Meadow, Roses and Nightingales

Bonnie Robiczek Meadow, Roses and Nightingales

A collection of Sephardic songs for voice and guitar. Translations and lyric settings of Ladino lyrics by Judith Kerman. 

Sephardic Jews and their music
The Iberian Peninsula—home to Spain and Portugal—was under Islamic rule from the mid-Eighth Century through 1492 of the Common Era. Participating in the Golden Age of Islam, with its flourishing of science, literature and the arts, Iberian society was perhaps uniquely tolerant and heterogeneous. Arab and Berber immigrants lived side-by-side with Spanish Muslims, Christians and Jews. Judaic creativity and scholarship benefited from this tolerance. Jews reached the highest echelons of secular government and the military and gained renown as poets, scholars, and physicians. A notable example was the physician and philosopher Moses ben Maimon (1138–1204), known as Maimonides.
In 1492, the fall of the city of Granada to the Catholic kings of Castile marked the end of Muslim rule on the Peninsula. Soon, the Jews of Spain and Portugal were given the choice of conversion to Christianity, exile, or execution. Many converted (sometimes maintaining Jewish identity in dangerous secret), and many were killed, but hundreds of thousands left. They settled in most Mediterranean countries, as well as Asia Minor, England, the Americas, and parts of Western Europe. Known as Sephardic Jews, these refugees brought with them Iberian culture and language, especially a variant of Spanish called Ladino or Judeo-Espanyol, which included Hebrew, Arabic and other elements. As the Sephardim dispersed, their creative works were flavoured by the new cultures in which they found themselves, particularly North African and Turkish influences. The varied music of the Sephardic Jews emerged out of this complex history.
There are several excellent songbooks available which include the songs in this collection and many others from the Sephardic tradition; references to our sources can be found in the notes at the back of this book. These collections also provide an introduction to the songs’ cultural background. However, few of them include playable classical guitar accompaniments. Guitarist/composer Bonnie Robiczek Meadow decided to write original accompaniments for performances with mezzo-soprano Judith Kerman, who wrote the English translations, resulting in this publication.

Listen to some of the songs from this collection performed by Bonnie Robiczek Meadow (guitar), Judith Kerman (mezzo-soprano):

Montanas Altas:

 

Ir Me Quero La Mi Madre:

 

Los Bilbilicos:

 

Respondemos:

 

• Product: Self-Print (PDF) or Print on Demand
• Pages: 84 pages + 32 pages voice part
• Level: Intermediate
• Order number: BE-241107
  
• ISMN 979-0-706842-21-9