FAU’s Kultur Festival highlights the work of JSA
Comments (1) Between March 6 and 11, 2010 the Boca Raton campus of FAU became a celebration of Jewish music and culture. It was the FAU Library’s second Kultur Festival. Events ran the gamut from klezmer concerts to cultural diversity forums. Two of these events highlighted the work of the Judaica Sound Archives.
The Man Who Spoke to God
Tues., March 9 : Dr. Jerry Glantz
The voice of the legendary Cantor Leib Glantz was one of the first to be heard on the JSA website. 
The importance of his compositions, the beauty of his voice and his unique ability to create an other-worldly spiritual experience for his listeners propelled him to prominence during the first half of the 20th century, also known as “The Golden Age of Hazzanut.” We are exceptionally grateful to Dr. Jerry Glantz for allowing the JSA to showcase his fathers bountiful talents.
Dr. Glantz discussed his book, The Man Who Spoke to God, a biographical loving tribute to his father, explained his father’s innovations in the field, and shared his father’s voice with the audience through recorded pieces. Especially dramatic was Cantor Glatntz’s rendition of Shema Yisrael. Dr. Glantz told the audience that because his father believed in improvisation the Shema was a new creation each time he sang it.
All of the recordings by this great cantor are available on the JSA website.
Yiddish Zingfest
Wed., March 10 : Phyllis Berk
There’s just something about Yiddishkeit that can fill you with a mixture of longing for days gone by, nostalgia, and concern about the future of Yiddish culture. When Jews immigrated to the USA from Eastern Europe, Yiddish was the language that they shared with each other. It was the language they spoke, read, wrote and sung. It was the language that expressed their struggles and their triumphs.
The JSA is committed to collecting recordings that express the Yiddish culture through music and humor. It is only through phonograph recordings that future generations will be able to hear for themselves what Yiddish sounded like in the early 1900s.
JSA Participating Performer, Phyllis Berk did an amazing job of bringing back the “old days” in this performance. Singing songs from her CD (Coming of Age) like Shpilzhe Mir a Lidele, Unter Beymer, Grine Kuzine and Mein Shtetele Belz, she not only entertained her large audience, she led them down memory lane and roused them to sing along as well.
There are currently 167 Yiddish song albums on the JSA website that you can listen to at any time.
Submitted by Maxine Schackman, JSA Assistant Director
You might be able to imagine the excitement that is generated at the Judaica Sound Archives whenever we uncover a genuine piece of history. Today I will share with you three 78 rpm albums from the Jack Saul Collection which have sitirred up some nostalgia here at the JSA.
enduring and acclaimed baritones. He was also a famous baseball fan who often sang the National Anthem on opening day at Yankee Stadium.
(3) Paul Whiteman secured his place in history in 1924 when he commissioned and introduced George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. Irving Berlin has been called “the greatest of American popular composers.” Born in Russia (1888), the family left for America when their home was burned to the ground. So it was in a crowded tenenment on Cherry Street in New York’s lower East Side that Irving Berlin (born Baline) grew up. His first big hit came in 1911 (Alexander’s Ragtime Band). He has written more than a thousand popular songs. During World War I his song, Oh, How I Hate To Get up In The Morning, became an anthem for the ordinary foot soldier.
Have you ever opened a surprise box not knowing what you might find? That is what has been going on at the JSA since the truckload of recordings from Jack Saul’s collection arrived on September 11, 2009. So you might be wondering, “Did you find anything interesting or unusual?” Of course we did!
Themocracy