Café Balkana: Sephardic folk music, a performance by Jewlia Eisenberg

In the 1930s, cafés in Greek and Turkish port cities like Salonika and Izmir were a meeting place for working people and underworld elements.

The musicians performing at these «cafés aman» (music cafés) were Greeks, Jews, Slavs, Turks, and Vlachs and the music that came out of them synthesized Turkish scales, Balkan meters, Hebrew chant, and words in Greek, Turkish and Ladino.

Café Balkana draws from both the violent, sexy rebetika music sung by Jewish women and the romantic and funny Sephardic folk music with its roots in Spain, North Africa, and the Balkans. Jewlia will perform the songs of the café aman, where rebetika meets Salonikan Jewish music.

Jewlia Eisenberg is a composer, extended-technique vocalist, lay cantor. She is the founder of the group Charming Hostess, whose most recent CDs include Sarajevo Blues and Punch.

Fuente: Bureau of Jewish Education