Matthew Krouse CD OFTHEWEEK
The coming of Jewish music to the world-music fold has occurred very much in the context of the traditional. Of course, there have been proponents of a contemporary shift think of Steve Reich and John Zorn, the latter whose recent albums have been brought under the Tzadik label that defines itself as “radical Jewish music”.
Most popular has been the enormous klezmer revival. For those who don’t know, klezmer was played at small town and ghetto celebrations and sounds a lot like the stuff you hear in Fiddler on the Roof.
Seeking out new alternatives, though, in the ever-broadening world-music landscape, Putumayo has now released A Jewish Odyssey that’s coined “a celebration of Jewish music around the world”. Presenting Jewish music from as far afield as Cuba and Morocco, it’s generally mellow, folksy and appropriately exotic.
It starts off with one of the biggest names in current Jewish music, Chava Albertstein, backed by the Klezmatics doing one of two Yiddish numbers, Di Goldene Pave, that comes from their collective album The Well.
What follows is a bit of old-fashioned bar mitzvah band stuff, the Yemeni-style Ofra Haza and the new Jewish music convention that has sprung up among the Sephardim of Latin America. Most beautiful must certainly be a studied Ladino reincarnation by the Turkish duo Janet and Jak Esim. A good gift for Jews, if you’re buying for them this Christmas.