The Eternal Jew's Tale, Part 2, complete

On August 3 I uploaded a preliminary version of Reading 2 of The Atternen Jewz Talen (The Eternal Jew's Tael). That upload was just the soundtrack and a single slide/image. This is the completed video, composed of 90 stills, and is 3 minutes and 7 seconds long.

The setting is Jerusalem, 33 CE. The Atternen Jew describes his meeting with a local revolutionary.

Your feedback is welcome and desired.

Atternen Jew: reading 2, preliminary

This is a preliminary version of the second reading from The Atternen Jewz Taelen, without visual accompaniment. I'm not sure about the music underlays, and will build another version tomorrow. May also change the accent of the voice.

Your critical feedback, as ever, is desired, appreciated, and of great value to me.

Aternen Jew: a reading; a video

I have been preparing a series of recorded readings of my current work, The Mith ov the Aternen Jew, since, for some reason, many people seem to think my poetry is hard to read. Go figure!

I've been told that listening to the poetry makes it a lot easier to "decipher." My mother used to have my father (both of blessed memory) read them to her, and then she'd exclaim, "Oh, so THAT'S what he's saying! Why doesn't he WRITE it that way!"

As I've mentioned before, this is a retelling of a myth that is at least a thousand years old. It has morphed into  innumerable versions, some anti-Semitic, some philo-Semitic, some using the symbolism and narrative to pursue existential and philosophical topics unburdened of religious charge! My poem is the first TRUE version. (smile). The section of the poem from which I have been preparing readings, is The Aternen Jewz Taelen, the Eternal Jew's version of history as he wanders around the Middle East and Europe. You might think of it as his diary.

So here's a short video, less than 3 minutes, to kick off the series. As always, your critical feedback is of great value to me, so don't hesitate to comment or email me.

Enjoy!!

Kristallnacht Sonata

May 1 was Yom haShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, and Nov 9 is the commemoration date of Kristallnacht, the 1938 pogrom in Germany orchestrated by the nazi high command. Kristallnacht is often thought of as "the start" of the Shoah.

I presented the following piece a number of years ago during a Kristallnacht commemoration, and have wanted to record it ever since. I just purchased Mixcraft, an inexpensive but rather powerful software package for mixing tracks (and apparently images and video, as well). My first experiment was to produce a version of this, my Kristallnacht Sonata.

Since blogspot doesn't allow uploads of mp3's, I'm embedding a link to the sound file on my website. Here it is, but I'm not sure how it will work for you.

http://www.shivvetee.com/resources/KnachtSonata_v3.mp3

 

If you have problems with it, the recording can also be accessed directly by going to the Audio Room of my website, Shivvetee.com. Here's the link:

http://www.shivvetee.com/audio_room/shivvetee_audio_rm.html

Let me know what you think.

audio version of Nishmat

On January 25, 2009, I posted a poem entitled Nishmat. Here is a recording of it, set to the melody of my favorite version of the prayer, as I learned it from my beloved teacher, Reb Victor Reinstein, may he go from strength to strength.