(HANATIV HANISTAR) הנתיב הנסתר

Our musical trek begins with a Ladino (Judeo-Spanish) song, “Cuando El Rey Nimrod” (When King Nimrod). It’s a piece which is rather well known to aficionados of the Ladino repertoire, but we have given it a new rhythm and a fresh setting. Instead of a 4/4 meter, it has been transformed into a Flamenco-style 6 beat, a rhythm often referred to as Bulerias.

Following this, also in an upbeat mood, is “Ahavat Hadasa - Libi V’Mizrakh” (The Love of Hadasa - My Heart Is in the East), an original adaptation of a Yemenite tune (text by Shalem Shabazi), together with an original setting of several lines from a poem by Judah Halevi. Here the rhythm has also been transformed, from a 4/4 to a 7/8. These verses are expressions of a yearning love for the land of Israel, our national home, and were written in the 17th (Shabazi) and the 12th (Halevi) centuries.

(SIMTAT HAPULKHAN) סמטת הפולחן 

The second disc is a compilation of sacred song, some remixed older pieces and some more recent or never before recorded. We begin with a canon that I wrote when I was 17 years old, while studying music at Yeshiva University in New York. “Hashmi-ini” (Let Me Hear Your Voice) is a setting of a verse from the Song of Songs, and is delivered by four mezzos, four baritones, four violins, four cellos, guitar and double bass. 

“L’Hadlik Ner Shel Shabbat” (Lighting the Sabbath Candles) was commissioned by my lifelong partner and sweetheart, Naomi Arney. She asked me for a tune for lighting the Sabbath candles that wasn’t the one we all sing on Hanukah. The melody I came up with is featured here, and can also be utilized for all holidays, by substituting the words shel shabbat (for the Sabbath) with shel yom tov (for the Holiday) or shel yom hazikaron (for the Day of Remembrance, Rosh Hashana) and so on.