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"Ariber di shotns" ("Crossing the Shadows") New Yiddish Songs by Joshua Waletzky
- From: Spudicmikhl <Spudicmikhl...>
- Subject: "Ariber di shotns" ("Crossing the Shadows") New Yiddish Songs by Joshua Waletzky
- Date: Tue 15 May 2001 04.51 (GMT)
Just wanted to mention to the list what a combination of privilege and
pleasure, koved un fargnign it was on Sunday afternoon on the Lower East
Side of Manhattan to attend the second set at Tonic of a "Klezmer Brunch,"
whereby Josh Waletzky presented music heard on his newly released CD
"Crossing the Shadows." Featured together with Josh were artists Deborah
Strauss and Jeff Warschauer--not to forget special guest D.J. Waletzky on
cymbal for one of the numbers--and it was a wonderful display of performance
talent that anyone who has been paying even the slightest attention to the
more serious Klezmer endeavors particularly over the last couple of years has
come to expect from all three of these multi-talented musicians. While
attending the performance, I picked up a copy of the CD and what an
impressive and beautiful collection of songs, all words and music by Joshua
Waletzky. It is a sincere, collaborative effort on the part of the three
musicians. Deborah Strauss and Jeff Warschauer have substantially
invigorated this CD with their added string timbre as well as vocal support.
From a production standpoint the CD itself is beautifully rendered,
album cover, calligraphy, typography (kudos to Ari Davidow!) and as to the
recording itself, imagine you are sitting somewhere in Josh's livingroom as
sonic shadows of the old world mix into the new one, (or could it be vice
versa?) as indeed you are taken on a journey through time, crossing
innumerable landscapes inhabiting the Jewish soul. He begins this space/time
conflation (a heymish one of course) with the very first song, a hint at the
troubled idea of the Krakow of today attempting to celebrate a Jewish culture
that subsists in a time puposefully forgotten by a good number of current
inhabitants. Josh begins the musical journey with a meditation upon the
ghostly absence of the very Jewish community that charted its own special way
of life in pre-shoah Poland, only to succumb in the end "Ikh heyb mayn fus"
("I lift my foot"). The more buyont instrumental interludes as well as the
instrumental conclusion represent such a stark contrast to the dire text of
this opening song. Josh seems to be provoking a piquant, profoundly dissonant
cosmos of sweet/sour, that leaves the listener with the sense that this
dilemma might never congeal into anything resolute; but then is there
anything about crossing shadows that may be deemed resolute? In general, the
sophisticated nature of the dialogue between music and text typifies so many
of the other songs in this collection.
Further topics encountered among the other songs concern the
assasination of Itzhak Rabin "Sholem-toyb" ("Dove of Peace"), as well as one
written with genuine brotherly regard for what was an optimistic time in the
peace process in Northern Ireland, "Irland, 5758" ("Ireland, 1998"). Other
topography include songs that Josh composed with immediate family in mind,
musical bouquets full of such honest expression and deep heartfelt emotion.
Exceptionally poignant and memorable are the two songs Josh dedicated to his
wife "In grinem veg" ("On the green road") and in memory of his father,
Sholom Waletzky, "Eyns un tsvey" ("One and Two").
I can only add that with such gems as "Visotski's tey" ("Visotski's
Tea") and "Dem zeydns nigndl" ("Grandfather's Little Tune") from this same
wonderful creator of "New Yiddish Songs," (so the beautiful proclamation that
follows the title on the CD jacket), how could I not but wholeheartedly
recommend "Ariber di shotns" ("Crossing the Shadows"), Joshua Waletzky's
latest gift basket to the larger family of us all.
Michael Spudic
Forest Hills, New York
- "Ariber di shotns" ("Crossing the Shadows") New Yiddish Songs by Joshua Waletzky,
Spudicmikhl