"Ariber di shotns" ("Crossing the Shadows") New Yiddish Songs by Joshua Waletzky

[Spudicmikhl <Spudicmikhl...>]

       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