TTT :: Haleluhu • Nissan

Yossi Green: WHERE ARE YOU?

"Nissan" is a Shlomo Simcha production. This song is brought to you and harmonized by Yossi Green.



The sad is that I get tremendously nostalgic—Stockholm Syndrome?—when hearing this song, as it played incessantly in "86", our London flat. Eh.

Ma Yedidus • Avraham Fried

Yossi Green! Where are you?... Oh! There you are again.



Good shabbos friendlies.
Right here, right now!

Omnom • Dedi

After Monday's matchup, I began thinking of all the Dediness that came and conquered our first-generation CD Stereos around the time of the first Gulf War and disappeared on or around 9/11.

I thought of how Yossi Green took many of his weirdest and greatest rhyming risks with Dedi (chavro dichavroch, chavro is-a-leiii), composed some long and beautiful slow songs for him and backed him up on almost every song.

And I thought of Omnom. I thought of how MB wakes up every morning, looks at the cereal cabinet and says "Nomnomnomnom..." But, also, that this must be a powerful and beautiful piyut of some sort or another.

On research, it seems actually to be a powerful and slightly frightening passage from RaMChaL's Daas Tvunos:

...when a person is brought to his knees, this is Hashem cleansing him of his Yetzer Hora; showing the power of His Kingship; whenever He wants, He puts the world on tornado watch and He created, and He causes suffering and He crushes and He heals and this is an anchor of Jewish faith...: the worse it is for the creations, the greater might Hashem's omnipotent strength be revealed; from the depth of the worst suffering sprouts absolute and powerful redemption.

אמנם, הנה זה הוא מחוקו של היחוד העליון לבדו ב"ה - להראות עוצם ממשלתו השלמה; שכל הזמן שהוא רוצה, מניח העולם להיות סוער והולך בילדי הזמן, עת אשר שלט הרע בעולם; ולא עוד, אלא שאינו מעכב על ידי הרע הזה מעשות כל אשר בכחו לעשות, ואפילו מגיעות בריותיו עד הדיוטא התחתונה. אפס כי לא מפני זה יאבד עולמו, כי הממשלה לו לבדו, והוא עשה, והוא סובל, והוא מחץ, והוא ירפא, ואין עוד מלבדו. והנה זה יתד חזק לאמונת בני ישראל, אשר לא ירך לבם לא מאורך הגלות ולא ממרירותו הקשה, כי אדרבה, הרשה הקב"ה והניח לרע לעשות כל מה שבכחו לעשות, כמו שביארנו. ובסוף הכל - כל יותר שהקשה הרע את עול סבלו על הבריות, כן יותר יגלה כח יחודו ית' וממשלתו העצומה אשר הוא כל יכול, ומתוך עומק הצרות הרבות והרעות מצמיח ישועה בכחו הגדול ודאי.

Now, I did post this some years back. Read my comments then, to hear my reaction now.

Still love the song.

TTT :: Ve'oz Yihyu • Yossi Green • 8th Note

"Is this really terrible?" I can imagine you asking this question of yourself, as you seldom ask questions of me. "No, not really," I hear myself responding, though I am technically just saying. "It is not really terrible, but beneath its exquisitely-plucked intro and beyond its mellow low part, it is quite the whiny ear-worm." And that is why it has been TTTd.

Your thoughts?

TTT Uva'u Ha'ovdim • Dudu Fisher

Another Yossi Green experiment, this one involves a world-class opera singer and Chazzan squeezed onto a Jewsic CD of songs, arrangements and Yossi Green harmonies that would likely be passed on by Yitzchak Simcha.

Dudu: Please, never on Fridays through Thursdays, thank you.

National Day of Kanei Lishimcha

By overwhelming request, today is National Day of Kanei Lishimcha.

I.M. Helfgot (composed by Yossi Green and recorded on his "8th Note" album). As I remember, when 8th Note was released, the sense was that Fried was wrongly-denied this magnificent song and weirdly assigned "Heseich Hadaas" (which could as well have been sung by Shloime Dachs). It was also the official induction of Chazzan Helfgot as a mainstream singer, and not only as a novelty act at HASC.

Avraham Fried. See original post and comments here.

Ateres Zekeinim • Dedi

First-stage "Dedi" is synonymous with "Yossi Green". "Beautiful" or "mind-blowing" do not always come to mind with this pair. "Happy" and "Contagious" do. The hyperactivity is Dedi. The melodies, arrangements and most of all, harmonies are Yossi Green. They both have more enthusiasm and musicality respectively, than either has singing ability.



Enjoyous.

Shades of Acapella • Yossi Green - Shades of Green

This track was naturally selected by the 9 Days themselves, which have proved surprisingly resilient in rejecting any *NSYNC, Bon Jovi or Mariah Perry in Jewish drag, a.k.a., AKA Pella. Grrrr.



And then there is the beauty of the two songs selected for acapella treatment: 1) Min Hameitzar composed for Shlomo Simcha, and 2) Ki Chilatzta, which I had not heard before and do not know from outside of this track. Do You?

Ribon • Dedi

Sorry for the delay in posting... I meant to not post, but then this came on. You just can't beat Dedi Day.

Yossi Green harmonizes starting 1:53.

“Shabbos with Zeidy Berish – Ma Yedidus Menuchoseich.”

Shades of Acapella - Yossi Green

For the beginning, a super-gawj Min Hameitzar composed for and recorded by Shlomo Simcha Sufrin. A gut shabbos, a gut choidesh, a gut yohr!



Today is Rosh Chodesh, the invisible beginning of everything bright! Let us grow, let us know. נצח ישראל לא ישקר!

Meshoych Chasdecha - Avraham Fried

There's Kabbala about this zemer. I've never learned Kabbala; Google it and tell me what it says.

Dedi - Pi Tzaddik

This is a nice enough song, sung by a nice enough fellow, now to be enriched by a very nice side note, preceded by a word of gratitude: Thank you S&RK for gifting me an evening of Jewy Shmoozic™ with Yossi Green last night. After the concert, I asked Yossi about this and that and he gave the backstory to this. (This was not one of things I asked about, though.):

There was a tekufa in 1992 during which three Tzaddikim--the Lubavitcher Rebbe, the Gerrer Rebbe and the Ribnitzer Rebbe--stopped speaking, and Yossi was moved to compose the song Pi Tzaddik. He recorded himself singing it and sent it to the Ribnitzer Rebbe's court by whom he was later informed that the Rebbe listened to it on headphones around the clock and would not let it be removed.

זכרוני צדיקים וקדושים לברכה

Tehillim 37:30, 31, 29
פי צדיק יהגה חכמה, ולשונו תדבר משפט
The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom and his tongue speaks justice.

תורת אלהיו בלבו לא תמעד אשריו
Hashem's law is in his heart; his steps never slide.

צדיקים יירשו ארץ וישכנו לעד עליה
Tzaddikim will inherit the land and live upon it forever.

Adon Olam - Kol Achai

If you've seen Kol Achai in concert, you may not be familiar with their edgier, funner stuff. They are easily a benchmark for vocal harmonies in Jewish music.

This is Yossi Green's Adon Olam...

Shlosha Kesorim - Sheya Rubenstein

Here's a man with a surprisingly pleasant voice for someone with an unbearably irritating voice. Paradoxically speaking.

The short story: A Yossi Green creation (ie, YG created him and composed his stuff). I love this song for Green's way of choosing lyrics that are not only obscure (these aren't necessarily) but that have been sliced-and-diced to extract a serious message that just freakin' WORKS with the tune and the and the and the arrangements and like, vocals. It just WORKS! And then Green injects a bunch of Greenitude into the later part of the song. Which I like.



.בשלושה כתרים נכתרו ישראל: כתר תורה, [וכתר] כהונה, ו[כתר] מלכות
כתר כהונה זכה בו אהרן [שנאמר: "והיתה לו ולזרעו אחריו ברית כהונת עולם",] כתר
מלכות זכה בו דוד [שנאמר: "זרעו לעולם יהיה וכסאו כשמש נגדי",] כתר תורה
הרי מונח ועומד ומוכן לכל ישראל, [שנאמר: "תורה צוה לנו משה מורשה קהלת
יעקב", כל מי שירצה יבא ויטול. שמא תאמר שאותם הכתרים גדולים מכתר
תורה? הרי הוא אומר: "בי מלכים ימלוכו ורוזנים יחוקקו צדק בי שרים ישורו",
הא למדת שכתר תורה גדול משניהם].

Whatevs.