CD Review: Beat'achon - Jewish acapella soul food

I would call Beat'achon a true acapella singing group in that they formed as an acapella group as opposed to releasing a special acapella CD. There are seven members at least on the album cover, more are listed on the web site. They have a full group style of singing similar to maybe a barbershop quartet or do-wop groups of the 1950s. But then again as with many Jewish music groups, they are hard to categorize. Who else releases acapella albums? Who else does the kinds of musical things that Jewish groups do?

One of the groups members id Jordan B. Gorfinkel who after Beat'achon went on to produce the Voices for Israel: We Stand as One project in 2004 with Yehuda!. The two CD set features the largest gathering of Jewish and singers together for a pro-Israel tribute. A follow-up CD of all women singers was released in called Keeping the Faith. Gorfinkel also writes and draws the Jewish themed comic strip Everything's Relative.

Beat'achon has three discs. West Side Zmirot is mostly Shabbat songs and familiar melodies for such traditional standards as Eyshet Chayil and Shalom Alechem. The music is mostly straight forward group singing. Jewish A Capella has more "doop doop doop" in it and also features traditonal songs, such as Psalms with some new a upbeat arrangements. They have a third CD called Soul Food.

As a side note, I have a friend named Teddy who in high school was very much into Israeli hip-hop such as Subliminal and TACT records. Once he came on the radio with me and started raving about Beat'achon and how "tight" and "sick" their vocals were. It surprised me, but I try never to argue with the musical taste of a high school student.

I also discovered some new Jewish acapella CDs which I hope to get the time to review They are: Avrumi Flam presents Songs for the 3 Weeks, Y-Love and Yuri Lane the Human Beatboxer's acapella rap CD, Lev Tahor volume 3, Eli Gerstner's hasidic acapella album, TACT records acapella rap singles, David D'or sings Yemenite acapella and a disc with no cover simply entitled Hasidi Vocali.

This week on The Beat: A Step-Mother's Poem for Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva Student

Poetry week on the Beat continues with Leah Moses, step-mother of a Merkaz HaRav student. Plus Sreekara Sharma calls in from Malaysia, Eli Newman, Jean Krainik, Rachel Beitsch and Lester Mobley.

Plus an interview with Jack from Teruah Jewish music blog. An exciting, in-depth discussion on the thriving Jewish music scene and his exploration of it.

CD Review: Hasidic Niggun as Sung by the Hasidim

The following two CDs are both from the Jewish Music Research  Center series which also includes Music of the Mountain Jews, Jewish Women's Songs from India and other preservations of Jewish musical traditions.  The two that I have and use as acapella CDs are The Hasidic Niggun as Sung by the Hasidim and The Western Sephardi Liturgical Tradition.

In the first all the songs are traditional hasidic melodies, many sung in a large group at a tish or farbregin or other mass gatherings. To hear the crowd singing a powerful "ai yai yai" in unison makes me feel like I'm there. Other tracks feature a single singer, some mournful, some happy. There is a thick, detailed booklet that comes with the two-CD set that describes each song and a little about the hasidic group it comes from.

Some songs are not specific to any one group and considered applicable to all hasidic groups. The CD calls these part of the pan-hasidic dynasty. That's a cool sounding phase. I personally hadn't even heard of many of these hasidic groups let alone knew that this many actually existed, and that makes it exciting. 

A couple tracks are not acapella and use instruments. These tracks are performed by Mona Rosenblum and orchestra and recorded in the 1970s. Moshe Mona Rosenblum is the Israeli composer that created Moshiach Moshiach Moshiach and countless other hits for Mordechai Ben David and others. His tracks on the album are live perfomances with a small band which, to me, sound like prototypes of what the modern hasidic pop sound developed into. For more info on The Hasidic Niggun as Sung by the Hasidim click here.

The other CD in the series, The Western Sephardi Liturgical Tradition is just one guy, and therefore less exciting. His name is Abraham Lopes Cardozo and he single handedly sings all the tracks and thus preserves their  melodies. If your family is from the Jewish comunity of Portugal or Amsterdam, then you might recognize these. I wasn't, but that doesn't stop me from enjoying the rich culture. For example, do you know how many different versions of Lecha Dodi there are? Thank goodness someone got the Portugese version. For more info on the CD click here.

My live poetry slam last week went well. You can check it out here:

CD Review: The Chevra Sing Acapella

Eli Gerstner and The Chevra Sing Acapella does not sound like an acapella do-wop group, a Jewish vocal group like Beatachon or a barbershop quartet. They mainly have one guy singing while the other three guys sing back-up with light "ooh ooh". There is one exception on the album where they have a more four-part harmony sound with "da dum da dum". The album sounds more like vocal versions of their other albums, which is to say, sort of pop style vocals. All the songs are composed by the well-known Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach. Although there are some slight variations, the melodies should be familiar to Carlebach fans. 

The album was released in 2002 making it the follow up to their hit debut album which introduced the Jewish music world to the now prolific Eli Gerstner and a different kind of Jewish singing group. The Chevra is kind of like Mordechai Ben David and Avraham Fried, but there are four of them and the beats and rhythms are a little more pop and a little less cantorial based. At least that's how I hear it.

Once I interviewed hasidic singer Udi Ullmann and he said he saw a huge difference between popular Jewish music in England and in America. He said in America the groups were mostly group like The Chevra and in England it was mostly a single singer.

One of my favorite songs of all time is The Chevra's Shema Hashem from their first album. It starts out acapella and then moves into this driving beat.

You can get The Chevra's acapella album here.