22 May 2020 – Shabbat is almost here
Love, love, love… that tearing feeling that drives us so crazy, is again the topic of today’s piece. A song about the quest to find the lady of his dreams, sang by Jako el Muzikante
In this occasion we will enjoy a very recent recording with Jako el Muzikante, that will take us back to Izak Algazi’s time before he moved to France (check the previous MBS, here).
As announced previously in another MBS, the friends from Sephardic Stories, that lead the Gibraltar World Music Festival, during the lockdown started the initiative Sephardic Collection, to support the work of the artists in this difficult time. In this frame, last Thursday it was premiered the video of this issue of MBS, that you can see below. ??
| ? Special announcement: next Thursday at 17h (Central European Time), Yan Delgado and me will make an interview with Jako el Muzikante, who will talk in Ladino and I will translate into English. Check here in advance ? |
The song about the quest of the perfect lady
In the lyrics of this song, Onde que tope una ke es plazyente? (where would I find a pleasant one), a man wonders where would he find the woman of his dreams, one that he liked, slim, graceful… and that thinks before she speaks! He will wait for her many years.
According to the book-CD “Ven al Luna Park”, by Jako el Muzikante, Jak Mayesh “on the 8th of September of 1942 he recorded his voice for this song for a record of the “The Jack Mayesh Phonograph Record Co. label, accompanied on the oud by K. Bozajain.”
The book-CD also explains that Mayesh recorded the song again in 1948 and that it exists also a version of this song in the oral tradition, sang by Roza Berro. “Ven al Luna Park” includes also some brief biographical infos about Jak Mayesh, who was born in Kushadashi in 1899, a city by the Aegean sea, that now belongs to Turkey. He moved to USA in 1929, served as a singer in the most important Sephardi synagoges and also stablished a business of wholesaling flowers. What happened with this business? You can learn it in the book-CD ?
The recording in which Jako el Muzikante is based for his rendition is in an album from the collection of Jakob Michael and it can be found in the mentioned book-CD, Ven al Luna Park, by Jako el Muzikante, available nowadays in most of the online shops and digital platforms.
And I know this song is specially appreciated by my friend Fernando, who will receive this message in Krakow, that I hope to be again soon, when all this awfulness ended!
| ?One more announcement: if you understand Spanish, you can listen the interview with Jako, done by Marcelo Benveniste for Radio Sefarad and Radio Jai. Listen here ? |
Clic the picture to enjoy Onde que tope, by Jako el Muzikante:
I hope you’ll like it and, if so, feel free to share it and invite your friends to join us.
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Shabbat Shalom.
Araceli Tzigane | Mapamundi Música