Cantor's Blog

Here are the words that Cantor Fogelman offered in her Sermon-in-Song featuring Sephardic music for Passover on Friday, March 26:

Many of you have heard me speak about my mixed Sephardic and Ashkenazic background before. My father’s side of the family is Ashkenazic, with roots in Russia, Hungary, and the Ukraine. My mother’s family is Sephardic, hailing from Turkey, Greece, and Rhodes. The variations in these two distinct traditions present themselves most overtly during Passover. Because Sephardic Jews eat kitniyot like beans and rice during Passover, you’ll find different foods at a Sephardic seder. Instead of gefilte fish and matzah ball soup, you’ll see stuffed grape leaves and spinach and leek patties.

You’ll also hear different music, and you may even hear a different language: Ladino, or Judeo-Spanish, is peppered throughout a traditional Sephardic seder ceremony. I’m told that my great-grandparents spoke this language at home, and my mom managed to catch onto words for foods and curses.

Tonight, we’re going to travel to Sarajevo and Turkey as we listen to three different Passover songs from the Sephardic tradition. One of the perks of this virtual format is that you can actually hear some these songs as performed by their original composers and with traditional ethnic instrumentation.

Pesach A La Mano by Flory Jagoda

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vh3JU9NpI_0

Our first selection is by the beloved and prolific composer Flory Jagoda, who we sadly lost earlier this year at the age of 97. I’m told that Flory was a scholar in residence here at TINW a number of years ago, so many of you may have been lucky enough to have heard her sing and speak in person.  

Flory left an enormous legacy to Sephardic musical heritage by capturing stories and traditions from her childhood in song. Her melodies are timeless. Many who know her Chanukah song Ocho Kandelikas are surprised to learn that it was written in the 1980s. It has such an authentic old-world quality that enables it to remain relevant across the generations.

Flory’s song, “Pesach A La Mano” is no different. She explains the background of this piece in her songbook:

“For the Jewish women of her village, the excitement of Purim ended with a great sigh as they contemplated the work of preparing for Passover: “turning out all the furniture, whitewashing, Grandmother leading her troops against every crumb, every drop of dust, readying the house for the Rabbi’s inspection. For the young people, the special Pesach oven in the center of town afforded a chance to look each other over, as every family would send a daughter to help with the baking of the boyus – a special word for the unleavened bread, which was as hard as a rock. The young men would gather the bread in special white cotton bags for delivering to Jewish homes.”

The lyrics incorporate some of the words that my mother learned as a child and has since passed on to us. Japrakis are stuffed grape leaves, which have a permanent place at our family’s seder meal. Instead of stuffing the grape leaves with rice like many separdic families, ours are stuffed with matzah farfel to enable those in my family who do not eat kitniyot to partake. You’ll also hear “grandmother” translate as “Nona” – that’s how my mom is referred to by my kids.

Here’s the translation of the song:

Purim, Purim, Purim is over. Passover is at hand. Matzot are being made, the stuffed leaves are being baked. Aman. Almighty God gives us good fortune.

Purim, Purim, Purim is over. Passover is at hand. The grandmother is telling the grandchildren, clean the dust. Corners and ceilings. Aman. Almighty God gives us good fortune. Aman.

Purim, Purim, Purim is over. Passover is at hand. The Rabbi tells the aunts not to eat bread for eight days. Aman.

Be in the look out for words you may recognize as you listen to Flory Jagoda sing her own “Pesach a la mano.”

Un Kavritiko/Chad Gadya/One Little Goat:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFax5q-ImC0

            If your family is still awake at the end of the seder, then you are likely familiar with the silly yet dark song  “Chad Gadya” – one little goat. For those of you who don’t know the song, the Aramaic text tells the cumulative song that tells the story of a little goat who was eaten by a cat that was then bitten by a dog and so forth. Some interpretations believe that each object or animal represents a different group of people who tried to persecute the Jews. Others see them as being different characters or time periods in the Hebrew Bible: The stick could be Moses’ staff; the ox could be Rome, who destroyed the second temple in 70 CE.

There is some discrepancies as to how long this song has been part of the Sephardic tradition. In 1894, a Haggadah was published in Salonika, Greece – which may very well have been the Haggadah my great-grandfather used since he was living in Salonika at the time. This Haggadah advertises on its cover that it was “translated very well into Ladino according to the custom of our city and complete with the full seder for the night and we included the liturgical poem of Chad Gadya.

The clear implication is that the inclusion of Had Gayda in Ladino was a novelty for Salonica’s Jews in 1894 and one worthy of being highlighted by the publishers on the title page.

But the Ladino translation and performance of the original Aramaic text varied widely across the globe. In the Ladino versions, “goat” was varyingly called un kavretiko or un kavrito; the currency with which it was purchased by the father varied among aspros, asprikos, as bari, lavanim, levanim, or levanikos, with some versions using a combination; the ox is referred to as buey or vaka; the stick as vara or palo; and God as El Santo Bendicho El or, like the Aramaic, El Akadosh Baruh U. 

In several places, the song was sung with the middle eastern-style Ottoman musical modes known as makams: in Salonica, makam saba; in Rhodes, makam oshok; in Bulgaria, makam bayat; in Ioannina, makam hijaz. In Corfu, it took on the upbeat style of an Italian tarantella.

The version you are going to hear tonight was popularized by the Israeli pop singer Yehoram Geon. This is a Turkish variation of the melody, and you’ll hear it performed on traditional instruments like Oud and Kamonchey. and by Chloe Pourmorady and Asher Saso Levy as part of a special multimedia “Passover Around the World” concert presented by the HUC-JIR Jewish Language Project last year. Because of the COVID-19 Pandemic, the program transitioned into a virtual events just three days before its premier, becoming one of the first such cultural events in this new normal. We come full circle as we watch this video on the eve of our second Pandemic Passover.

Par’o Era Estrallero, arr. Eleanor Epstein

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBkyTTOcuLo

            Staying in Turkey, we conclude with the Ladino folksong “Par’o Era Estrallero,” arranged for women’s choir by Eleanor Epstein and performed by my wonderful cantorial classmates as a special virtual Passover gift. Like the first piece we heard, this song details the important role of women in the Passover story.  Jagoda describes the role of women preparing for the holiday, while this folk song celebrates the quiet but indispensible role that women played in the redemption of the Jewish people from Egyptian slavery. The text is rooted in Midrash, translated into Ladino to tell this often overlooked part of the Passover story.  Here is the translation:
 

Pharoah was a stargazer. He went out one night to look at the moon.

He saw a divine star foretelling that Moses would be born.

He commanded that the midwives be called – all that were in Egypt. To all of them he warned – don’t catch a Jewish baby!

The midwives were Jewish, beloved by God.

They caught the babies and fled, and so Moses was born.

His sister, the Levite, made him a basket.

She covered it with pitch and placed it in the Nile.

As we prepare to celebrate what may still be a virtual Passover for many of us, I present to you one of the positive things to come out of this pandemic. My classmate, Cantor Aviva Marer of Indianapolis Hebrew Congregation, had the brilliant idea of virtually reuniting our powerhouse cantorial class of ten women to perform this hauntingly beautiful piece. I hope it sets the stage for a Happy Passover, a zissen Pesach, or as we say in Ladino, a Pesach Allegre.  Shabbat Shalom!