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Bas Sheva--The Sacred and the Profane

Mark Hausman | 08/04/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Rarely has an artist put out such little material that spans the whole spectrum of our existence. In the case of the singer Bas Sheva this is certainly evident. Born to a famous Cantor she was steeped in the tradition of Jewish liturgical singing. And yet the quality of passion so evident as she reached the heights of religious fervor in "The Soul of a People" spoke to at least one man (Les Baxter) as passion of a different sort. That is to say; sexual passion.



Hearing a primal, almost prehistoric quality in her voice as she traversed the extreme demands of Jewish religious fervor, he felt compelled to write what was surely his masterpiece, "The Passions". In this 35 minute aural document he was able to depict a woman's many moods from the maternal to , most notoriously, the sexual. Backed by a full symphony orchestra ( with the teenaged John Williams of Star Wars fame on piano) and chorus, Bas Sheva gives the performance of a lifetime.



Of course this material was way too strong for its day (the mid 1950's) and has remained something only known to a few cognocenti. Sammy Davis jr. was known to keep a copy at his bedside for obvious reasons.



So Bas Sheva remains an artist whose fan base remains as widely divergent as a Chasidic Jew living in Williamsburg and a performance artist in San Fransisco. The Sacred and the Profane. Which category do you fall under? Mark Hausman (her son)."