"you didn't sing any Ladino songs!"

[Judith R Cohen <judithc...>]

Hi, 
I was fascinated last week by this comment after I finished a
concert-workshop on Judeo-Spanish songs for a Jewish school, Grade 5-6
students and their teachers. The comment came from a fairly young (as I
get older , too many people get younger...) teacher born or at least
raised in Canada but whose family was from Salonica and Tangier. (The
age matters because of the repertorie he is likely to have [not] heard).

ANyway I did my usual shpiel which several of you know, about what is
and what isn't - Ladino, Judeo-Spanish, medieval, modern, blablabla, and
how the best-known (still, though a little less so now) Judeo-Spanish
songs on CDs etc tend to be the most recent ones blablabla, and then I
sang a whole lot of things, old and newer. 

But as usual, there are so many wonderful songs that I can't fit in in
an hour or so, and that I want to share with people, and so many
wonderful songs I haven't even learned yet, that it never occurs to me
to sing any of the "top ten". For two main reaosns (1) many of them I
don't even like that much (gasp! finger-point! travesty!) and (2)
probably most important - these songs are ok. Lots of people sing them.
They're not going to disappear and (3) I don't sing that sort of thing
particularly well anyway.

Every now and again I'll stick in "Cuando el Rey Nimrod" which is about
as "pop Ladino" as I'll get, (years ago I even wrote a singable English
version when I was working with a bunch of Jewish kids at a SUnday
morning programme).

Anyway, the kids had a good time, I had a good time with them, they
asked fabulous, often challenging questions, I could tell they weren't
bored because they didn't punctuate my presentation with velcro noises
from their running shoes (my sure-fire boredom index in school
audiences) - and then afterwards, the Sepahrdic teacher, in his late 30s
or so, came up to me and said "that was great! But you didn't sing a
single Ladino song!"

hmmmm..................
Judith

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