Thread: A huge missing link in Oriental studies: Sephardic music, poetry and history

Serpentine started a thread about finding an Egyptian style teacher and this wound up meandering into the realm of Sephardic music.

So, while the subject is on my mind I thought I'd bring this up in the instructor forum because it is up to teachers to study and understand forms beyond their immediate scope of expertise. Too often we get into ruts, for example, if we are "Egyptian" that's all we look at, and in fact that's a trap because the Middle East is so old and so complex that we shouldn't look at any one region or time period or dance or musical style in isolation, in my opinion.

Sephardic studies are important for a number of reasons, not the least of which is political: there is in the modern Middle East and even in the West a strange notion that Jews are foreign to the Middle East. The presence of Oriental Jews, of which the Spanish or "Sephardic" Jews constitute one branch, is living testament to the contrary.

(This sentiment is of course ironic in view of the fact that both European antisemites and the notorious bigot Henry Ford regarded the Jewish people as "the oriental menace.")

Regardless, Sephardic music spans a very long and interesting timeline and a range from Morocco to Turkey and of course modern Israel where many Sephardim now reside, along with a majority of the Jews from the Arab world who fled or were forced out of their lands after 1945. This amounted to nearly the entire population of "Arab" Jews - approximately 900,000 people at least, some 2/3 of which went to Israel; and this exodus was subsequently joined by the vast majority of Persian Jews after the 1979 revolution.

So politically as well as historically this is a little understood but highly significant area of study. Belly dancers can sometimes be biased against knowing this history, unfortunately; one well known teacher listed the famous Israeli Yemenite singer Ofra Haza as a Moroccan Jew on her website.

That's a huge mistake and it's easy to rectify through unbiased study. We argue endlessly about tiny matters of modern Egyptian vs classical Egyptian vs Lebanese, etc, but know nothing whatsoever about Oriental Jews, and this is something we can fix by at least making sure that we ourselves are educated.

Sephardic music is part of a complex of Andalusian, Flamenco, Arabic, Ottoman Turkish, and Fado styles, which also includes a heavy influence from India via the Roma people. Its very complexity makes it difficult to define, and because the Jews of Spain were expelled en masse in 1492 (except for those who were killed or forcibly converted and who subsequently suffered under the Inquisition), the music changed stylistically and in some cases evolved into Turkish patterns. Some however became part of the gharnati (a classical Arab/Andalusian) style and the romances form yet another branch. One could consider as well malouf and some Egyptian styles to be offshoots from al Andalus, which traveled east via expelled Spanish Jews and also Moors. Of course Jews as far away as Yemen wrote mushwasha.

So we see not only the expected East to West influences - but a profound West to East influence that dates back centuries. And the cultural richness and complexity of al Andalus with its mixtures of peoples and artistic traditions and scholarship remains a touchstone to this day and a source of inspiration throughout the Jewish and Muslim world.

This includes both an ancient linguistic connection - probably the Jewish presence in the Iberian peninsula predates Rome; and musical forms which continue to evolve. For example the old song Morena me Llaman has acquired verse after verse, has undoubtedly morphed musically more than once and has taken on yet another form in modern Israel. Another piece I've worked with, "L'Adultera," apparently has lyrics dating back to 11th century Tetouan, Morocco.

Here's a link featuring classical Sephardic, Arabic and Flamenco music and dance performed by an all female orchestra in Morocco. This just scratches the surface but it's clearly a very deep and rich pool of both music and poetry and resonates in the dance, if people will but listen to it - and just as importantly, study the history of the people who created it.

Sephardic Jewish Arabic Moroccan Gitano Flamenco song & dance Al-Andalus - YouTube

I for one have definitely felt this tension. I feel that belly dance resonates with me, particularly the music along with ME culture in general.

I myself am a Mizrahi Jew, meaning Jewish person of Ararab origin. My family emigrated from Libya to Israel, to escape dreadful religious persecution (Europe wasn't the only place where Jewish people were targeted). My safta (grandmother) spoke Arabic, and made amazing cous cous dishes on sabath afternoons :) I have always felt very connected to bellydance as it allows to artistically explore my Jewish/middle eastern roots. And it saddens me to say that I have felt tension in the BD community, and have not felt that it was ok to be proud of my Jewish/Arab roots.(let alone advertise that I'm 1/2 Israeli) It's sort of something you learn to expect in old world arab communities, but I'm surprised to see it manifest in the American BD community.

All that aside, at the very least, check out the music! It's heartbreakingly beautiful!!! :D

Students can't learn what no one teaches, no matter how much interest might potentially be in the market. While it's true there are probably a few dancers who would avoid Sephardic arts because it may reflect negatively on their commercial potential (not a news flash that there's tension between Muslims and Jews in the world), the bigger issue is very few teachers are even marginally competent on these smaller-interest subjects, and not many possess the tools to learn. Presumably the better educational materials on Sephardic arts are not written for the student who speaks no Semitic languages, doesn't understand the maqamat, and can't read Western musical notation. How would you teach yourself this if you don't have access to a teacher?

Second, teaching/archiving this information isn't enough of a priority for anyone. In a perfect world, it would be, but it isn't. For example, if you're some guy living in Yemen, caught in the middle of a political mess involving tribal sheiks, al-Qaeda, and the Yemeni government, and you're barely literate and living hand-to-mouth, doing academic research about the fine arts of a local Jewish minority is not on your to-do list. If you're some ex-Reda Troupe dancer trying to make a career in the dance community, you don't care about Yemeni Jews, either, because the money's not in teaching a handful of hardcore geeks about specialty subjects. It's in selling mainstream belly-dance choreographies to beginners and intermediates. If native experts don't or can't come forward to shoulder the educational burden, who's going to lead the charge?

I don't think it would be entirely fair to characterize this as exclusionary anti-Semitism. Sure, there is some of that, especially when it bumps up against pre-established ME ethnic tensions, but this is representative of a universal problem in the dance community. It's the same reason we have very few people teaching Omani, non-Reda Sudanese, and Kurdish dance, too. Students aren't exposed to what isn't taught to have a chance to be interested in it. Teachers tend to teach what students are clamoring for. There aren't enough experts to fight for a place at the table.

There's a coincidence! My teacher just did a series of belly dance workshops finishing in a performance to live music by a group called Joglaresa, who perform some of this type of music (and others) and do workshops at festivals and schools. This was as part of an early music festival, so not within the belly dance scene, but it would be SO AWESOME if things like this, handled with knowledge about the music, found their way into belly dance events.

The music is beautiful, some of it hauntingly so.
There is certainly information on the folk dancing- the most readily available seems to be line dancing such as the Hora.
Going back- archeology- finding the clothing/bone/rhythm making belts/adornments - what peoples are these things connected with? My understanding is the oldest found fox tooth belt is Natufian. There was certainly intertwining of cultures between the people who later became known as Palestinians and the Egyptians during the New Kingdom- and lots of rich history of musical instruments including metal percussive ones.
DNA studies of the people's of the region - show that they ALL have links to the region. With Jews having the most "mixed" heritage *by and large* but this of course is because they were dispersed for so long. From my readings, the Sephardic Jews show strongest lineage to the area of all the peoples legally given full rights in Isreal.
Sephardic music is certainly "of the east," and it is certainly linked with lovely folk dancing and most definitely also has gorgeous heart felt music for listening. If there is no book/source published about music made for belly dance in the history of Israel - well, there are questions to be answered.
Start with research into the rules about dancing in the culture and how they changed over time? How was it for Sephardic Jews over time? How was it for people who immigrated late 1800's? What were the influences? How was it for immigrants post WWI and then again post WWII and post 1947? What were the influences?
How many Jewish girls were professional dancers (in history)? What was their recent cultural background?
What was the development of the music made for dancing in PRE 1948 Jewish cultures? Not just "well this rhythm was common," but beyond line dance music and beautiful listening music- what was the music made for dancing socially? Was there history of the more complex music MADE for dancing? Not all Andalusian music is for dancing. These things need to be separated and looked at without any hope of finding something one way or another. These are questions be to researched without bias in any direction.
I think it's worthy of looking into and a beautiful rich history of some sort will be found.

Dear Sophia, you really started an important thread (as your threads always are) about a question that I often think about.
When the Jews were expelled from Iberia in 1492, most of them went to Egypt, Turkey and the Maghreb. They took with them not only the Sephardic musical tradition, but also a background of fashion, tradition and musical culture of the most sophisticated and developed society of the Middle Ages: the Al-Andalus (Spain and the "Gharb Al-Andalus", Portugal).
The Jews always protected muslim rulers (since the Berbers invaded the Iberian Peninsula in 711) against christian authority. Anyways, there was a huge cultural exchange between Christians, Jews, Berbers, Arabs and Mozarabs (Christians who adopted Arabic customs), especially in performing arts. The most important evidence is our music heritage and medieval poetry!
Here are some bibliographical references for further reading:

ABU-HAIDAR, J. A., «The "muwashshahat" and the "kharjas" tell their own story» in Al-Qantara - Revista de Estudios Árabes, vol. XXVI, fasc. I, Madrid, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Instituto de Filología, 2005, pp.43-98.

NIRENBERG, David, «Conversion, sex, and segregation: jews and christians in medieval Spain» in The American Historical Review, 107, 4, Oct-2002, pp.1065-1093.

PÉRÈS, Henri, La Poesie Andalouse en Arabe Classique au XIe Siècle - ses aspects généraux et sa valeur documentaire, Paris, Adrien-Maisonneuve - Publications de l'Institut d'Études Orientales - Faculté de Lettres d'Alger, 1953.

RIBERA Y TARRAGO, Julian, La Musica Arabe y su Influencia en la Española, Madrid, Mayo de Oro, 1985.

Originally Posted by Aniseteph

group called Joglaresa, who perform some of this type of music

Aniseteph, I don't know this group, but it sounds interesting. Well, it must be "jogralesa". As a medievalist, I study the role of this medieval female character in medieval performing arts. The "jogralesa" was a woman that accompained male musicians ("trovadores" - troubadours and "jograis" - joglars), singing and, most of all, dancing!
The "jogralesa" was a woman whose behaviour (especially because of her dance) was not well regarded by medieval society...

My article is in portuguese, but here's the reference anyway:

CHORA, Ana Margarida, «A jogralesa: mobilidade e marginalidade» in Lors te metra en la voie... Mobilidade e Literatura na Idade Média - Mobilité et Littérature au Moyen Âge - Actas do Colóquio Internacional (coord. Carlos F. Clamote Carreto), Lisboa, Universidade Aberta, 2011, pp.37-45.

Off topic: I know I owe you an e-mail, dear Sophia...

Thanks so much to all of you for the thoughtful responses!

I would like to comment further but I have a performance tonight - aaacckkkkkkkkk - so am in FULL PANIC MODE.

Ana by the way, as an oriental scholar, has many insights of great value. Plus she is from Portugal and is adept at languages.

As far as peoplehood though, Jewish nationhood, I'd like to make one comment: Jews have always, dating back to the dawn of our history, been a mixed people ethnically and racially.

This is not the issue. Ethnically based nationhood is something the Germans tried to institute - not us!!!

We are of all colors, all races and anybody can join our "tribe." If you really want a headache.

Seriously it more a matter of philosophy, which in human history is unusual really - nevertheless that is also the primary factor in modern democracies around the world; France for example, the US...Brazil...

Anyway, genetics do not constitute nationality, if so there would be no Arab nation, no Palestinian nation; and most certainly no America.

So I'd like to put that issue to rest immediately! Sephardim are not necessarily more closely linked genetically to ancient Israelites than people who fled the region 1500 years ago - but the point is moot in any case; I hope people realize this.

Many Palestinian people didn't come to Israel/Palestine until the 20th century. The definition of who constitutes an Arab Refugee from the war of 1948 only demanded residence in the Palestine Mandate since 1946!* And, many people were brought into "Southern Syria" by the Sultan in the 19th century due to underpopulation, this included people from all over the Ottoman world, not necessarily Arab at all; nevertheless if people self-identify as Palestinian that is their right.

*Incidentally that is very unusual; check the UN on refugee issues.

XOXOXOXO!

Later gators, gotta find my fishnets - aaaccckkkkkk.

Originally Posted by Elibelinde

Sephardic music is part of a complex of Andalusian, Flamenco, Arabic, Ottoman Turkish, and Fado styles, which also includes a heavy influence from India via the Roma people. Its very complexity makes it difficult to define, and because the Jews of Spain were expelled en masse in 1492 (except for those who were killed or forcibly converted and who subsequently suffered under the Inquisition), the music changed stylistically and in some cases evolved into Turkish patterns. Some however became part of the gharnati (a classical Arab/Andalusian) style and the romances form yet another branch. One could consider as well malouf and some Egyptian styles to be offshoots from al Andalus, which traveled east via expelled Spanish Jews and also Moors. Of course Jews as far away as Yemen wrote mushwasha.

This is very interesting. The first time I heard Andalusian music (well, the ones we call muwashahat, as opposed to Flamenco which I was already somewhat familiar with) I thought to myself "this sounds like the Jewish music I've heard, it must be Jewish!" before looking into it. There is also some Turkish music that gives me this feeling.

I confess I am very ignorant on this subject, I am not Jewish and my exposure to Jewish music has been very limited, but it's nice to know I wasn't completely off.

Sounds like this is one of many gaps in our understanding, which we can hopefully slowly begin to fill as people begin asking questions and researching these topics. I look forward to following this discussion, despite not having anything to add to it

Originally Posted by Elibelinde

This is not the issue. Ethnically based nationhood is something the Germans tried to institute - not us!!!

I only mentioned DNA as the "link to the land" references necessitates it. If one is saying "hey, this group of people is from here"- one needs to know and understand thoroughly the groups of people in the area and where their ancestors are mixed from. Because THIS also effects the dances of a region. It's simply a part of the puzzle. Thorough research, right? :)
I personally find it prejudiced to base nationality on ethnic group, color, or any other homogenous group of people. Protecting the rights of *only* one special group of people automatically creates other marginalized people.

Shira and Tarik both have great posts here regarding the subject Israeli Belly Dancers/Jewish Belly Dancers - Page 2 - Belly Dance Forums

Assuming it's anti- antisemitism that creates this gap in knowledge is also... let's say short sighted. Torbeau already made very good points. I'd add the following:
Working knowledge of both Hebrew (for the last two hundred years) and Yiddish (for before that) is also necessary. These are not common specialties. Must also be combined with musical, dance and history knowledge AND have the drive to do it, yet no bias as to the outcome if it is to be real research...and the time and resources. It's a tall order.
It seems this gap may also extend to Israel, where while experiencing a "resurgence", it is NOT generally smiled upon by family. Dancing stereotype goes belly up in Israel | j. the Jewish news weekly of Northern California Please don't assume antisemitism.
Our business, with a few exceptions in small pockets of populations, simply doesn't have the driving numbers in the Jewish population hiring dancers for their venues or parties. Why is this? I think that's an important question. There ARE large Jewish populations in many major metropolitan areas. I don't know a single Israeli or Jewish owned venue in my area that hires dancers (as opposed to at least 30 Arab owned). I have danced at a couple synagogue events and a couple parties that were primarily American Jews in attendance. But that's literally a handful out of close to 3,000 shows. What does this say about the traditions? AND this definitely is part of a causal effect for professional dancers to research what their paying market IS.
What music does Orit dance to? I've mostly seen her do Arabic classics. What does she dance to at home for her hometown audiences? .....

...Speaking of which- Orit and Asi Haskel (his costumes! Swoon!) are the only two Israelis that are commonly on the circuit. Why are there not more out there "representing?"
Outside of Erev Shel Shoshanim (used for veil, which is not traditional of that region in the way we dance to slow songs) and Alabina (pop with lots of other influences) I'm simply not very familiar with the belly dance appropriate music. Would you please share with us you tube links? It would be a great place to start to learn more about music.

Originally Posted by SamiraShuruk

Our business, with a few exceptions in small pockets of populations, simply doesn't have the driving numbers in the Jewish population hiring dancers for their venues or parties. [...] What does this say about the traditions?

My guess is that it says there is not enough ownership of the Sephardic arts to compensate for misconceptions that it isn't part of the Jewish tradition. The general perception in the wider population is that belly dance is an "Arab thing," and to a lesser extent, a "Turkish thing." I'd like to think that people who are raised in strong, proud Jewish families have a better sense of Jewish history than some random dude on the street, but there's a wide range of assimilation/not-assimilation experiences. If you're a Jewish person and you think "classical music" means Mozart and Bach, and "Jewish music" means Klezmer and "Hava Nagila," where does this classical Sephardic music fit into your paradigm? When did you learn to appreciate and own it as part of who you are?

What if your timeline just isn't that long? There are a lot of Jewish people who consider their roots to be in Russia or Germany or somewhere else in Northeastern or Eastern Europe. They don't think in terms of a timeline involving Moorish Spain or the Middle East before 1947, any more than someone from Sweden considers his roots in Mesopotamia because it was the Cradle of Civilization. Maybe they have some vague sense that they have a cultural or historical connection to this stuff, but it doesn't mean much. On one level, Americans know that our government has ties to the Magna Carta, Ancient Rome and Greece, and all that other good stuff, but we act like Thomas Jefferson invented it out of thin air in 1776. That older stuff isn't ours. It doesn't count as much. (There's probably a huge tangent in all of this about "seeing around" the monolith of the Holocaust...)

Even if you reach this point where you embrace Sephardic music as part of your Jewishness, can you guarantee the guests at your party or customers at your restaurant are similarly enlightened? Is is possible they might interpret the presence of a belly dancer as some sort of pro-Arab statement, even if you are very careful to choose a performer who is doing a Jewish presentation? Who wants a huge argument about the Palestinians to break out at Bubbe's 75th birthday party? What Jewish restaurateur wants to invite the possibility of a boycott by hiring a dancer, because the segment of his customer base who identifies the strongest with being Jewish may also intersect largely with the segment who is the most passionately Zionist? (Not always, but what kind of sensible businessman wouldn't take that kind of thing into account? The Christian Right doesn't have a monopoly on kneejerk conservatives.)

Some of the issues of where Sephardic arts fit into the picture fall beyond the dance community.

Originally Posted by Tourbeau

...What Jewish restaurateur wants to invite the possibility of a boycott by hiring a dancer, because the segment of his customer base who identifies the strongest with being Jewish may also intersect largely with the segment who is the most passionately Zionist?...

And this is where it can get confusing and unpredictable. There is the Zionist "everything of this region belongs to us" (Including the dance. These are people who would actively seek out any possible connection to the land.) and the Zionist "it's associated with Muslim Arab culture and therefore something we do not support as it can be interpreted as antisemite."*
*Please note I said "Zionist," not "Jewish" or "Israeli"- there are many different beliefs and attitudes in all countries.
I personally believe it IS a dance of the region.
The warm and welcoming policy of any Jew being able to move there- and the policies and political climate of the last two hundred years means that many of the people there now are most recently (or within the last three generations most recently) from other places (and their cultures reflect that).

Originally Posted by Aniseteph

There's a coincidence! My teacher just did a series of belly dance workshops finishing in a performance to live music by a group called Joglaresa, who perform some of this type of music (and others) and do workshops at festivals and schools. This was as part of an early music festival, so not within the belly dance scene, but it would be SO AWESOME if things like this, handled with knowledge about the music, found their way into belly dance events.

Here in Boston, Karim Nagi and other classical Arab musicians have collaborated with the Boston Camarata to produce a winter holiday concert that draws on the seasonal sacred music traditions of Arabs, Jews and Southern Europeans--it's an enormously moving concert. A recording is available on their CD A Mediterranean Christmas. The liner notes alone are worth the price of the CD.

Originally Posted by SamiraShuruk

.
Outside of Erev Shel Shoshanim (used for veil, which is not traditional of that region in the way we dance to slow songs) and Alabina (pop with lots of other influences) I'm simply not very familiar with the belly dance appropriate music.

One of the best known Sephardic songs appropriate for bellydance is Fel Sharah - better known as Uskudara :-)

Originally Posted by steffib

One of the best known Sephardic songs appropriate for bellydance is Fel Sharah - better known as Uskudara :-)

Awesome. I've only heard Uskudara and love it. I'll look for Fel Sharah right away.

Originally Posted by badriya_al_ahmar

Here in Boston, Karim Nagi and other classical Arab musicians have collaborated with the Boston Camarata to produce a winter holiday concert that draws on the seasonal sacred music traditions of Arabs, Jews and Southern Europeans--it's an enormously moving concert. A recording is available on their CD A Mediterranean Christmas. The liner notes alone are worth the price of the CD.

Thank you so much - I'll definitely be checking them out. Isn't it great when you get that "I've found a whole new genre of music to discover" buzz?

(I just downloaded that concert. OK no liner notes :(, but it is insanely cheap at the moment on Amazon UK if any other UKers out there are interested).

There's an event coming up in DC that I hope to attend GW Lisner Auditorium
Andalusian-Arab-Sephardic (and more)
A lovely book relating is called The Ornament of the World (How Muslims, Jews, and Christians created a Culture of Tolerance in Medieval Spain) by Maria Rosa Menocal

I haven't read through the whole thread. But there is a clip on my profile of me performing to a Sephardic tune "Calvi Calvi." I call it an "interpretive" dance because we don't know how people danced back then. but the tambourine in the song inspired me to do a tambourine dance to it.

As usual many fascinating comments.

OK, please let me say right away I don't think there's any antisemitism involved in the lack of knowledge of Sephardic and other Oriental Jewish studies, certainly not any deliberate antisemitism, and certainly I didn't wish to imply that.

There is antisemitism involved in certain political and religious perspectives and fake histories that exclude a Jewish presence or religiously, put Jews in an inferior position. This includes "replacement covenant" theories, etc. But, this is outside the scope of our discussion, let's talk about art.

Now, as to that art. Only recently, say the last 6 years or so, have I been able to find substantial and good recordings of Sephardic and other Oriental Jewish music on the mainstream market. In Israel of course there have been recordings because Israel is substantially, indeed majority Oriental Jewish demographically but Israel being western in outlook and formidably modern in culture, I could scream because some of the greatest artistes in the Oriental genre, like the Yemenite Ofra Haza, did very popular tracks that crossed over into the mainstream market, heavily overlaid with electronics.

Oh well.

Lately though there have been fantastic recordings available. These are some of my favorite artists, note this is not a comprehensive list and I will be adding to it as I think of stuff.

One album I think everybody should actually break down and buy even though it's expensive is a four volume set of Sephardic music, not least because it has wonderful booklets with it and talks about the people, has translations of the music, discusses time signatures, history, the full catastrophe:

The Renaissance Players and Winsome Evans

This is available on Amazon and the price has come down recently, I'd grab the four volume set.

This group is classical. The singing and orchestration are more what you'd expect of highly trained singers and musicians than of folk art; that's fine but it's certainly not the only way to interpret this music; but it's beautiful. As I say the hidden value here is the books.

A quick note as to belly dance vis a vis Jews and Israeli dancers. Well there are LOTS of Israeli belly dancers, and Jewish belly dancers, the festival in Eilat is huge. I'd say if you looked at belly dancers in general you'd fine LOTS of Jewish professional dancers around the world.

Orit is great dancer though, so you see her more than other Israeli dancer. But she's hardly the only one!

As for my own experience: I did Arab weddings as well as bar mitzvot and other Jewish parties, this is not uncommon in the US; and this was in the Jewish community at large not just Israeli, and and I had a large Israeli fan club also, especially people who'd come originally from Iraq. They came to the clubs and we had a blast.

I think that the way women are perceived in general, artists, dancers, musicians, this you can't stereotype obviously but this is my experience and my observation, so take it for what it's worth.

Now, in the ME: people focus on Egypt as a cultural center of the Middle East and forget Baghdad, Aleppo, North Africa and also, probably are not aware of the large and ancient Jewish communities in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, North Africa especially Morocco, Yemen etc, who are no longer there due to having been expelled or forced to flee. They were culturally significant even if their numbers shrank over the years. The Jewish community in Roman times was large, perhaps as much as 10% of the population of the Empire. Over centuries it has shrunk to the point that globally there are only 15 million Jews at most, period.

In 1948, the Arab Jewish community was only about 900,000 people.

People of those communities did "belly dance" dance socially and I understand professionally; as an outsider group they were not subject to the same constraints as the dominant Muslim group; under dhimmitude they would already have been second class citizens at best and by law would have been forced to take "unclean" jobs.

In some cities, Baghdad was one, both classical and popular music was frequently written by and performed by Jews. Much the Andalusian classical style, Moroccan Mawwal, malouf, probably survived at least partially because of the flight of Andalusian Jews back into the Ottoman Empire.

Favorite groups and artists in the classical Andalusian genres, this includes Arabs and Jews and others; some of which have been pushing the envelope into modern forms:

Al Turath Ensemble
Amina Alaoui
Francoise Atlan
Ensemble Albaycin
Ensemble Al-Ruzafa

Other interesting artists some of whom work with musicians in the above groups; note they cover specifically Jewish as well as other music. Now - this is sometimes confusing because Arabs and Jews played, sang and danced to the same songs and they often performed together. However if the song was in Hebrew it probably had a liturgical meaning:

Jordi Savali
Jon Balke
Constantinople
Eduardo Paniagua

Sephardic and other Oriental Jewish Music

Album Music of the Oriental Jews, Abraham El-Harar is a very good survey
Jasmin Levy - fantastic Sephardic singer from Israel who ventures into flamenco, I adore her and she is very danceable
Los Desterrados from England cover Sephardic songs and sometimes have a flamenco edge, quite modern at times; very good to dance to
Mor Karbasi - modern edge
Claire Zalamansky -

Now she came to her music via a similar path to my own discovery and intepretation of this genre: via Lorca and the films of Carlos Saura. So there's that edge to her music, a little harder line if that makes sense and it hits me where I live.

The album Aman Aman is marvelous.

There are wonderful albums grouped as "Tresors de la chanson Judeo-Arabe"

Gerard Edery is fantastic, Jew from Morocco, covers many favorites, some including songs like Fel Sherah.

This should be a good start.

There are others, needless to say!

So go to Amazon and start shopping.

@Samira Shuruk:

Orit Maftsir is known for her interpretations of the music of Oum Koulthoum. But she also dances to other Egyptian music such as balady and saidi. They are her own style, she's a very strong dancer and has a classical Egyptian base imo but interprets the music/dance her way, I think.

This is what she performs in Israel as well as on the road.

However, our own member Sophie has been working with Turkish Rom and other Israeli dancers have been exploring Central Asian styles. So there is probably a style or three for every dancer in Israel. The Arab Israelis though, from what I understand, hire their own dancers from within their community; surely this is the case with the Palestinians also although I understand that in Gaza Hamas have outlawed belly dance classes.

As to what was danced in the past and exactly how it looked. That's a good question. We don't know. My own dances are out of my head. LOL. I try to find what looks/feels right according to styling, syncopation, rhythm, language, the meaning of the song.

But, according to Jewish musicians, people who were there, Jews danced like the Arabs at social occasions, weddings, so forth, ie they did the belly dance among other things such as line and circle dances. Some Sephardic songs are now set to Pontic music for example.

Yemenite dance isn't like an oriental dance, but the music CAN be danced to quite successfully by an oriental dancer.

Meanwhile, Orit I would say is really dancing an Egyptian style and Sophie is performing what looks very close to what is being taught now as Turkish Rom, but others of course are not trying to copy anybody, just making what to us feels right; I'm sure this has always been the case throughout the history of art.

Here's a clip of Yemenite folk dancers, you can hear the drive and power of the song. Much Yemenite music is a 7/8 and it's GREAT for the oriental dance.

It should be noted that a great deal of the Yemenite music is meant to be danced to and is spiritual in nature. There are wonderful modern interpretations by Ofra Haza, sadly deceased, but also a traditional one, Ahavat Haddasah (For the Love of Esther).

This is a wedding song:

Yemeni Jewish Dance - YouTube

One further thought (for now)

There is not more focus on Arab studies within the Jewish community because the numbers of Jews who fled the Middle East was far greater than those who stayed. So the links between Azkenazim and the Orient are there, they are clear not least in the music, but the direct connections were lost until now.

That's #1.

Secondly, in modern times, Jews are afraid of Arabs and are thus unable to perceive the beauty of Arab culture. I argue with MOT all the time about this. I think we and our art are root and branch of the same tree as the Arabs, certainly have been an important part of Islamic culture and history from Spain to China; and that mutual studies of art, music and culture is a natural bridge between us.

Yet, instead of exploring this world, we see efforts by Daniel Barenboim and the East/West Diwan, wonderful as that is, focusing on classical WESTERN music.

Oh well.

Finally, you don't see more obvious celebration of Oriental dance by Israelis and other Jews for the same reasons we aren't dancing all the time on stage at the Met. People IN GENERAL do not respect oriental dance. So you see ballets, you see folk dancing, you see everything but us as a rule.

That's a shame and it's another problem we all confront.

Originally Posted by SamiraShuruk

...Speaking of which- Orit and Asi Haskel (his costumes! Swoon!) are the only two Israelis that are commonly on the circuit. Why are there not more out there "representing?"
.

From my observation, I think it's because most people don't want to deal with the conflicting politics of hosting them. I was lucky enough to meet Orit when I last visited my fam in Israel. I asked her why she didn't do more performances and workshops in the states, and she said something to the affect that she would if people would invite her.

Later, I went to the Dina workshop in Chicago and I got to know Didi, an Egyptian woman based in Texas ( I believe) who was hosting the workshop. I suggested she have one for Orit who I feel has a strong following in the states but was sadly underrepresented, she had never heard of Orit, when I told her she was Israeli she flat out told mr she would never do business with an Israeli. (obviously she had no idea that I was...)

Wow. I just loved the youtube clip that you posted, Sophia. I could listen to it all day. If there are other youtube clips that you love, please post them.
Warmly,
--Natalie.