Shai Tsabari Sings Love Songs, And You Can Sing Along
Shai Tsabari Sings Love Songs, And You Can Sing Along
The singer’s rich cultural heritage is the essence of modern Israel
For Israeli vocalist, Shai Tsabari, music and prayer are one and the same, which, given his background, seems almost inevitable. “Most of my songs are prayers,” he says about his Hebrew-language cover of the Leonard Cohen song, “Lover Lover Lover.” “I like praying, and ‘Lover’ is a praying song.”
For Tsabari, that distinction between the holy and the profane, if it exists at all, was blurred early on. He grew up in Bat Yam, on the Israeli coast, just south of Tel Aviv, and was raised in a traditional Yemenite home. In that world, music was ever-present. It was the backbone of daily life, a pillar of worship, and central to the liturgical experience. As a boy, he sang in synagogue—as did most of his peers—and learned proper vocal technique from his father, who is a Mori, or traditional Yemeni teacher.
“Yemenite Jews are famous for their singing,” Tsabari says. “I don’t think it’s genetic. It’s that you practice so much singing while you’re in the synagogue. It’s not like in other synagogues where there is a cantor leading, everybody sings throughout the service.”
Traditional music was an integral part of Tsabari’s home life, too, especially from his grandmother. She sang songs that drew from an ancient Yemeni women’s musical tradition, and, in addition to the songs she sang that accompanied cycle-of-life events—like birth, marriage, and death—improvised music that fit the moment, almost on a whim. “Many times, my late grandmother used to spontaneously sing whatever came to mind,” he says.
But coming from such a rich cultural heritage isn’t without its baggage, and in the 1990s, when Tsabari was first coming up, Israeli tastes were Western-leaning. There wasn’t much of a market for his brand of traditional-flavored music. He spent well over a decade working behind the scenes, on staff at the Israeli label, NaNa Disc, and as a backing vocalist for the popular Israeli singer, Berry Sakharov. But change was in the air, and in 2013, his vocals on “Ma'alei Dammma,” one of the final releases of Israeli icon, Ahuva Ozeri, coincided with the growing popularity in Israel of music from Jewish diaspora communities. The song was a hit, and Tsabari was on the map.
Tsabari’s music is an organic fusion of traditional sounds, and a heavier, Western-influenced vibe. He mixes rock instrumentation, retro synths, and old world musical styles and aesthetics. His Yemeni background looms large, but doesn’t overshadow the other ingredients he factors in. That’s a big part of the modern Israeli experience, too, or as he tells it, “[The music] has everything inside, and in Israeli terms, is very much accepted. It sounds logical to us because we live in a very pluralistic place.”
That pluralism, and how that meshes with Tsabari’s more traditional and spiritual influences, was a big part of the conversation I had with him from his home in Bat Yam. We spoke about his struggles sticking to that identity at a time when it wasn’t in vogue, his experiences with Sakharov and Ozeri, discovering his audience and the recent embrace of traditional musics in Israel, and falling in love with the intimacy of small performances as an unexpected blessing of pandemic-related restrictions.
I recently interviewed Karolina, and she told me that back in the mid-90s, she entered a contest, and came in second place. You came in first.
Yeah, that was so many years ago. It was in 1996. There is a video of me on television, too. I was very young and very frightened. It was a very long time ago, and it seems like in a different life.
Were you studying at the Rimon School of Music at the time?
I was there for only one year. I took two courses in the next year, but I left very soon after that, because I didn’t find my place there. For me, it was an unwelcoming experience. I won the contest, and they really liked me, but there was no place for Jewish or Yemeni music, which were the things I brought from home. At Rimon at that time, they mostly studied jazz and American music, which is great, but my heart was not only there. I love rock and I started liking jazz after Rimon as well, but there was no resonance for the stuff I brought from home, and I guess that’s why I left.
Did you study vocal technique and how to control your voice when you were there?
That was the thing, when I got to Rimon, I was already a very good singer with really good technique. It was all intuitive. I knew it because I sang in the synagogue. My father is a cantor. I learned how to sing from him, and he sang correctly. But then at Rimon they started trying to fix me, and I couldn’t understand why. It was very difficult. I started treating singing as something intellectual, although it is very, very physical. I was—and I still am—a very physical singer. I see the voice as part of my body, and I think singing is more physical than intellectual. It’s something tribe-like.
Are you saying that they tried to intellectualize what you did intuitively?
Yeah, and I didn’t like it at all. It brought so much frustration to my singing. I thought I should quit and find my own path.
Is your father a Mori [traditional teacher]?
My father is a Mori, and I learned from him. I also taught myself. I listened to the radio, and my brother used to buy rock ’n’ roll records on vinyl. I used to listen to the music, and imitate the singers. I listened to a lot of different kinds of music. Israeli music, and Yemeni music at home, like liturgical Yemeni music.
Like Piyutim?
In the Yemeni community we don’t call it piyutim, we call it shira. I sang in synagogue like every other Yemeni kid. In the Yemeni synagogues, we all sing throughout the service. My learning was quite intuitive. I learned a lot by myself, how to sing, and about music. I came to Rimon with no official education, but with a lot of common sense.
Your grandmother also sang. Does Yemenite culture have a tradition of women’s singing, too?
The women’s singing is very different from how the men sing. It’s in Arabic. The topics of the songs are mostly secular, not religious. Whereas the male music is mostly religious. You usually you won’t hear a man sing love songs, unless it’s a love song for HaKadosh Baruch Hu [God].
The women’s songs often follow the cycle of life. For a wedding, or a bride on her wedding night, or when a woman gives birth. They sing at funerals as well. But they only sing for women, they don’t sing for men. It’s totally separate. At a funeral, the men would walk ahead, and then the ladies would follow—if they are allowed to follow—[otherwise], their part of the funeral would be at the beginning. They would mourn and wail.
Did they sing together, or was the music improvised? Do they have a repertoire?
There are some classic folk songs, but, for example, many times my late grandmother used to spontaneously sing whatever came to mind. She used to improvise. She took a drum, or a tassa—a tassa is a metal plate—she used to knock on it with a gold ring or with a spoon, and that’s where the rhythm would come from.
The Yemeni Jews never played musical instruments—or formal musical instruments—they only played informal percussion, like a tank of oil or a tank of gasoline. They never played oud—most of them didn’t—or never played violin or whatever was the common instrument in the different communities of the Middle East. It’s a Jewish thing. It’s because they’re mourning on the ruins of the first temple. But it isn’t a Jewish law, it’s a Jewish custom. They accepted it on themselves.
But that’s what makes them such great singers. They sang only the melody, and they had to be very precise with singing the melody, so they are quite phenomenal singers.
Is the repertoire familiar to everyone?
They know the music by heart. They know the melodies, and many times they argue about it. They are very proud of their singing, and they have this tradition of singing by heart. Yemeni Jews also have different ways to pronounce the Hebrew language, which is more similar to Arabic pronunciation.
After you left Rimon, did you take a break from music for a while?
After Rimon, I went to India and learned a lot of music on the road, but I didn’t practice music in a professional way there. After that, I started working at a small record label, NaNa Disc, first as a secretary, and then I worked there as an intern, bringing sandwiches to the studio, and that kind of thing.
Working there, is that where you met other Israeli artists?
At that time I had the privilege to meet and learn about the work of many great Israeli artists, like Berry Sakharof, Ahuva Ozeri, and others. I had a chance to see how they work, and to understand the mechanics of recording an album. I saw a lot of concerts and I learned a lot about the Israeli music industry. It was a fascinating time. About five years later, I became a backing vocalist for Berry Sakharof, and I sang with him for 13 years. He really helped me with my career. I also had a chance, because of my acquaintance, to work with Ahuva Ozeri.
Were you with her at the end of her life?
I performed with Ahuva Ozeri the last three years of her life. When I worked at NaNa Disc, she was recording her last album as a singer, which is called Tsiltsulei Pa’amonim. I had the chance to meet her, but we didn’t become friends. About seven years later she lost her voice—she had throat cancer and her vocal cords were cut—and she was muted. But she was a very strong person. She was a really great and devoted musician, and she never quit writing music. She wrote a lot of songs, and she wanted other Israeli artists to sing her songs. I really tried hard to become part of this album, but she didn’t want it. But the album’s executive producer really liked me, and he saw a chance when they got a song [that had been recorded for the album], and they were not happy with the vocal performance. He suggested the song to me, and I had the chance to get onto the album. When the album was finished, my song was the only song that became a radio hit. For me, it was a miracle, you know, because I was not supposed to be on that album at all. It was the right time for me, because three months afterwards I had my own song on the radio. I started working with my own band for the first time, and it was very meaningful independent entrance to the Israeli music scene.
Was she happy with your performance in the end?
Ahuva was a very complex person, sometimes she was very happy and sometimes she wasn’t. It was ok by me, because at that time I had my own band and my own career. Me and my band really loved hosting her at our concerts. We did hundreds of concerts together and it was fabulous.
When you were with Berry, was that your first real gig?
That was my first professional gig in the music industry. I did something on a soundtrack with him about five years before that, but it wasn’t a project. It was one-time recording. A few years later, he gave me the chance to be his backing vocalist on a project called, Adumei Hasefatot. I was hypnotized by the music and by the lyrics. The musicians that I was sitting with were all virtuoso talents, masters of their instruments, and their instruments were really special.
It was around that time that Israelis started embracing music that wasn’t Western, but was coming from Jewish diaspora communities. What’s been happening in Israel that there's been this resurgence of interest in non-Western music?
It’s not just from Middle Eastern countries, it’s also from European origins. Up until the 1990s, most Israelis were looking up to American music. They were seeking the best new American or English or European music. Beginning in the 2000s—and by the end of the ‘00s, it became a big wave—people started to look at their grandparents’ music. It doesn’t really matter if your grandparents came from Russia or Poland or Morocco or Iraq or Yemen. People started doing the music from their old homelands. You can put someone outside of his homeland, but you cannot take it out. A man cannot invent his culture in a decade or in a generation, and the grandchildren of the people who immigrated to Israel in the 1950s started revering the music of their origins. Because they were Israelis and they lived in this pluralistic place where you can find so many people from so many countries, they had a chance to compose a different kind of music. They could attach music from Iraq or from Yemen, with rock ’n’ roll, or to put together klezmer music with Yemeni music or electronic music. It is a very special phenomenon to Israel, and that is regarding the texts as well.
In the beginning of Zionism in Israel, at the beginning of the state, it wasn’t mainstream to lead a Jewish religious life. The mainstream was to be a secular socialist, preferably living on a kibbutz, and that was the new Jew. People rebelled and said, “No, we have origins. We speak Hebrew in other forms—like more ancient forms—and we are devoted to the texts. We are devoted to the ideas coming from these kinds of texts.”
For me, it was a very blessed phenomenon, because that was what I was lacking at Rimon. The things I brought from home were meaningless at Rimon. They wanted to teach me jazz and blues, but I wasn’t born in the southern parts of the U.S.A. to a black family, I was born to a Yemeni family in a suburb of Tel Aviv. Something was wrong about that, although I love jazz and I love the blues.
But it wasn’t authentic to you.
It’s not authentic to the Middle East. We live in the Middle East. This is the Middle East. You cannot invent yourself.
You also combine a lot of different elements and influences in your music.
When I was young, I read an article in a youth magazine about the hippie movement. I really loved it, because it said that the hippie people live in a house with no walls, and that was because they didn’t want a hierarchy between them. I really loved that idea. At my concerts, there is no hierarchy between me and the audience. I don’t like hierarchy, and I don’t think there is important music and less important music. I show that in my music by the fact that I combine many different kinds of genre. For example, take my song, “HaMelech.” It is a very Middle Eastern melody, with a dub like bass, psychedelic influences, and it finishes with a klezmer part. It has everything inside, and in Israeli terms, is very much accepted. It sounds logical to us because we live in a very pluralistic place. It’s something we have to remember and celebrate.
You have Hasidim and Yemenite Jews living next each other.
Exactly, and you can open the radio and listen to Billy Eilish.
You covered Leonard Cohen’s “Lover Lover Lover.” Is he well-known in Israel?
People love Leonard Cohen in Israel. He had a huge concert a decade ago in Ramat Gan, and there were 60,000 people in the audience.
What’s his appeal?
Leonard Cohen is a great poet and Israelis admire great poetry. He was a great singer. He started writing “Lover Lover Lover” while he was here. He volunteered in the Yom Kippur War, and went to Sinai and sang to the soldiers. He wrote the song as a jam, and improvised different lyrics. When he got back to Canada or America he wrote the lyrics for “Lover Lover Lover.” The song has an Israeli connection.
Why did you do it in Hebrew and not English?
A good friend of mine, Shlomi Shaban—who is a phenomenal pianist and a great songwriter—we had a concert together and wanted to do something special. From time to time he translates songs from English to Hebrew. He had started translating this song when his first son was born. He realized he hadn’t finished, and suggested it to me. We did it one time at this concert and everybody liked it so much, we had to record it.
What are your plans post-corona?
I am working on a new album, but I guess the world won’t be the same. I don’t feel like doing the same things as I did before. In Israel, we had a chance to perform to 20 people on rooftops or in gardens or in open spaces. It was very close. I just came with a guitarist and sang with no microphone and no sound system. It was like going back in time to when people gathered and sang and talked to each other. It was fascinating, and I think I have to bring something from that to my upcoming post-corona concerts.
Will you play smaller venues?
No. I think it will be more acoustic and people will be more a part of the concert—singing together and dancing together—maybe I’ll do the concert in the audience and not on stage. I don’t know yet. I haven’t figured it out yet, but that’s what we intend to do.
But it’ll be much more intimate.
For sure.
From The Archives: #ICYMI: We Don’t Play The Sad Stuff
Annette Ezekiel Kogan explains her take on Jewish identity, and how her band, Golem, embodies those ideals.
Go here to read the complete interview with Annette Ezekiel Kogan.
Subscribe To Our Premier Tier And Get Even More Great Stuff
In addition to the incredible interviews you receive every week, we’re now offering a special premium tier. The premium tier does not replace the great content you already receive, rather, it gives you even more.
The premium tier is only $5 a month, or $50 for an entire year (2 free months!), and for a limited time, we’re offering 40% off the annual price. That’s right, you get a one-year subscription for just $30.
Yikes!
Specifically, paid subscribers get:
Deep, probing essays about the spiritual nature of music. We’ve been working on this content for a while, and it is powerful stuff. It offers a uniquely Jewish take on music and spirituality. Not to be missed.
Incredible curated playlists. These playlists include more than just music from the artists featured in the Ingathering, but also things we stumble upon in our research, and amazing things we need to share. If you’re a paid subscriber, you’re someone who needs to hear this.
The opportunity to support the Ingathering. The Ingathering is fun to produce, but it takes a lot of effort and time to research and write. A paid subscription is an amazing way to show your support.
Become a Founding Member. If you love the Ingathering, and you’re looking for a way to show even more support, become a founding member. The suggested founding donation is $180. You can give less if you want—as long as it’s more than the cost of an annual subscription—and obviously, you can always give more. The amount is up to you.
If you’d rather just give a donation, you can do that, too. The Ingathering is a project of Vechulai, a registered 501(c)3 tax exempt organization. Go here to donate and learn more.
If you don’t want to be a paid subscriber, that’s not a problem. Stay a free subscriber and keep enjoying the great content you already receive.
The first premium newsletter, about “Music, Community, and Prophecy,” went out last week, and it was amazing. Also, if you have any questions, reply to this newsletter and we’ll get right back to you (or email us at: jewishmusicandspirituality@gmail.com).
Thank you being a regular reader and part of the Ingathering team. Your support at whatever level—founding member, premium subscriber, or free subscriber—is invaluable, and we can’t do it without you.
Thank you!