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In Honor of Florence Amzallag-Tatistcheff, a Vice President of the American Sephardi Federation’s Board of Directors
11 January 2016
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For the past eight months, Sephardi Ideas Monthly has been exploring piyyut ─Sephardi liturgical poetry and (soul) music
─from Israel’s piyyut revival to the Golden Age of Andalusian Spain. This month, Sephardi Ideas Monthly is featuring Aryeh Tepper’s essay on the New Jerusalem Orchestra’s ground-breaking, jazz-infused performance of North African piyyut, “No Greater Love.”The American Sephardi Federation’s Director of Publications, Aryeh Tepper is a teacher, scholar, and writer living in Israel. Tepper first wrote about the New Jerusalem Orchestra (NJO) in 2010 when the band was featured as the opening act at the Israel Festival. He then penned an essay on the NJO for the Jewish Review of Books, “No Greater Love,” after a recording of the performance was released two years later as a double-disk, Ahavat Olamim: Andalusian Hebrew Song from the Maghreb to Jerusalem.
 Aryeh Tepper,The Sephardi Report Launch Party, 9 September 2015 (Photo courtesy of Chrystie Sherman)
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The New Jerusalem Orchestra
Ahavat Olamim was born thanks to the love of piyyut shared by three different artists: Yair Harel, Omer Avital, and Rabbi Haim Louk. Harel is a highly accomplished Israeli vocalist, musician, and educator, who was interviewed for the November issue of Sephardi Ideas Monthly; Avital, a world-class jazz musician and band-leader, took time out in the middle of his career to master classical Arab music and various traditions of piyyut; and Rabbi Louk is “a Torah scholar and world-class vocalist with an extraordinary ability to communicate emotion through a microphone.” The artistic collaboration on Ahavat Olamim works wonderfully, and on one level the double-disk is a contemporary example of the inter-cultural dialogue that animated the best of classical Andalusian culture, “connecting… |
Ahavat Olamim was born thanks to the love of piyyut shared by three different artists: Yair Harel, Omer Avital, and Rabbi Haim Louk. Harel is a highly accomplished Israeli vocalist, musician, and educator, who was interviewed for the November issue of Sephardi Ideas Monthly; Avital, a world-class jazz musician and band-leader, took time out in the middle of his career to master classical Arab music and various traditions of piyyut; and Rabbi Louk is “a Torah scholar and world-class vocalist with an extraordinary ability to communicate emotion through a microphone.”
The artistic collaboration on Ahavat Olamim works wonderfully, and on one level the double-disk is a contemporary example of the inter-cultural dialogue that animated the best of classical Andalusian culture, “connecting…
| …the jazz clubs of New York City to the late-night ‘Shirat Ha-bakashot’ (‘Songs of Seeking’ in Edwin Seroussi’s wonderful translation) sung in Morocco, to present-day Jerusalem.” On another level, Ahavat Olamim marks one of the artistic high-points of Israel’s contemporary piyyut revival, celebrated not only in Jerusalem but also by the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. |
 Click here to watch an interview with the artists behind the New Jerusalem Orchestra’s Ahavat Olamim (Photo courtesy of the New Jerusalem Orchestra) |
Click here to watch an interview with the artists behind the New Jerusalem Orchestra’s Ahavat Olamim (Photo courtesy of the New Jerusalem Orchestra)| For his part, Tepper emphasizes the music’s cultural and spiritual implications: “Ahavat Olamim reminds us that, culturally and spiritually speaking, the Jewish people is not so much part of the West as the West is part of the Jewish people, in the same way that the East is part of the Jewish people.” Furthermore, by musically connecting New York, Morocco and present-day Israel, the NJO “helps expand the possibilities of Jewish-Israeli identity.” |
| Sephardi Ideas Monthly is happy to introduce our readers to the New Jerusalem Orchestra’s music, and to the implications of that music, with Aryeh Tepper’s thought-provoking and entertaining essay, “No Greater Love.” |
January 13th, 17th, 19th, and 21st
at The Center for Jewish History
15 West 16th Street, New York, NY
Back by popular demand, the American Sephardi Federation invites you to David Serero’s The Merchant of Venice. Playing to sold-out shows in the summer, the French-Moroccan baritone opera singer once again directs and stars (as Shylock) in his Sephardi adaptation of Shakespeare’s play about love, commerce, and bigotry. Featuring a diverse cast and Sephardi music, there will be a preview matinee on January 13th, ahead of opening night on January 17th.
Please click
here to buy tickets
on display now through March 2016
Click here for viewing hours and additional information
THE POMEGRANATE CARD
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($54 tax-deductible)
Contact us by email or phone (212-294-6170) to sponsor future issues of the Sephardi World Weekly in honor or memory of loved ones.
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Copyright © 2015 American Sephardi Federation, All rights reserved. Thank you for opting (on our websites, at an event, or by email) to receive American Sephardi Federation Programming Updates and Publications. We apologize if this message was sent in error. The American Sephardi Federation is a proud partner of the Center for Jewish History (15 West 16th St., New York, NY., 10011). American Sephardi Federation | http://www.AmericanSephardi.org | info@Sephardi.House | (212) 548-4486
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Copyright © 2015 American Sephardi Federation, All rights reserved.
Thank you for opting (on our websites, at an event, or by email) to receive American Sephardi Federation Programming Updates and Publications. We apologize if this message was sent in error.
The American Sephardi Federation is a proud partner of the Center for Jewish History (15 West 16th St., New York, NY., 10011).
American Sephardi Federation | http://www.AmericanSephardi.org | info@Sephardi.House | (212) 548-4486
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