The blurring of secular and sacred lines that was North
African music in the twentieth century is an absolute delight. Melodies
intended for coffee shops and cabarets soon made their way into religious
spaces. For the sixth night of Hannukah, we’ll dig into that phenomenon in the
form of a wonderfully scandalous song that was soon adopted for synagogue use.
In 1959, American author and composer Paul Bowles made a
series of field recordings in Morocco for the Library of Congress. Below,
you’ll find a recording he made in the Benamara synagogue in Meknes in December
of that year. Bowles set out to capture what he called “the musical antique
shop” of Jewish liturgical music - in theory, a timeless, ancient tradition.
What he found (unbeknownst to him) was the early twentieth century liturgical
poetry of Rabbi David Buzaglo, in this case, "El hay ram gadol," set to the early
1950s tune of Samy Elmaghribi’s “Qaftanec mahloul” (Your robe is open, my
lady). Again, unwillingly, Bowles managed to capture on disc the swiftness that
Moroccan secular music was adapted for synagogue use.
First, take a listen to Bowles’ 1959 recording of El Hay Ram
Gadol in Meknes:
Next, listen to Algerian artist Blond Blond’s cover of Samy Elmaghribi's "Qaftanec mahloul." As you’ll note, the two pieces employ the same melody - with Blond Blond speeding things up just a tad. Toggle back and forth and you’ll be quite happy.
You can hear more of this blurring on the excellent “Sacred Music of the Moroccan Jews” (edited by Edwin Seroussi, with the assistance of Rabbi Meir Atiya - the men who first brought all of this to our attention) put out by Rounder records in 2000. Hag Sameah and Shabbat Shalom!
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