Orthodox Rap Star Nissim Brings Judaism to Hip Hop
"Rabbis were telling me that if I have a gift like that, I shouldn’t sit on it. But I felt that rap was going to lead me away from my spirituality."...
Saturday, July 20, 2019
Music Tag
Boublil & Schönberg: The French Duo Behind Two Broadway Megahits
The helicopter has landed—again. Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg’s musical behemoth Miss Saigon returns to Broadway this March after a 16-year hiatus....
Book Review // Light Come Shining: The Transformations Of Bob Dylan
When Bob Dylan became the first songwriter to win the Nobel Prize in Literature last October, the internet erupted with reactions ranging from euphoria to dismay....
Bob Dylan: The Unauthorized Spiritual Biography
By Nadine Epstein and Rebecca Frankel [dropcap]I[/dropcap]n the early 1960s, Bob Dylan performed at tiny Greenwich Village folk clubs, acoustic guitar strapped across his compact shoulders, harmonica perched on a metal rack around his slender neck. His chord changes were simple and his voice a soft-grating...
A Cappella Graduates with Honors
by Rachel E. Gross [dropcap]I[/dropcap]t was 2006 when Rabbi Sue Silberberg of the Indiana University Hillel got the call. Our nation had an urgent request: one Jewish a cappella group to perform at the White House’s annual Hanukkah party. Silberberg didn’t have an a cappella...
Moment in Music // Michael Bloomfield
By Josh Tapper On February 15, 1981, Michael Bloomfield’s body was discovered in a parked car on a San Francisco side street. The 37-year-old Jewish blues guitar player, one of the most influential of the 1960s, was dead of a drug overdose. The body lay, unrecognized, in...
Brian Epstein: The Man Behind the Beatles
Brian Epstein, the man who discovered the Beatles and shaped them into the biggest music sensation of the 20th century, died 40 years ago at age 32. The pivotal role the enigmatic and charming Epstein played made him the world’s most admired band manager. But...
Bell Man
One of the last in a lineage of great Jewish violinists, this “farm boy” of the American heartland drives a Porsche and plays the world’s most famous “Jewish” violin. Joshua Bell’s tall frame tilts sideways on the sleek gray banquette of the Tamarind Tea Room, a...
Singing a New Song
11:47 01 September
in Arts & Culture
By Steven Philp It goes without saying that these are trying times. Yet it is in the face of crisis that humankind produces its best music, art, and literature; while grappling with adversity, men and women exercise their creative abilities to express anger, sadness, and—above all—hope...
Yael Naim: A New Soul Comes of Age
When New Soul peaked at number seven on the Billboard charts, Yael Naim became the first Israeli soloist to have a top-ten music hit in the United States. Four years later, the star of the Paris-based musician continues to rise....