Re: Abayudaya

[Alex J. Lubet <lubet001...>]

Responding to the message of <988522276(dot)3aeba7248ed36 (at) 
mymail(dot)yorku(dot)ca>
from jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org:
> 
> hi, I`ve had that Abayudaya "Shalom everybody everywhere"cd for a few years 
> now, 
> ever since it came out, and have often played excerpts for students. It`s 
> definitely a curiosity but - "too wonderful for words"???? Actually, I 
> thought 
> it waspossibly one of the few musically UN-impressive recordings of African 
> music I'd ever heard. I'll have another listen, just in case, but... cheers 
> from 
> Spain (leaving tomorrow after finishing teachiong this Balkan dance and 
> song workshop in Madrid - with, naturally, a few Sephardic songs from the 
> Balkans thrown in...) Judith
>
To each one's own I guess.  Having been steeped in the ideology of musical 
impressiveness for longer than I care to admit (and I performed my African 
Shabbat last night with a master drummer from Ghana with whom I've been working 
for almost twenty years, so I have some exposure to virtuosity from that 
continent, thank you) and having bought into it for way too long, I think it's 
simply lovely and imagine, having spent a weekend with a scholar who knows the 
Abayudaya, that they're lovely, too.  I enjoyed the sentiment behind the lyrics 
I understood and got a lot of pleasure from their Luganda-inflected Hebrew and 
their way with familiar texts.  They have maintained their faith under daunting 
conditions and that, too, comes through.

I suspect you wouldn't much care for my African Shabbat, either.  I wrote it so 
it could be done by the volunteer choir at my own shul, whom I also adore and 
who appreciate that someone of my background cares enough about them to write 
nice melodies (and harmonies) they can sing and enjoy singing.  People tell me 
they cannot get my tunes out of their heads and it makes me feel a bit like 
Irving Berlin and I enjoy that.  People of some erudition tell me that the 
simplicity is deceptive.

Sorry, but I refuse to be chastened.  Next time I hear something I regard as 
simple, touching, and poignant, whose purchase would benefit a struggling (read 
the liner notes) Jewish community in Africa, that impresses me as a statement of
earnest faith under difficult circumstances, I still intend to tell my friends 
about it.

I play stuff for my students, too.  Sometimes when I ask them about the ideology
of the difficult and complex, I question whether they imply that standard to 
other aspects of their lives besides music.  Is this a standard we attach to our
favorite foods or our most cherished personal relationships?  Why then to music.

As our Abayudaya co-religionists would say in a manner too wonderful for words, 
"Shalom Everybody Everywhere!"

 

Alex Lubet, Ph. D.
Morse Alumni Distinguished Teaching Professor of Music
Adjunct Professor of American and Jewish Studies
University of Minnesota
2106 4th St. S
Minneapolis, MN 55455
612 624-7840 612 624-8001 (fax)

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