Search - David Broza :: Starting to Breathe

Southern Spain to Southern Israel: A Mediterranean Arc

Mitch Ritter | Po' Land, Or-Wa USA | 09/07/2002

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This double CD is a welcome return to form for Broza after suffering a collapsed lung in a car crash. Broza has been Israel's leading exponent of Spain's Nuevo Cancion. This concert set at the Arad Festival in the Judean Desert features guests from Spain such as Manzanita (aka Jose Ortega Heredia) and Pepe (aka Jose Ortega Soto) with some scintillating Flamenco choruses swapped in Spanish and Hebrew. The Spanish guitars riffing off of each other blow sensual delights from the Costa del Sol through the still desert air.Broza and his lyricist partner Yehonathan Geffen have been doing faithful, if often loosely grafted onto Israeli milieu, Hebrew adaptations of Ortega Heredia's work for years. There is added joy in hearing them get to perform together, bridging the language gap between the guests from Spain and the Israeli audience with Broza's own fluency in Spanish. One hopes Volume 3 in the Massada series will bring the other master of Spain's Nuevo Cancion, Joan Manuel Serrath, to Israel for another anticipated concert meeting. Broza and Geffen have been turning Serrath's hits from Spain into Hebrew household staples, just as they have with Ortega Heredia's work.Highlights of this long awaited collaboration include "Por Tu Ausencia" and "Paloma Blanca" the latter known in its Hebrew adaptation as "Tzipor M'hapesseth/Sparrow Searching." Broza seems to have borrowed an idea from Lebanon's songwriter Marcel Khalife, whose Arabic song "Asphur/Sparrow" uses the same poetic concept of a bird seeking a safe landing place, free of traps and ambushes. Khalife was writing about the Lebanese and Phalestinians displaced by the Lebanese Civil War and the earlier creation of the State of Israel. Marcel Khalife may have in turn borrowed the idea from exiled Algerian Amazigh (Berber) bard Slimane Azem, who over 30 years ago as the Arabization of North Africa was forcing native Imazighen (Berbers) from their gas,oil & uranium rich lands and outlawing their majority Tamazight language, wrote a song called "Asroukh" which also came from the point of view of a bird seeking a safe place to nest. Palestinian Arabic diva Aml Murkus recently recorded a very powerful version of the Khalife song "Asphur" with both Arab and Jewish musicians. It might be healing to hear an artistic collaboration on this classical, if all too contemporary Mediterranean theme, between Ortega Heredia, Broza, Khalife, Murkus and the host of Amazigh Algerian bards forced into exile for recording their views in their native language of Tamazight. Such a collaboration could blend both eastern and western Mediterranean musical modalities, using all four languages of Spanish, Hebrew, Arabic, and Tamazight. The players could use both fretted guitar and fretless oud to find the harmony between western and eastern scales.This 2-CD set steers clear of duplicating any songs from the first CD recorded live by Broza with a smaller band a few years earlier at Massada. In addition to the adapted repertoire from Spain featuring the special guests mentioned above, along with Laila Malcos and the Jerusalem Salsa Band, Broza has chosen as lead guitarist young Israeli rocker Nimrod Lev, whose own debut CD and follow-up are not yet available outside of Israel. A gem of a short acoustic lullaby from early in Broza's career, "Srohim/Tangled Shoelaces" gets a rushed treatment early on in the evening, and one wishes Broza could have saved that for a more intimate moment later in the set, and really stretched out on it. "Gluya Shana Tova Min Shoshana/New Year's Card From Shoshana" is a surprising obscure item from Broza's youthful early recordings. The intervening years and depth of experience have prepared Broza to deliver this song in concert with a delicate and sensitive patina that could have only been a shallow pose those many years ago in the studio. Long before Tom Waits became known as even a cult figure in America as a bohemian be-bopping jazz poet, Broza was adapting Waits's "Christmas Card From A Hooker In Minneapolis" into this "Gluya Shana Tova Min Shoshana/New Year's Card from Shoshana" song, re-setting it by the port of Haifa and peopled with Israeli characters as hushed in their desperation and down on their luck. But Broza kept Waits's heartbreakingly melancholy melody, and should have credited the music to Waits on this otherwise beautifully packaged CD that carries all other credits and notes in both Hebrew and English. Come to think of it, given the input from Spain's stars, it might've been nice to see the booklet translated into Spanish as well."

Southern Spain to Southern Israel: A Mediterranean Arc

Mitch Ritter | Po' Land, Or-Wa USA | 01/03/2002

(4 out of 5 stars)

"As stated by the other reviewers this double CD is a welcome return to form for Broza after suffering a collapsed lung in a car crash. Broza has been Israel's leading exponent of Spain's Nuevo Cancion. This concert set at the Arad Festival in the Judean Desert features guests from Spain such as Manzanita (aka Jose Ortega Heredia) and Pepe (aka Jose Ortega Soto) with some scintillating Flamenco choruses swapped in Spanish and Hebrew. The Spanish guitars riffing off of each other blow sensual delights from the Costa del Sol through the still desert air.Broza and his lyricist partner Yehonathan Geffen have been doing faithful, if often loosely grafted onto Israeli milieu, Hebrew adaptations of Ortega Heredia's work for years. There is added joy in hearing them get to perform together, bridging the language gap between the guests from Spain and the Israeli audience with Broza's own fluency in Spanish. One hopes Volume 3 in the Massada series will bring the other master of Spain's Nuevo Cancion, Joan Manuel Serrath, to Israel for another anticipated concert meeting. Broza and Geffen have been turning Serrath's hits from Spain into Hebrew household staples, just as they have with Ortega Heredia's work.Highlights of this long awaited collaboration include "Por Tu Ausencia" and "Paloma Blanca" the latter known in its Hebrew adaptation as "Tzipor M'hapesseth/Sparrow Searching." Broza seems to have borrowed an idea from Lebanon's songwriter Marcel Khalife, whose Arabic song "Asphur/Sparrow" uses the same poetic concept of a bird seeking a safe landing place, free of traps and ambushes. Khalife was writing about the Lebanese and Phalestinians displaced by the Lebanese Civil War and the earlier creation of the State of Israel. Marcel Khalife may have in turn borrowed the idea from exiled Algerian Amazigh (Berber) bard Slimane Azem, who over 30 years ago as the Arabization of North Africa was forcing native Imazighen (Berbers) from their gas,oil & uranium rich lands and outlawing their majority Tamazight language, wrote a song called "Asroukh" which also came from the point of view of a bird seeking a safe place to nest. Palestinian Arabic diva Aml Murkus recently recorded a very powerful version of the Khalife song "Asphur" with both Arab and Jewish musicians. It might be healing to hear an artistic collaboration on this classical, if all too contemporary Mediterranean theme, between Ortega Heredia, Broza, Khalife, Murkus and the host of Amazigh Algerian bards forced into exile for recording their views in their native language of Tamazight. Such a collaboration could blend both eastern and western Mediterranean musical modalities, using all four languages of Spanish, Hebrew, Arabic, and Tamazight. The players could use both fretted guitar and fretless oud to find the harmony between western and eastern scales.This 2-CD set steers clear of duplicating any songs from the first CD recorded live by Broza with a smaller band a few years earlier at Massada. In addition to the adapted repertoire from Spain featuring the special guests mentioned above, along with Laila Malcos and the Jerusalem Salsa Band, Broza has chosen as lead guitarist young Israeli rocker Nimrod Lev, whose own debut CD and follow-up are not yet available outside of Israel. A gem of a short acoustic lullaby from early in Broza's career, "Srohim/Tangled Shoelaces" gets a rushed treatment early on in the evening, and one wishes Broza could have saved that for a more intimate moment later in the set, and really stretched out on it. "Gluya Shana Tova Min Shoshana/New Year's Card From Shoshana" is a surprising obscure item from Broza's youthful early recordings. The intervening years and depth of experience have prepared Broza to deliver this song in concert with a delicate and sensitive patina that could have only been a shallow pose those many years ago in the studio. Long before Tom Waits became known as even a cult figure in America as a bohemian be-bopping jazz poet, Broza was adapting Waits's "Christmas Card From A Hooker In Minneapolis" into this "Gluya Shana Tova Min Shoshana/New Year's Card from Shoshana" song, re-setting it by the port of Haifa and peopled with Israeli characters as hushed in their desperation and down on their luck. But Broza kept Waits's heartbreakingly melancholy melody, and should have credited the music to Waits on this otherwise beautifully packaged CD that carries all other credits and notes in both Hebrew and English. Come to think of it, given the input from Spain's stars, it might've been nice to see the booklet translated into Spanish as well."

This cd will having you breathing again...

kbp | Tel-Aviv | 10/24/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

""Starting to Breath" marks the return of David Broza to the live stage after a serious traffic accident in August 1998. The album was recorded during a six hour concert that began at midnight and ended with the sun rising behind the virtuoso guitarist, singer, and composer as he performed at the bottom of the Massada fortress, an ancient site located in Israel, next to the Jordan river. This album begins with sensuous,slower songs of self-investigation and discovery, mostly in connection with love, and climbs, gradually, to a breathtaking pace. David Broza welcomes Nimrod Lev, Manzinata (well known Spanish composer) and the Jerusalem Salsa Band. The music of this album encompasses the spirit of Spanish and Israeli folk music, the lyrics come from the finest Spanish and Hebrew poets. Broza also introduces, for the first time, lyrics that he wrote.Listening to this live performance, (as with all of Broza's records in English, Spanish and Hebrew (...)), you will involuntarily experience every possible emotion - even if you don't understand the words. The timing of this release is especially important - it will bring listeners a sense of joy and healing in these difficult times."