Re: ladino music

[Joel Bresler <jbresler...>]

Hi, Lucy. I think Judith hit the nail on the head -- I'll just add a few 
comments. In addition to turning Makam into well tempered western scales 
and simplifying the rhythms, the Hemsi and Levy don't convey any of the 
amazing ornamentation of the originals.

There was also a large and hugely interesting "class" differential and 
educational differential to this process of changing performance practice 
in the first half of this century, very broadly along the lines of:

Eastern/Ottoman = old-fashioned; unrefined; lower-class
Western/French = new-fangled, refined; upper-class (or upper class wannabes)

This difference was succinctly exemplified in the actual descriptions for 
styles of performance among Turkish Sephardim: a la Turka, and a la Franka. 
The sole exception was synagogal music, which retained a resolutely eastern 
orientation (though western choral music has made small inroads there, 
too.) This subject was taken up in great depth in a PhD thesis by Pamela 
(Dorn) Sezgin, where she traces a total shift in popular music performance 
practices among Turkish Jews in a 70 year period. (I don't have the name of 
the thesis at hand, but you can find it on the University Microfilms site, 
or anyone interested should email me privately.)

As for learning songs from recordings, that's certainly a time-honored way 
of adding to one's repertoire. Just understand what "filters" the 
performance has gone through by the time you hear it. With Sra. de los 
Angeles you will get a Western-trained voice and someone who doesn't 
understand Ladino very well, nor how to pronounce it. For example, the 
liner notes to one of her recordings translate song lyrics like so:

"Ah, el novio no quiere dinero,
Quere a la novia de maizal (sic) bueno"

(This should be "mazal bueno",  or good luck. In other words, the groom 
doesn't care about money; rather he wants a bride with good luck.) This 
gets translated as:

"Oh, the bridegroom doesn't want money;
he wants a bride with a good field of maize."  (!!!)

On the pronunciation front, another common error is pronouncing a word 
transliterated into Ladino with an "x" as "ks" as opposed to "h" or "sh" or 
a Scottish-style "ch" sound, etc.,  For example, Paxaro (bird) should be 
pronounced as Pasharo, etc., not Paksaro.

Having said all that, I adore de Los Angeles' performances. But in a very 
different way from those of traditional performers, or performers like 
Judith Cohen that were not raised in the tradition but have assiduously 
tried to cultivate appropriate pronunciation and performance practices by 
working with informants that were, or going back to 78-era performances for 
their inspiration.

Hope this helps!! Do you have any recordings of your own out?

Best,

Joel



At 09:07 PM 9/5/99 +0100, you wrote:
>Replying to Joel Bresler: can you be more detailed about how these Sephardi
>musicians 'smoothed out' traditional songs? Were they trying to make them
>more acceptable/mainstream/classical?
>
>I am one person who is delighted to hear from Judith that the songs were
>originally sung a capella by women with percussion accompaniment. Would she
>approve of my arrangements? I grew up listening to recordings of Victoria de
>los Angeles singing old Spanish, Flamenco and Sephardi songs and that's where
>I get my knowledge of harmony from (definitely not from books or music
>teachers).
>
>Lucy Fisher
>'Ignorance is a delicate flower - touch it and the bloom is gone.' (Oscar
>Wilde)
>



Joel Bresler
250 E. Emerson Rd.
Lexington, MA 02420 USA

Home:           781-862-2432
Home Office:    781-862-4104
FAX:            781-862-0498
Cell:           781-622-0309
Email:          jbresler (at) ma(dot)ultranet(dot)com

---------------------- jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org ---------------------+