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זמירות zemirot —⟶ tag: זמירות zemirot Sorted Chronologically (old to new). Sort most recent first? כִּי בוֹ יִשְׁתֶּה צַדִּיק תָּמִים | Ki Vo Yishteh Tsaddiq Tamim, a parody of Yom Zeh Mekhubad by Avraham Menaḥem Mendel Mohr (1855)This is a parody riffing on the piyyut Yom Zeh Mekhubad for Purim by Avraham Menaḥem Mendel Mohr from his Kol Bo l’Purim (1855) transcribed and translated from Hebrew into English by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer. . . . Categories: Purim The African-American Christian spiritual adapted for a Pesaḥ song in Hebrew and English. . . . הָאִינְטֶרְנַצְיוֹנָל | the Internationale, by Eugène Pottier (1871); Hebrew translation by Avraham Shlonsky (1921)The Chanson Internationale (‘International Song’) was originally written in 1871 by Eugène Pottier, a French public transportation worker, member of the International Workingmen’s Association (The First International), and activist of the Paris Commune. He wrote it to pay tribute to the commune violently destroyed that year. The song became the official anthem of The Second International, of the Comintem, and between 1921 and 1944 also of the Soviet Union. Most socialist and communist parties adopted it as their anthem during the last decades of the 19th century and throughout the 20th century, adapting it in local languages (Russian, Yiddish, etc.) to their particular ideological framework. The anthem was first translated into Hebrew by Avraham Shlonsky in 1921. . . . Categories: 🇫🇷 France, Nirtsah, 🌐 International Workers' Day (May 1st), 🇺🇸 Labor Day (1st Monday of September) שיר מזמור לפורים | Shir Mizmor l’Purim, an anti-Prohibition drinking song for Purim by Rabbi Sabato Morais (1889)This “Shir Mizmor l’Purim” by Rabbi Sabato Morais (we think) was first published in The Jewish Exponent on 15 March 1889. It was preserved by Rabbi Sabato Morais in his ledger, an archive of newsclippings recording material he contributed to the press, among other announcements. . . . Categories: Purim Tags: 19th century C.E., 57th century A.M., American Jewry of the United States, Philadelphia, Prohibition in the United States, זמירות zemirot Contributor(s): Sabato Morais, Aharon N. Varady (transcription) and Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) Kuando el rey Nimrod (When Nimrod was King), a song relating the story of Avraham & the Furnace (ca. 1890)The sephardic folk-song “Kuando el rey Nimrod” in Ladino with English translation. . . . Categories: Se'udat Yom Shabbat אַמעריקע די פּרעכטיקע | America the Beautiful, a patriotic hymn by Katharine Lee Bates (1895) with Yiddish translation by Berl Lapin (1950)“America the Beautiful,” the patriotic hymn (1911 version) by Katharine Lee Bates (1859-1929) in its Yiddish translation by Berl Lapin (1889-1952). . . . Categories: 🇺🇸 Independence Day (July 4th) 📖 בזמרות נריע לו | Die häuslichen Sabbathgesänge für Freitag⸗Abend, Sabbath⸗Tag und Sabbath⸗Ausgang, by Dr. Leo Jehudah Hirschfeld (1898)Birkonim (bentschers) with table songs sung on the Sabbath with accompanying translations are now commonplace, but they not always were. The first major collection with accompanying translations was Dr. Leo Hirschfeld’s בזמרות נריע לו Die häuslichen Sabbathgesänge für Freitag⸗Abend, Sabbath⸗Tag und Sabbath⸗Ausgang (1898), an anthology of Sabbath table songs organized according to their traditional feast (Sabbath night, day, and Sabbath afternoon) in the Ashkenazi tradition. . . . Contributor(s): Leo Jehudah Hirschfeld and Aharon N. Varady (digital imaging and document preparation) אָשִׁיר לָאֵל אֲשֶׁר שָׁבַת | Ashir la-El Asher Shavat, a piyyut by Rabbi Mosheh ha-Levi (ca. 19th c.)A piyyut and table song for Shabbat by the chief rabbi of the Ottoman Empire. . . . Jadą Chassidim do Góry (יאַדוֹם חֲסִידִים דוֹ גוּרִי) | The Ḥassidim are going to Ger (translated by Yaakov Wasilewicz)This is the traveling song Gerer Chassidim would sing on their way to see the Gerrer Rebbe in Góra Kalwaria, Poland before World War Ⅱ. . . . The popular table song calling for the redemption of the Messianic age in Tsiyon. . . . אֲשׁוֹרֵר שִׁירָה | Ashorer Shirah, a piyyut in honor of the Torah by Ḥakham Raphael Baruch Toledano (ca. 20th c.)A piyyut in honor of the Torah. . . . Contributor(s): Honi Sanders (translation), Raphael Barukh Toledano and Aharon N. Varady (transcription) The piyyut, Ma Navu Alei, in Hebrew with an English translation. . . . Categories: Engagements & Weddings A popular 20th century piyyut. . . . Categories: Morning Baqashot This translation of Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik’s “Shabbat ha-Malkah” by Israel Meir Lask can be found on pages 280-281 in the Sabbath Prayer Book (Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation, 1945) where it appears as “Greeting to Queen Sabbath.” The poem is based on the shabbat song, “Shalom Alekhem” and first published in the poetry collection, Hazamir, in 1903. I have made a faithful transcription of the Hebrew and its English translation as it appears in the Sabbath Prayer Book. The first stanza of Lask’s translation was adapted from an earlier translation made by Angie Irma Cohon and published in 1920 in Song and Praise for Sabbath Eve (1920), p. 87. (Cohon’s translation of Bialik’s second stanza of “Shabbat ha-Malkah” does not appear to have been adapted by Lask.) . . . Categories: Ḳabbalat Shabbat Tags: 20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., English Translation, modern hebrew poetry, Queens, rhyming translation, זמירות zemirot Contributor(s): Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Israel Meir Lask (translation), Angie Irma Cohon and Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik A song in Yiddish bemoaning the suffering brought about in an epidemic. . . . Categories: Epidemics & Pandemics שָׁלוֹם עֲלֵיכֶם | Shalom Aleikhem, the piyyut for Friday evenings in German translation by Franz Rosenzweig (1921)The popular adjuration of the angels of peace and ministering angels, Shalom Aleikhem, in Hebrew with a German translation by Franz Rosenzweig. . . . Categories: Se'udat Leil Shabbat Tags: 20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., Angels, German Jewry, German translation, פיוטים piyyutim, שלום עליכם shalom aleikhem, זמירות zemirot Contributor(s): Franz Rosenzweig (translation), Unknown Author(s) and Aharon N. Varady (transcription) 📖 סדר זמירות ישראל | Seder Zemirot Yisrael: Gesänge für Sabbat und Festtage, compiled by Rabbi Dr. Moses Loeb Bamberger (1922)A birkon and collection of table songs in Hebrew with German translation. . . . Categories: Birkonim (בענטשערס Bentshers) Tags: 20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., ברכת המזון birkat hamazon, German Jewry, German translation, זמירות zemirot Contributor(s): Moses Loeb Bamberger and Aharon N. Varady (digital imaging and document preparation) Mediæval Hebrew Minstrelsy: Songs for the Bride Queen’s Feast (1926), an anthology of Sabbath table songs with rhymed English translations by the compiler, Herbert Loewe as well as others identified in his “Introduction.” The sixteen zemirot included have commentaries based on those provided by Dr. Leo Hirschfeld in his בזמרות נריע לו Die häuslichen Sabbathgesänge für Freitag⸗Abend, Sabbath⸗Tag und Sabbath⸗Ausgang (1898). Musical notation for the zemirot melodies were prepared, and a chapter on the music was written, by Rose L. Henriques. There are also delightful illustrations throughout by Beatrice Hirschfeld. Chief Rabbi Joseph H. Hertz provided the foreword. . . . גאָט בענטש אַמעריקע | God Bless America, for Armistice Day by Irving Berlin (1918/1938) with Yiddish translationThe words of the prayer for Armistice Day 1938, “God Bless America” by Irving Berlin, in English and Yiddish. . . . Tags: 20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., American Jewry of the United States, doikayt, hereness, Patriotic hymns, United States, Yiddish songs, זמירות zemirot Contributor(s): Henry Sapoznik (translation/Yiddish), Irving Berlin and Aharon N. Varady (transcription) This is a vocalized transcription and translation of the World War Ⅱ era song, “Shir haGe’ulah (Song of Redemption)” from the source images shared in A Tribute to Rabbi Mordechai Meir Hakohen Bryski v”g Bryski (Rabbi Mordechai A. Katz, 2017), pp. 19-20. The song is also known by its incipit, “Heḥayyeinu El.” . . . Categories: Kristallnacht (9-10 November, 16 Marḥeshvan), 🌐 Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), 🇮🇱 Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), 🇺🇸 Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust, Se'udah haShlishit The Many and the Few | רַבִּים בְּיַד מְעַטִּים (Rabim b’Yad M’atim) — a Hebrew adaptation of Woody Guthrie’s Ḥanukkah ballad by Isaac Gantwerk MayerDid you know that the great songwriter and activist Woody Guthrie wrote Ḥanukkah music? It’s true. Though Guthrie himself was not Jewish, Marjorie Greenblatt, his second wife and their children were, and he would write Ḥanukkah songs for the kids in his neighborhood in the 1940s. Two of these songs were recorded by Moses Asch, head of Folkways Records, in 1949 — a kid’s song called “Hanuka Dance,” and a twenty-verse ballad retelling the story of Ḥanukkah called “The Many and the Few.” Below is an original Hebrew translation of “The Many and the Few,” preserving the meter of the original. With a simple melody and a lot of historical research, it could certainly be sung at a Ḥanukkah event. . . . Categories: Ḥanukkah בָּאנוּ חֹשֶׁךְ לְגָרֵשׁ | Banu Ḥoshekh l’Garesh (We come to chase the dark away), by Sara Levi-Tanai (1960)In 1960, the Publishing House of the Composers’ League in cooperation with the Center for Culture and Education (בית הוצאה של איגוד הקומפוזיטורים בשיתוף עם המרכז לתרבות ולחינוך), published the songbook זמר־חן (Zemer Ḥén), containing the now popular Ḥanukkah song and melody “Banu Ḥoshekh l’Garesh” (p. 49), originally simply titled “Ḥanukkah” by Sara Levi-Tanaiׁ (1910-2005). . . . “National Brotherhood Week” by Tom Lehrer was first released on his album “That Was The Year That Was” (1965). National Brotherhood Week in February was first established in the 1930s by the National Conference of Christians and Jews as a means of promoting the values of inter-religious tolerance and civic interdependence. The week gained federal support from President Franklin Roosevelt during World War Ⅱ as a means of combatting fascist and nativist objections to a vision of democracy built on the foundation of a multicultural civil society. By the time Tom Lehrer lampooned the civic commemoration in 1965, the McCarthyite oppressions of the Red Scare and Lavender Scare during the Cold War, the manufactured Vietnam War, lingering anti-Semitic prejudice and suspicion, the continued struggle for civil rights with its continued lynchings, the assassination of JFK and increasing political violence had all exposed National Brotherhood Week for many young adults as phony, a historical relic that had lost the import of any cultural imperative it might have once possessed. . . . Categories: 🇺🇸 Brotherhood Week A Hebrew translation of the lyrics to Harry Nilsson’s “One” (1967) as sung by Aimee Mann (1995) . . . Categories: Sefirat ha-Omer “Just Walk Beside Me” (לֵךְ פָּשׁוּט לְצִדִּי | امشي بجانبي | נאָר גיין לעבן מיר), lines from an unknown author circulating in 1970; Jewish adaptation with translations in Aramaic, Hebrew, Yiddish, and ArabicVariations of the original three lines culminating with “…walk beside me…” first appear in high school yearbooks beginning in 1970. The earliest recorded mention we could find was in The Northern Light, the 1970 yearbook of North Attleboro High School, Massachusetts. In the Jewish world of the early to mid-1970s, a young Moshe Tanenbaum began transmitting the lines at Jewish summer camps. In 1979, as Uncle Moishy, Tanenbaum published a recording of the song under the title “v’Ohavta” (track A4 on The Adventures of Uncle Moishy and the Mitzvah Men, volume 2). . . . Categories: Travel, Additional Preparatory Prayers, Social Justice, Peace, and Liberty, 🇺🇸 Brotherhood Week The pedagogical song “Hashem is Everywhere!” by Rabbi Yosef Goldstein (1928-2013) can be found in the context of his story, “Where is Hashem?,” the second track on his album מדות טובות Jewish Ethics Through Story and Song (Menorah Records 1972). In the instructions to reciting the lyrics, the singer points first to the six cardinal directions and lastly, by pointing inward towards one’s self. In so doing, one explicitly affirms the idea of the divine within ourselves and implicitly, in each other. . . . “[I’m Spending] Hanukkah in Santa Monica” by Tom Lehrer was first written at the request of Garrison Keillor for his radio show The American Radio Company on which it was performed twice, in 1990 and 1992. The song was later released on the album, Bible & Beyond (Larry Milder, 1999). The first recording of Tom Lehrer singing his song can be heard on The Remains of Tom Lehrer (Disc 3) (2000). In 2022, Tom Lehrer gave an enormous Ḥanukkah present to the world, dedicating his entire oeuvre to the Public Domain including this song. . . . Categories: Ḥanukkah These are the lyrics of the song, Miryam haNevi’ah, written by rabbis Leila Gal Berner and Arthur Waskow (with Hebrew by Leila Gal Berner) as found published in My People’s Prayer Book, vol. 7: Shabbat at Home, (ed. L. Hoffman, 1997), section 3, p. 189. The English lyrics are from an article published several years earlier — “Memories of a Jewish Lesbian Evening” by Roger McDougle appearing in Bridges (vol. 4:1, Winter/Spring 1994), on the top of page 58. No specific date is given for the havdalah program described in the article, alas. If you know the earliest reference for the publication or use of Miryam haNevi’ah, please contact us. . . . A pun filled ditty by the Fall 2010 Jewish environmental educators of the Teva Learning Center. . . . “In the Sukkah At Least, It’s a Wonderful World” by Len Fellman was written for Sukkot in 2015. . . . Categories: Sukkot בָּאנוּ חׇשֵׁךְ לְקַדֵּשׁ | Banu Ḥoshekh l’Ḳadesh (We come to sanctify the dark), by rabbis David Seidenberg and Jill HammerThis is a new version of the popular Ḥanukkah song, Banu Ḥoshekh. (The original by Sara Levi-Tanai can be found here.) Our new version does two things: 1) it avoids the association of darkness and blackness (shḥor) with evil and harm, which in our society gets tangled up with white supremacy, and 2) honors the darkness as something precious that we need, especially in our time of light pollution when so much of the time, so many people can’t even see the stars. . . . 📖 סִימָן לְבָנִים | Siman l’Vanim: a birkon celebrating the wedding of Honi Sanders and Simona Dalin (2019)The birkon/bentsher (blessing-book) prepared for the wedding of Honi Sanders and Simona Dalin on July 7th, 2019. . . . Categories: Birkonim (בענטשערס Bentshers) Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., בענטשן bentshn, Needing Decompilation, wedding bentshers, wedding blessings, זמירות zemirot Contributor(s): Akiva Sanders (translation), Honi Sanders (translation) and Aharon N. Varady (translation) Some communities have a practice of singing a song about Miriam alongside the well-known Havdalah song about Elijah the Prophet. But Miriam isn’t really a parallel to Elijah — she’s a parallel to Moshe and Aaron. When we’re talking about distaff counterparts to Elijah the clearest example is Seraḥ bat Asher. Seraḥ, the daughter of Asher, is mentioned only a handful of times in the Tanakh, but is given great significance in the midrash. Like Elijah, she is said to have never died but entered Paradise alive, and comes around to the rabbis to give advice or teachings. This song, which includes several references to midrashim about Seraḥ, is meant to be sung to any traditional tune of “Eliyahu haNavi.” It is dedicated to Ḥazzan Joanna Selznick Dulkin (shlit”a), who introduced me to the legends of Seraḥ bat Asher. . . . Categories: Motsei Shabbat Qevelta de-Liba’i (“My Heart’s Lament”) is a melancholy song I wrote in Targumic Judeo-Aramaic in 2010. This piece is an existential peek into an old man’s private moment. He looks in the mirror and waxes wistful, longing for his bygone youth. . . . Categories: Self-Reflection אֵלִי כְּבוֹדִי: זמר לסעודה השלישית | Eli Kevodi (My God, My Glory), a hymn for the third sabbath meal by Asher Hillel BursteinEli Kevodi (My God, My Glory”), for seudah shelisheet, was composed by Asher Hillel Burstein in 2018. The hymn was awarded the “Rabbi Hershel Matt Creative Liturgy Award,” the first prize in the creative liturgy contest sponsored by ARC (The Association of Rabbis and Cantors), an interdenominational group of Jewish clergy. . . . Categories: Se'udah haShlishit This piece is about Ḥanina ben Dosa, a wonder-working rabbi who lived in Judea in the first century. The singer pleads to Ḥanina that he intercede in Israel’s behalf and obtain God’s help and salvation for her and the world. . . . Categories: Theurgy Yā Ḥanukka[t] | יָא חַנוּכָּה | يَا حَنُكَّة — a Judeo-Arabic adaptation of Mordkhe Rivesman’s “Oy Khanike” by Isaac Gantwerk MayerAn original Judeo-Arabic adaptation of the song “Oy Khanike” (derived from the Yiddish poem of the same name by Mordkhe Rivesman) also known in English as “Oh Ḥanukkah” or in Hebrew as “Y’mei ha-Ḥanukka.” With thanks to Mazen Haddad for his help with the Arabic! Some notes: 1) Case endings and nunation, which would (in colloquial dialects) often be skipped or dropped, are transcribed in brackets. 2) The word “sufnāj” is a Moroccan Arabic dialectal word which is the agent noun for sfenj, a traditional type of North African doughnut. . . . Categories: Ḥanukkah איידי! סיליבראמוס | Айде! Селебрамос | Ayde! Selebramos — a Ladino adaptation of Mordkhe Rivesman’s “Oy Khanike” by Isaac Gantwerk MayerAn original Ladino adaptation of the song “Oy Khanike” (derived from the Yiddish poem of the same name by Mordkhe Rivesman) also known in English as “Oh Chanukah” or in Hebrew as “Y’mei ha-Ḥanukka.” I’m aware that the custom of spinning tops was not originally a Sefaradi one. So sue me, I was looking for something to rhyme with “libertaḏ.” I’ve included the Rashi script, the Aki Yerushalaim orthography, and (as an added bonus) the Cyrillic transcription used by the Jews of the Balkans. . . . Categories: Ḥanukkah 🆕 עוּרִי עוּרִי – שִׁירַת מִרְיָם וּדְבוֹרָה | Uri Uri – Song of Miriam and Devorah, a piyyut for Shabbat Shirah by the Diwan Ashira Project“Shirat Miriam and Devorah / Uri, Uri” (Song of Miriam, Song of Deborah / Rise up, Rise Up) was first published in 2024, as the second of four piyyutim published through the Diwan Ashira Project by Ephraim Kahn. . . . שָּׁבוּעַ שֶׁל אַחְוָה לְאֻמִּית | National Brotherhood Week (in Israel), an adaptation of Tom Lehrer’s song by Isaac Gantwerk MayerA satirical look at contemporary Israeli civil society in Hebrew and English, as adapted from Tom Lehrer’s sardonic “National Brotherhood Week” (1965). . . . Categories: 🇺🇸 Brotherhood Week According to Joseph Judah Chorny’s On the Caucasian Jews, this acrostic piyyuṭ was customarily used as an epithalion before a wedding. He writes, “Before morning light, the bride is led to the groom’s house accompanied by many women and men, all carrying lit wax candles in their hands, and singing this song along the way.” Variants of this piyyut are found throughout the greater Sephardic world, generally in an abbreviated and slightly altered form. In Syria it is sung during the haqafot for Simḥat Torah, while in Livorno Sephardic practice (and subsequently in most Eastern Sephardic maḥzorim) it is a Shavu’ot piyyut. . . . 🆕 אחת סבום | 𐩱𐩢𐩩𐩽 𐩪𐩨𐩥𐩣𐩽 | חַד גַּדְיָא (ʔaħat sabawam) — a Sabaic translation of Ḥad Gadya, by Isaac Gantwerk MayerḤad Gadya has a place in Seder tables throughout the Jewish world, and in many communities it was read in translation. Probably not this one though, seeing as it was written almost a thousand years after the Sabaic language became extinct. But Sabaic, a South Semitic language somewhere between Arabic and Ge’ez, is worth studying for any Jewish scholar because of the light it sheds on the history of the Semitic languages and the Middle East as a whole. (Not to mention that it was a lingua franca of the Yemenite Jewish kingdom of Himyar!) This is a Sabaic translation, transcription, and hypothetical vocalization of Ḥad Gadya. . . . Categories: Nirtsah | ||
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