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FAU gives second life to Jewish songs

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published September 11, 2006

BOCA RATON - The woman was in her 90s and moving to a nursing home when Rhea Bertelli met her. The woman's husband had been a cantor, leading prayers in synagogues, and she had helped by composing and arranging Hebrew and Yiddish songs. Jewish records and sheet music filled her home, but the music was in danger of being lost.

"Her children were totally uninterested," said Bertelli, now 81. "She had to find a home for the music or it was going to go into a Dumpster."

The woman agreed to donate her collection to the Judaica Music Rescue Project at Florida Atlantic University, where Bertelli volunteers.

Bertelli and other volunteers have heard similar stories countless times. Since the project started in 2002, they've gathered more than 9,000 unique records (LPs, 45s and 78s), 8-tracks, cassette tapes and other materials. The project's director, Nathan Tinanoff, said some institutions have donated large collections, but he also gets records from around the country, sent by people cleaning out closets or attics.

The Judaica Sound Archives at the university now has about 60,000 unique songs, many of them in Yiddish, making it one of the largest repositories of Jewish music in the country. Still, organizers at the archive say they're racing to save the music as some of the children and grandchildren of those who enjoyed it decide to throw it out.

"People say to me 'Why are we doing this? My kids don't care,' " Tinanoff said. "What we say is that if we don't preserve the music now they'll never have the opportunity to determine if they do care. Maybe it will skip a generation and their grandchildren will really care about their heritage. If they do, we'll be there for them."

Maxine Schackman, the archives' assistant director, said the collection captures important moments in history. She points to songs like Roumania, Roumania, about immigrants who are longing for their homeland, and Die Greene Cousine, about a woman who comes to the United States expecting instant wealth and must instead work in a factory. Other songs like a Yiddish translation of Goodnight, Irene and one called Hot Dogs and Knishes are also revealing.

"This is about the history of America and the history of Jews in America," Schackman said.

Volunteers have already put 1,000 of the archive's oldest songs online and hope to add more. One advantage the FAU archive has over others is space and a large work force of Jewish volunteers, Tinanoff said.

Tinanoff has been told the archive is like an "old age home for Jewish records." He takes that as a compliment but thinks of it more like an assisted living facility, he said, where the records aren't retired but getting a new life.

[Last modified September 11, 2006, 02:21:06]