lingua franca

[Judith R Cohen <judithc...>]

hi, re Francesco's question about Fel SHara (Uskudar) etc., which I do
in one version with Gerineldo "In medio del camio" and in a slightly
different version on my "Primavera en Salonica: Songs of the Sephardim &
their Neighbours", and in other versions... etc.; the Turkish song is a
late 19th century aria from a popular operetta, and the melody became so
popular it shows up in dozens of songs in different languages - not only
Judeo-Spanish (I learned that version directly from Gloria Levy's late
and wonderful mother Emily), but in Greek, Bosnian, Arabic, Hebrew,...
Eartha Kitt sang , I believe, the Turkish version, and so on. I learned
a Greek version at a musicology conference in Spain, as a Greek
professor sang it to me under one of our umbrellas under pouring rain on
a street corner in Madrid (there was a reason for taping this soggy
rendition outside rather than inside but at a distance of 11 years it
escapes me).

The Turkish song begins "Uskudara [with umlauts on the u's] gider
ik'en..." (I walked the streets of Uskudar, which is the Asian continent
side of Istanbul). Judith>
> 
>  * "Fel shara" (or whatever the song is titled: Gerineldo' cd has it 
> in "Huskudara Suite", track 16 of "En medio de aquel camino", 1994, 
> CDG-1094 --- Judith: your help here, I remember you telling me some 
> fascinating details about the song, and where it is from)

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