Hazaq u’Barukh to Nina Avidar Weiner, Israel Scholarship Education Foundation (ISEF) Co-Founder/Chairwoman Emerita & Distinguished ASF Board Member, for receiving the high honor of lighting one of the 12 torches on Mt. Herzl for Israel’s 75th Independence Day!
Get Your Passes & Tickets Now for the 25th NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival!
✡️“The song that made me an Israeli”
By Yossi Klein Halevi, The Times of Israel
Kfar Todra by Habreira Hativit
Music is a straight path to the soul, and in honor of Israel’s 75th birthday, celebrated writer Yossi Klein Halevi shares how, in 1982: “My initiation into the mysteries of Israeli identity began through Hebrew music.” The band that opened Halevi’s soul to receive an influx from the soul of Israeli culture was Habreira Hativit:“They were the first Mizrahi band to break into the mainstream… a soundtrack for the political revolution that was replacing Labor Ashkenazi Israel with Menachem Begin’s Likud.” But “the agenda of Habreira Hativit was… more ambitious” than party politics, and as Halevi recalls, “Even more than an essential protest against the exclusion of Mizrahi culture from the Israeli playlist, this was the soundtrack of our story; at once eastern and western, pious and subversive, insisting on respect for our differences even as it celebrated our oneness. By embracing the synthesis of ingathering, the band was offering a radical but obvious statement about Israeli identity: Only when our collective song included all the songs we had brought home from exile would the ingathering be complete.”
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Feature: Tzur Mishelo✨🎶
Shlomo Bar and Yasmin Levy
(Photo courtesy of YosMusic)
World-renowned Ladino singer-songwriter Yasmin Levy has earned widespread recognition for her capacity to communicate passion through a microphone, and on May 8th she will receive the “ASF Pomegranate Award for Music” and perform live at the Opening Night of the ASF’s 25th New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival. In this week’s featured video, Levy joins Shlomo Bar, leader of the iconic Israeli band, Habreira Hativit, for a delicate version of Tzur Mishelo, a classic piyyut sung before grace after meals in many Jewish communities.
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🍽️“A long journey, a long table”
By Aylin Öney Tan, Hürriyet Daily News
(Image courtesy of Hürriyet Daily News)
While the desire for food is rooted in biological, animal neediness, Sephardi Jewish culture has elevated culinary pleasure to a celebration of our humanity through open-hearted hospitality and thoughtful preparation. As the Ladino expression reminds us, El ke alarga la meza, Alarga la vida (“one who expands the table, expands life.”) A recently opened Istanbul exhibition examines “Sephardic Flavors and Aromas” by featuring Turkish chef and food photographer Javier Zafra’s exploration of Sephardi cuisine. The exhibition includes twenty-seven works by Zafra with “historical notes, gastronomic discoveries and inspiring images,” and is a reminder that if we enlarge our culinary curiosity, “our table will be longer to share (and) conviviality will expand.”
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By Dr. Hélène Jawhara Piñer, a 2018 ASF Broome & Allen Fellow
In this extraordinary, award-winning and best-selling cookbook now in its 4th imprint, chef and scholar Hélène Jawhara-Piñer combines rich culinary history and Jewish heritage to serve up over fifty culturally significant recipes. Steeped in the history of the Sephardic Jews (Jews of Spain) and their diaspora, these recipes are expertly collected from such diverse sources as medieval cookbooks, Inquisition trials, medical treatises, poems, and literature. Original sources ranging from the thirteenth century onwards and written in Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, Occitan, Italian, and Hebrew, are here presented in English translation, bearing witness to the culiary diversity of the Sephardim, who brought their cuisine with them and kept it alive wherever they went. Jawhara-Piñer provides enlightening commentary for each recipe, revealing underlying societal issues from anti-Semitism to social order. In addition, the author provides several of her own recipes inspired by her research and academic studies.
Each creation and bite of the dishes herein are guaranteed to transport the reader to the most deeply moving and intriguing aspects of Jewish history. Jawhara-Piñer reminds us that eating is a way to commemorate the past.
The Historic Synagogues Of Turkey / Turkiye'nin Tarihi Sinagoglari
(In Turkish and English)
By Joel A. Zack
Photographs by Devon Jarvis
Drawings by Ceren Kahraman
Published by the American Sephardi Federation
This project testifies to a historic Jewish community of vibrancy and dynamism that once dotted Turkey. Dating back to Roman and Byzantine times, Jews thrived on Turkish soil, finding refuge in the tens of thousands after their expulsions from Spain, Portugal, and Italy in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Joel Zack and his team have performed an important cultural service, retrieving for posterity rich testimony of the Jewish architectural heritage in Ottoman and modern Turkish History.
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Upcoming Events or Opportunities
25th New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival Lineup:
Exciting Dramas, Powerful Documentaries, Timeless Classics, and Must-See Romantic Comedies – only at the ASF
To celebrate its 25th Anniversary, the NYSJFF will play both at the ASF - Center for Jewish History & via our new online platform for the first time!
7- 11 May 2023
ASF - Center for Jewish History
15 West 16th Street
New York City
14 -18 May 2023
Online platform: nysjff.eventive.org
This 25th edition of the NYSJFF is dedicated to Ike, Molly and Steven Elias
Book your Passes & Tickets
VIP Festival Pass – $600
(includes Opening Night, Closing Night, All Screenings at the ASF - Center for Jewish History and Parties)
Film Pass – $225
(includes Closing Night and All Screenings at the ASF - Center for Jewish History):
Opening Night and Pomegranate Awards Ceremony - $225
Featuring a Performance by Yasmin Levy!
After Parties - $125
Single Screening - $18
All Access Online – $225
(includes 15 films selected from the Festival and online exclusives streaming from Sunday, 14 May to Thursday, 18 May)
The NYSJFF provides a range of opportunities for donors looking to support the American Sephardi Federation’s year-round preservation, education, and empowerment mission.
Your contribution will help us continue to promote the richness of Sephardic culture and to continue to provide representation with results for American Sephardi communities. Haj Sameyah!
Discuss Sponsorship or Advertising: Yves@AmericanSephardi.org
Email Inquires: info@AmericanSephardi.org
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The Belzberg Program in Israel Studies at the University of Calgary and the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis University. With the collaboration of the American Sefardi Federation, Centro Sefarad Israel, and the International Network for Jewish Thought present:
Sephardi Modernities Seminar Series, 2023
Join us as we explore the relationship between our narratives about the past and the future to which we aspire. The ways in which scholars approach the stories, events, characters, and historical processes of the Sephardi/Levantine past are inevitably guided by values, by their moral and political beliefs. Which elements of the past do they strive to preserve, reclaim and grant continuity? What are they trying to say about a potential future? Which stories become part of canonized history, and which ones are dismissed as mere anecdotes? Which theoretical, social, political, and cultural frameworks do they wrestle with, and which do they seek to advance?
On Zoom
(Registration is required for each session)
9 May at 12:00PM EST
Sephardi Musical Modernities: Listening to the Past in the Future
Edwin Seroussi, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Yair Dalal, Composer, violinist, oud player, singer, and teacher
Sign-up Now!
Throughout this year’s series we will discuss the future invoked by each way of looking at the past, the political agendas of historical research, and the values that unavoidably guide scholastic inquiry. Topics include the transmission of narratives among collectives and among researchers, ownership of archives, encounters with the past, the academic legitimacy of certain topics and collectives, vehicles of memory (music, oral history, proverbs, etc.) and the construction of historical narratives.
Organized by Dr. Angy Cohen, Inaugural Hy and Jenny Belzberg Postdoctoral Associate in Israel Studies, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology at the University of Calgary, and Dr. Yuval Evri, Assistant Professor of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies on the Marash and Ocuin Chair in Ottoman, Mizrahi, and Sephardic Jewish Studies, Brandeis University.
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YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, in partnership with the American Society for Jewish Music, American Sephardi Federation presents:
Babylon: Ghetto, Renaissance, and Modern Oblivion
Film Screening
Followed by a Q&A with director Jessica Gould
The award-winning film, considers the resonance of Psalm 137 (By the Waters of Babylon) through the music of two ghettoized peoples – Italian Jews of Mantua during the period of the Counter-Reformation, and African Americans before, during, and after the Harlem Renaissance.
Wednesday, 17 May at 7:30PM EST
@the Center for Jewish History
(Complimentary RSVP)
Sign-up Now!
About the film:
A 29-minute voyage through four centuries, Babylon confronts vital questions about minority musicians and their foundational roles in the music we enjoy today. Who was celebrated? Who was erased? Who was invited to the party and who was left out in the cold? Whose genius was attributed to someone else? Who contributed the most while remaining on the sidelines of history? And most importantly, why does it keep happening?
Ezra Knight narrates a script that interweaves works by Italian-Jewish composer Salomone Rossi (1570 – 1630) and contemporary American Brandon Waddles (1988 –). Additional Rossi works include performances by the Bacchus Consort, Voices of Music, and soprano Jessica Gould in collaboration with lutenist Lucas Harris. Also featuring the groundbreaking Kaleidoscope Vocal Ensemble, other musical selections include historical recordings by Ma Rainey, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Big Mama Thornton, The Fisk Jubilee Singers, as well as two luminaries in contemporary West African music – Kevin Nathaniel Hylton and Yacouba Sissoko.
About the speaker:
Jessica Gould is a director, writer, and soprano who continues to enjoy a formidable reception for her maiden film project, Babylon: Ghetto, Renaissance, and Modern Oblivion, on the international film festival circuit. Having become a filmmaker by virtue of the pandemic out of a need to continue presenting classical and early music through the prism of history in the absence of live performance, Ms. Gould’s ever expanding laurels include 90 awards and counting from festivals across the globe. As the Founder and Artistic Director of Salon/Sanctuary Concerts, based in New York City, her original projects have received grants from numerous foundations and institutions, generous support which has enabled the series to blossom into one of the more significant presenters of historical performance in New York City and beyond.
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Kahal Kadosh Mikveh Israel presents:
Gala In Honor of Rabbi Albert Gabbai
Join Kahal Kadosh Mikveh Israel to celebrate Rabbi Gabbai’s 35 years of service and dedication to the Synagogue of the American Revolution!
Sunday, 21 May
4:00PM EST
Cocktails
5:30PM EST
Program Followed by a Dinner & Dessert Buffet
@44 North Fourth Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Formal Attire
Sign-up Now!
For more details:
gala@mikvehisrael.org
(215) 922-5446
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Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue and Museum presents:
Greek Jewish Festival
Sunday, 21 May 12:00-6:00PM EST
(280 Broome Street, Lower East Side, NYC)
Join the Greek Jewish Festival as we celebrate the unique Romaniote and Sephardic heritage of the Jews of Greece!
Experience a feast for the senses including authentic kosher Greek foods and homemade Greek pastries, traditional Greek dancing and live Greek and Sephardic music, an outdoor marketplace full of vendors, arts and educational activities for kids, Sephardic cooking demonstrations, and much more!
The ASF is once again proud to be a Festival Sponsor.
Learn more at www.GreekJewishFestival.com
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ASF Broome & Allen & ADL Collaborative for Change Fellow Isaac de Castro presents:
Entre Diasporas: Telling the Latin-American Jewish story. Contando la historia judía latinoamericana
Tell your story. Cuenta tu historia.
We’re looking for first-generation Latino Jews in the United States who immigrated because of political and social turmoil. Jews of Sephardic descent from Colombia, Cuba, and Venezuela that now reside in the Miami area will be given priority, but others are welcome to apply as well.
Fill out this form to be considered as an interviewee for this project. After you’ve submitted, we will be in touch promptly to set up a preliminary phone call.
Click here for more information.