An unusual disc title deserves explanation, though this disc’s
somewhat clunky subtitle provides an answer of sorts. It is
in essence ‘a sequence of songs from the Yiddish repertoire
devised by opera singer and cantor Mark Glanville, recreating
the original, Schubertian journey in a Holocaust context. The
singer reflects on the life and world he has just seen destroyed
as he flees the Vilna ghetto. Minor-key or modal melodies may
evoke a sense of sadness, yet a deep-hearted joy, even triumph,
are often equally evident.’ [Naxos]
The arranger of many here, and excellent pianist, Alexander
Knapp analyses the salient features of much of the music – its
indebtedness to mid nineteenth century ‘German classical harmony’
and its frequent adoption of the minor key, straightforward
form and rhythm and the use of improvisatory passages. He has
not sought to improve the original melodic lines but has responded
to them in a personal way, whilst respecting their essence.
What emerges therefore is a sequence of songs, the poets or
writers of which range chronologically from Levi Yitzchok, who
was born in 1740. Mordecai Gebirtig, Abraham Brudno and Moshe
Nadir died between 1942 and 1944. Both Aklexander Olshanetsky
and Janot S. Roskin however died in 1946.
The disc opens with the sonorous declamation of the traditional
Khosn bazingns (Singing for the Bridegroom) and then
leads on to the journey proper where the poet’s town is ablaze.
Fear, anger, and injunctions to quench the flames are the mileposts
of this song but the journey is not all pogrom and flight. The
putative wanderer’s mental journey takes in landscape and rabbi,
hearth and home, parents and children, Messiah and orphan, the
chosen texts illuminate his mind’s imaginative conjunctions
and consonances between settings, a kind of sub-conscious or
indeed conscious internalised self-communing.
Therefore there are nostalgic-romantic settings, of which the
reverie that is Vilna is the most prominent. The jaunty
settings of What Will Happen When the Messiah Comes and
The Rabbi has Bid Us be Happy attest to a double laced
irony, the injunction to ‘be happy’ sounding too much like an
emotional forced march. Moments of self-pity, melismatic vehemence
and fiery declamation fuse in Raisins and Almonds. The
tenth setting is a of Schubert’s Der Lindenbaum, an infusion
that conjoins the German with the Yiddish in which language
it is set. Further in the journey the impassioned and anguished
peaks reached in Habeit mishomayim (Look Down from the
Heavens) attest to the tormented weight pressing on the traveller
though he soon relaxes to the cimbalon evocations of Der
rebe Elimelekh (Rabbi Elimelech). These lead to a series
of songs on childhood of which Kleyner yosem (Little
Orphan) is very beautifully and simply done. In the context
the twenty first setting, Un a yingele vet zey firn (And
a Little Boy Will Lead Them) has some quite striking, indeed
startling harmonies in the context of the journey. This questing
harmonic writing, which becomes more and more incursive, leads
toward the penultimate song, that urges one never to forget
to say Kaddish. This in turn leads to the final setting, a spoken
recitation of the Kaddish, which not only acts as a cyclical
corollary of the opening recitation but which also functions
as an act of praise and of deliverance. This is a story of survival
after all.
Glanville is the singer who guides us through this internalised
human landscape. He is the orator and inquisitor, the mediator
and the innocent. His voice rises to pitches of crises of recall;
sinks into gauze-gentle recollections of childhood. It is the
voice of rebuke and regret, the voice that embraces but must
stifle self-pity. It is the voice that goes on.
He and Alexander Knapp form a harmonious ensemble and have been
finely recorded. There are full English texts.
Jonathan Woolf
Track listing
Khosn bazingns (Singing for the Bridegroom) - Traditional [2:10]
S'brent (It's Burning) – Mordecai Gebirtig (1877-1942) (arr.
A. Knapp) [5:12]
A zemer (A Song) Samuel Bugatch (1898-1984) (arr. A. Knapp)
[4:06]
Vilne (Vilna) Alexander Olshanetsky (1892-1946) (arr. A. Knapp)
[3:45]
Oyfn pripetshik (By the Fireplace) - Mark Warshavsky (c.1845-1907)
(arr. A. Knapp, C. Haran - Smith) [5:56]
Vos vet zayn az moshiach vet kumen (What Will Happen When the
Messiah Comes) (arr. Max. Persin) [2:38]
Judische Volkslieder, Sammlung III (Jewish Folk Songs, 3rd Collection),
Op. 13: No. Der rebe hot geheysen freylekh zayn (The Rabbi has
Bid Us be Happy) - Janot S Roskin (1884-1946) [1:26]
Shulamis: Rozhinkes mit mandlen (Raisins and almonds) - Abraham
Goldfaden (1840-1908) (arr. A. Knapp) [3:47]
Judische Volkslieder, Sammlung I (Jewish Folk Songs, 1st Collection),
Op. 11: No. 26. Yerusholayim (Jerusalem) - Janot S Roskin (1884-1946)
[3:08]
Winterreise, Op. 89, D. 911: No. 5. Der Lindenbaum (sung in
Yiddish as Di lipe) - Franz Schubert (1797-1828) [5:24]
Tumbalalayke (Play, Balalaika) – traditional (arr. A. Knapp)
[3:04]
Moyshele mayn fraynd (Moyshele, My Friend) – Mordecai Gebirtig
(1877-1942) (arr. H. Anik) [5:38]
Hot a yid a vaybele (If a Jew has a Wife) Morris Goldstein (d.1906
(arr. J. Kammen) [1:01]
Unter dayne vayse shtern (Under Your White Stars) Abraham Brudno
(d.1944) (arr. A. Knapp) [4:12]
Judische Volkslieder, Sammlung III (Jewish Folk Songs, 3rd Collection),
Op. 13: No. 2. Khatskele - Janot S Roskin (1884-1946) [0:55]
Habeit mishomayim (Look Down from the Heavens) – S. Gozinsky
(fl.1928) (arr. A. Knapp) [4:44]
Der rebe Elimelekh (Rabbi Elimelech) – Moshe Nadir (1885-1943)
(arr. A. Knapp) [2:47]
Judische Volkslieder, Sammlung I (Jewish Folk Songs, 1st Collection),
Op. 11: No. 5. Der zeyger (The Clock) - Janot S Roskin (1884-1946)
[2:08]
Kinder yorn (Childhood Years) – Mordecai Gebirtig (1877-1942)
(arr. J. Kammen) [3:13]
Kleyner yosem (Little Orphan) – Mordecai Gebirtig (1877-1942)
(arr. A. Knapp) [4:35]
Un a yingele vet zey firn (And a Little Boy Will Lead Them)
- traditional (arr. A. Knapp) [3:45]
A malekh vert geboyrn (A Child is Born) – Mordecai Gebirtig
(1877-1942) (arr. A. Knapp) [3:17]
Kaddish - Traditional [2:43]
Mark Glanville (bass-baritone)
