Hanukkah Mix from the Idelsohn Society

My pal David Katznelson is co-founder of Idelsohn Society, a non-profit dedicated to the musicology of great old Jewish music. Indeed, it was named after Abraham Zevi Idelsohn, a musicologist who also wrote the classic tune "Hava Nagila." The Society reissues incredibly strange, offbeat, "space age," and fantastic vintage Jewish albums by the likes of Irving Fields, Gershon Kingsley, and The Barry Sisters. I have all of the releases and every one is absolutely fantastic. I can't recommend them enough. Tonight is the first night of Hanukkah, and in celebration David and his gang put together what is now my favorite Hanukkah compilation ever. Hit play below and head over to the Idelsohn Society to buy some CDs in support of the organization!



From the Idelsohn Society:

In honor of the holiday season, we are proud to offer this little mix of music culled from our various albums, archives and projects. There's plenty of choice old-school tracks mixed in with new school Idelsohn exclusives like the re-mix of the Yemenite Trio by Soulico's DJ Sabbo. Songs from Lionel Hampton and Marlena Shaw are just a taste of what's to come on our next release forthcoming in 2010, Black Sabbath, an homage to the musical history of Blacks and Jews. Of course, there's also a couple of classic Christmas anthems courtesy of that other tradition's most beloved holiday crooners, Barbra and Neil.

Track list:
"The Problem"- Ray Brenner & Barry E. Blitzer
"White Christmas"-Barbra Streisand
"Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel"- Ella Jenkins
"Hava Nagila"- Lionel Hampton
"Mizrachi on the Drums (Sabbo Remix)"/"Seeing Israel"- The Yemenite Trio Vs. George Jessel
"Kale Kale"- Avram Grobard
"Holiday Mambo"- Machito & His Afro-Cubans
"They're Serving the Fish"- Benny Bell & The Brownsville Klezmers
"Blue"/"Santa Claus"- King Midas Sound vs. Ray Brenner & Barry E. Blitzer
"Where Can I Go?"- Marlena Shaw
"The Jewish Experience (MIS Remix)"/ "In The Beginning"- Gershon Kingsley vs. Charlton Heston
"Songs My Mother Loved"- Milton Berle
"That Old Black Magic"- Johnny Mathis
"Loco"- Don Tosti
"Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas"- Neil Diamond
"Hanukkah Dance"-Woody Guthrie

Idelsohn Society for Musical Preservation

• [pinehead]

  Happy Hanukkah!

• [Uncle Geo]

  No really, Senator Warren Hatch’s Hanukkah song:

  http://www.npr.mobi/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121240561

  • [grimc]

    I was just going to post that the Idelsohn Society should contact Robert Siegel at NPR. Hatch’s song is awful by any measure, measure by measure.

• [ryuthrowsstuff]

  Idelsohn Didn’t write Hava Nagila. Its an old Hebrew folk song set to an old Ukrainian folk song. Idelsohn simply wrote the most commonly cited modern version of the lyrics.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hava_nagila

• [TharkLord]

  You can also check out the cool “Jews on Vinyl” exhibition at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco.

  http://www.thecjm.org/

  • [David Pescovitz]

    Good call, TharkLord. I thought it had closed already…. Same group of folks curated that show and the book “And You Shall Know Us By The Trail Of Our Vinyl.”

• [naosuke]

  Me First and the Gimmie Gimmies also have a pretty cool cover of Hava Nagila as well.
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrhPJAtU6WY