|
|
 |
Top Live Shows
|
| Click Here to go back. |
Time Out Chicago, Top Live Shows >>
By Steve Dollar
Chava Albertstein + Les Yeux Noirs
Symphony Center, Wed 1
Different strands of Jewish musical traditions entwine as Israeli folksinger Chava Albertstein and the French ensemble Les Yeux Noirs share a bill that celebrates a cultural bounty.
Albertstein, now in her late fifties enjoyed a long career before reaching a wider American audience with 1998's The Well, her collaboration with New York's ragingly rad Yiddish contingent, the Klezmatics. These versions of bittersweet Yiddish poems, scored to the band's frenetic and far-reaching collusion of sounds, gave Albertstein a broad template to showcase the naturally low registers of her voice. That voice- think of smoke and honey - remains a potent draw, even when she's backed up with simpler instrumentation. Her combination of folk tradition and contemporary protest comes as second nature for a peacenik in a nation always at war. "In Israel," she once said, "everyone goes to the army. You come back and go to fight in the peace movement. It's really crazy."
The seven-piece Les Yeux Noirs takes its name from an old Django Reinhardt tune, and draws deeply on Gypsy and Jewish traditions. Eric and Olivier Slabiak, the violinist brothers who cofounded the group, animate old melodies with fanciful instrumentation and eclectic arrangements: Hasidic rhythms slide into a lilting reggae pulse; electronic touches burnish a contemporary edge; traditional lyrics in Yiddish or Romanian shimmer with a renewed sense of loss and desire. Mostly, as on the band's latest disc, Tchorba, the musicians sound happy stirring up a good time in the HotClub of their own collective minds. 02/02/06
|
| Click Here to go back. |
|
 |
|
|
|
