Ladino Music and Cultural Identity
By: Julien Palliere
Tags: Spanish, Culture, Research, Music, Judaism

Yasmin Levy — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQI0icY8XJs

Introduction

“Adío…” The haunting word grows from silence, shivering with vibrato as it recedes. “Adío, kerida” returns with greater conviction, its voice cracking with flamenco ornaments. A single clave accompanies her with its rhythmic tresillo, only to become the Turkish wahda. From the silence of this dramatic opening comes a Spanish guitar, morphing again into its Turkish twin, the qanún. Soft shakers, a whispering Turkish ney, and a double bass join. A gentle male choir follows the voice in her serpentine melodic sighs. After a few short verses, she finishes the song alone: “…me l’amargates tu.”

“You made my life miserable.”

Yasmin Levy sings her rendition of Adío Kerida in her third album, Mano Suave. As the daughter of two accomplished Sephardi-Turkish singers, Levy has become the most successful Ladino artist today. Her father, Yitzhak Levy (1919–1977), is a legendary singer and influential collector of Ladino music– the music of the Sephardim. The Sephardim are a community of Iberian Jews who flourished first inbetween Christianity and Islam, then dispersed across the Mediterranean. Today, a revival of Sephardic culture and musical heritage, Ladino music, has prompted questions into what it means to be authentically Sephardi. Levy’s interpretation of Adio Kerida, her career, and her personal relationship to Ladino music are representative of the Sephardic cultural evolution.

In this brief analysis, I begin by summarizing the complex historical context of the Sephardi community. I consider the development of the Ladino language in the post-1492 Sephardi expulsion, and its endurance within the lyrics of Sephardic vocal ballads. I, then, consider the role of music in the cultural maintenance of the Sephardic identity, reintroducing Levy and Adío Kerida as agents in the modern revival of this identity. Finally, I engage with the implications of authenticity, homogeneity, and antiquity which complicate the cultural legitimacy of the Sephardi diaspora.

Historical Background

Sephardim are loosely defined as Spanish-speaking Jews from the Iberian peninsula. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Iberian peninsula was the battleground between Christianity and Islam. Over time, the Sephardic community appropriated elements of the two warring cultures. As the cultural go-between for both Arabs and Christians, the Sephardic communities enjoyed a relatively privileged position throughout the conflicts.[1] When Christians assumed total dominance of the peninsula, the need for Jews was replaced by antisemitism. This culminated in 1492 with a mandate requiring all Jews in Iberia to convert or submit to exile. In response, mass emigration ensued. It flowed primarily to North Africa and the Ottoman Empire (the latter of which welcomed Jews for their courtly knowledge).[2] Throughout the 16th and 20th centuries, the Sephardim oscillated between waves of Western assimilation and Ladino revival.

Each step in the history of the Sephardic community — its origins, departure from Spain, and recent developments — challenges modern conceptions of Sephardic identity. I will now discuss these inconsistencies, beginning with the source of Sephardi Jewish lineage. The prevailing belief among the Sephardi community is that they are descendants of Jerusalemite Jews. This belief originates in a specific translation of the name Sepharad. The term Sepharad is first found in the Tanakh as the destination of an ancient Jewish exile from Jerusalem. In the Middle Ages, the Spanish Jewish population understood “Sepharad’’ to mean “Aspamia”. The phonological resemblance between “Aspamia” and “Hispania” (Spain) led medieval Spanish Jews to believe that they were direct descendants of the exiled Jerusalemites mentioned by Prophet Obadiah (Cohen 2005, 24). However, it is historically unlikely that the majority of Jews in Iberia were truly descendents of Jews at all. Instead, it is more plausible that the majority of the Sephardic community were converts to Judaism whose origins can be traced to “Berbers, Arabs, and, more marginally, other peoples [Punic, Himyarites]” (Wexler 2012, 230). The situation is further complicated by the integration with Jews who did not pass through North Africa (such as those who came through Europe).[3]

Another inconsistency lies within the myth of a shared Sephardi language. It is simultaneously referred to as Ladino, Spanyol, Djudezmo, Djudyó/Djidyó, Hakitia in Morocco, and Djudeo-Espanyol (Bunis 58). Such a variety of terms showcases the decentralized heterogeneity of the language spoken by these communities. Remy Attig confirms “the idea that the Sephardic Jews were originally part of any linguistically homogeneous group is erroneous” (Attig 8). Not only does this challenge the exocitizing myth that Ladino is a more ancient and authentic Spanish than contemporary, it also dismantles Ladino as the central unifier of the Sephardic community within Spain.

The dispersion of Sephardim to various regions further complicates the coherence of Ladino. The Sephardic Jews, expelled in 1492, brought with them the plurality of “languages and dialects spoken in the regions where they had lived: Castile, Aragon, Catalonia, Balearic Islands, etc” (Attig 8). Such languages continued to develop abroad independently of both their Spanish origins and other Sephardic diaspora: “Sephardim also borrowed from the languages of the people with whom they came into contact following the Expulsion” (Bunis 60). Today, the population of Ladino speakers is so small that Ladino is a UNESCO endangered language.[4] Although it is rarely spoken, the importance of Ladino to the Sephardic identity is visible in its indelible presence within the lyric poetry of Sephardic ballads. The multifaceted, heterogeneous nature of the Sephardic community is mirrored in its musical expression.

Sephardic Ballad

Throughout their journey beyond the Iberian peninsula, the Sephardim have maintained a form of Spanish sung ballads, dating from pre-1492. The Spanish ballads:

“(romances) are defined according to their form. If a verse is structured with predominantly eight-syllable lines, and vocalic assonance at the end of every even line, then it comes into the category, regardless of its length or subject matter.” (Wright 411)

Ballads are an oral, dramatic tradition, primarily sung by women in private or during celebrations (63, Bunis). The thematic content of ballads is diverse, yet similar themes recur across different ballads — a process referred to as “vive en variantes” (Wright 412). The ballad’s emphasis on dramatic emotional affect means that “all events, whether historical in inspiration or not, tend to be important mainly for the effect they have on the protagonists of the ballad” (Wright 414).

Ladino ballads are commonly known to “preserve many features of Spanish ballad tradition” which have “disappeared from the Hispanic ballad tradition” (Armistead 128). While I caution against the use of terms “preserve,” “archaic,” and “highly conservative” (ibid.), this backdrop of so-called ancient tradition is useful to highlight the heterogenous developments in Ladino music. Similarly to the development of Ladino, Sephardi ballads have significantly evolved as a result of their multicultural interactions and, more recently, the recording industry. In the former case, “Sephardic ‘romanceros,’ ballad singers, borrowed from the popular poetry of the peoples among whom the Sephardim lived after their exile from Spain” (Fromm 163). In her essay, The Mediaization of Judeo-Spanish Song, Judith Cohen discusses how “nonelectronic media has already changed Judeo-Spanish song, and had introduced various types and degrees of Westernization” (201). However, through all these musical mixtures, what has remained the same in the Sephardic songs are the lyrics (Cohen 2010).

In my own listening, I have identified the same songs interpreted through both maqam and Western intonation, using additive meters (Balkans, Turkey) and common time, arranged with jazz, Western early music, or Egyptian orchestra; sung in both Hebrew cantorial (hazzan) and Qur’anic recitation styles, and using Spanish/Ladino, Arabic, or Hebrew lyrics.[5] Cohen (1993, 1999, 2005) has presented comprehensive reviews of contemporary Ladino recorded music. These reviews exemplify claims of a broad Ladino revival, facilitated by the recording industry. It is within this revival that I now turn to Yasmin Levy, Adíos Kerido, and the anxieties of cultural authenticity and legitimacy.

Revival, Romance, and Yasmin

The Sephardic cultural revival raises questions of authentic reproduction (see Alexander 2007 for a critique of J. Cohen, Zucker et al.). The Levy family fulfills Timothy Taylor’s three conditions of “authentic mediator” within Ladino heritage: Sephardic heritage, spiritual connection, and appeals to an ancient tradition (Aliberti 29). As mediators of the Ladino heritage, both Itzhak and Yasmin have been the target of much, and often incongruent, revivalist critique (Refael 2015).

Itzak Levy is credited with documenting and publishing the most influential collection of Ladino songs. He is often viewed by many, including his daughter, Yasmin, as having produced highly authentic transcriptions (ibid.). However, within his recordings and transcriptions, Levy strikingly omits the maqamat (pitch intonation subtleties) and rhythmic subtleties native to Ladino ballads. His work represents the creative liberties that are taken in cultural reproduction and reveals his desire to perform “‘de-Turkicization’ of Judeo Spanish songs” (Cohen 2005, 192).

Itzhak’s daughter, Yasmin, grew up in Israel. She claims to not speak Ladino, but rather, Spanish.[6] Levy’s stylistic mobility drew heavy criticism from both Ladino and flamenco cultural communities: “Je me suis mise à me justifier, à expliquer pourquoi je voulais faire cette musique de fusion” (Bensignor 159). Later, Yasmine describes her decision “to express [herself] as an artist, and not just as a singer who preserves some tradition.”[6] Her third album, Mano Suave, reaches many musical genres around the Sephardic diaspora. It is within this album that we find the song, Adio Kerida.

Adio Kerida is both an exemplary Ladino romance and a staple of Ladino music. The song is in Ladino, with a few lines of text– 8-syllables per line. The song is non-narrative and sings of unrequited love: a bitter farewell [Appendix 1]. Surprisingly, the melody comes from the legendary Addio del Passato, from Verdi’s 1853 Opera, La Traviata (Cohen 1994). Levy’s adaptation combines musical instruments from both Turkey and Spain, with a flamenco vocal style which is, itself, a result of the interaction of Western and Arabic cultures.

Conclusion

“The student of ethnic and historical origins has to reconstruct … the historical facts surrounding the ethnic origins of the group, and the factors determining how the group chooses to fashion its myths of origin.” (Wexler 2012, 1)

Both the origins of the Sephardim and its development defy rigid interpretation. Perhaps the single most concrete aspect of the Sephardi community has been its enduring cultural development. Its history belies a negotiation between imagined roots from the past and creative adaptability in the present. What makes the Sephardic community unique is their lack of a central locale. As a community which has only been “hosted” by other, dominant cultures, it falls victim to a sort of cultural relativity which views dominant cultures as the source material with which the Sephardi community built their “hybrid” identities. Problematic attempts to define Sephardi, Ladino music, or even particular artists like Yasmin Levy, necessitate the rewriting of historical perspectives, creation of myths, and the omission of internal diversity. As the subject of myths and romanticization, the term “Sephardi” has come to represent all non-Ashkenazi Jews.[7] In the words of Edna Aizenburg, the allurement of the Sepharad lies in its “mutating richness, its exemplary ability to depict both the peaks and valleys of Jewish history…” (Lévy 160). Rather, we should explore the creative force within Sephardicf histories as a form of productive engagement which leaves the possibility for new, relevant futures.

Notes

[1] Stillman, Norman A. “The Judeo-Arabic Heritage.” 40–54.

[2] Bunis, David M. “Judeo-Spanish culture in medieval and modern times.” 55–76.

[3] Wexler, Paul. “Are the Sephardic Jews?” 29–42.

[4] https://en.unesco.org/news/unesco-conference-highlights-place-judeo-spanish-heart-cultural-diversity-and-intercultural

[5] Link to Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5MlekLioHOzZl5dm1JeuzP?si=7duUI71PS5WeSSCsJgaeVQ

[6] Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPa0MKOKEso

[7] Chapter 1, Chapter 6; Wexler, 2012.

References

Alexander, Tamar.”Review: Sephardic Identity: Essays on a Vanishing Jewish Culture.” (2007): 189–192.

Aliberti, Davide. “Ecos de Sefarad: Identidad y Tradición en la Música de Yasmin Levy.” (2011): 21–32.

Armistead, Samuel G. “Judeo-Spanish and Pan-European Balladry.” Jahrbuch für Volksliedforschung 24 (1979): 127–138.

Attig, Remy. “Did the Sephardic Jews Speak Ladino?.” Bulletin of Spanish Studies 89.6 (2012): 831–838.

Bensignor, François. “Yasmin Levy, le chant ladino magnifié au contact des musiques du monde.” Hommes & Migrations 1271.1 (2008): 156–160.

Bunis, David M. “Judeo-Spanish culture in medieval and modern times.” Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry: from the Golden Age of Spain to Modern Times (2005): 55–76.

Cohen, Judith R. “Sonography of Judeo-Spanish Song (Cassettes, LP’s, CD’s, Video, Film),” jfer 15(2) (1993): 49–55.

Cohen, Judith R. “Judeo-Spanish (“ Ladino”) Recordings.” (1999): 530–540.

Cohen, Judith R. “The Mediaization of Judeo-Spanish Song.” Sephardic Identity: Essays on a Vanishing Jewish Culture (2005): 189–203.

Cohen, Judith R. “Judeo-Spanish song: a Mediterranean-wide interactive tradition.” Trans. Revista transcultural de música 14 (2010): 1–8.

Cohen, Mark R. “The origins of sephardic jewry in the medieval arab world.” Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry: From the Golden Age of Spain to Modern Times (2005): 23–39.

Cohen Serrano, M. (1994). “‘Adio Kerida’ Julie”, Aki Yerusahalyim 50: 48–49.

Fromm, Annette B. “Hispanic culture in exile: Sephardic life in the Ottoman Balkans.” Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry: From the Golden Age of Spain to Modern Times (2005): 145–66

Harris, David Jordan. “Sephardic Vocal Music and the Tape Recorder: New Life or the End of an Oral Tradition.” Sephardic Identity: Essays on a Vanishing Jewish Culture (2005): 179–188.

Lévy, Isaac J., 1 “Sephardic Scholarship: A personal Journey” Sephardic Identity: Essays on a Vanishing Jewish Culture (2007): 11–25.

McIntyre, John C. “Yasmin Levy’s Ladino ballads and flamenco songs: background for students of Spanish.” Tejuelo: Didáctica de la Lengua y la Literatura. Educación 7 (2010): 44–56.

Refael, Shmuel. “The Judeo-Spanish Folk Songs in Israel: Sephardic Music and Literature between Survival and Revival.” European Journal of Jewish Studies 9.1 (2015): 38–51.

Stillman, Norman A. “The Judeo-Arabic Heritage.” Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewry: From the Golden Age of Spain to Modern Times, New York, London: New York University Press (2005): 40–54.

The Judeo-Spanish Languages: Expressing Identity … — UNESCO. (n.d.). Retrieved January 10, 2021, from http://www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/single-view/news/the_judeo_spanish_languages_expressing_identity_and_opennes/

Wexler, Paul. “Are the Sephardic Jews?” Sephardic Identity: Essays on a Vanishing Jewish Culture (2007): 29–42.

Wexler, Paul. The non-Jewish origins of the Sephardic Jews. SUNY Press, 2012.

Wright, Roger. “15 Hispanic Epic and Ballad.” Medieval Oral Literature (2011): 411–27.

Appendix 1

Tu madre cuando te pario

Y te quito al mundo,

Corason ella no te dio,

Para amar segundo.

Adio, adio querida,

No quero la vida,

Me l’amargates tu.

Va, buxcat’ otro amor,

Aharva otras puertas,

Aspera otro ardor,

Que para mi sos muerta.

When your mother gave birth to you

And brought you into the world,

She gave you no heart

To love another.

Goodbye, farewell beloved,

I do not want this life,

You have embittered it for me.

Go, look for another love,

Go, knock on other doors,

Hope for some other passion,

Because for me you are dead.