responded. Instead he reacted
strongly against the following, which partly was intended as an answer to
Seth Rogovoy's stimulating contribution to the discussion:

>For me the problem was the _pretended_ authenticity of Patinkin's. This is
>perfectly mirrored by Aris word, quoted by me already, about this album
>being "such an amazing tribute to language, to culture, and to our times
>and the times of 75 and 100 years ago". It should also be noted that Ari's
>evading my criticism on this point in his reply. Instead he falsely
>juxtaposes Patinkin, a pinchbeck plagiarist, to Krakowski, an expert in
>Yiddish culture and language.Well aware of Ari's aversion to Wolf, I
should
>perhaps have mentioned, say, Michael Alpert of "Brave Old World" instead.
>I also want to remind you of the fact that I mentioned Jaacov Shapiro as
an
>authentic Yiddish-singer too (those three correspond to Seth's definition
>given above - Patinkin does not).

Now instead of discussing this Ari (wilfully I hope) misunderstands what I
mean with "authenticity", which should be evident for all and anyone,
namely "artistic genuineness", and tries instead to lecture me on , yes, as
I said before, I don't know what. What is more: he's absolutely unwilling
to defend his own juxtaposition of Patinkin to Krakowski. Instead - in his
usual way - he evades the burning matter and attacks me with accusations of
having insulted Patinkin and his admirers gravely, if not for life, by
calling him "a pinchbeck plagiariast". Well, strong words, perhaps, but I
have strong feelings for music, and besides I have already made clear why I
think so. Here Ari again (wilfully?) misunderstands me and brings some
matters up that I never had in mind, although he claims that this "of
course" was what I meant. What I meant should be clear from my sendings,
quoted above.

Sorry to have bored you with them again, but I deemed it necessary. I
reckon you understand why. The rest is silence.

Ingemar