Program Notes:

Through the Alleys of Time – for classical guitar and tape focuses on the Ladino language, culture and way of life – left behind, as the older generation is passing away. My feeling for the disappearing tradition came mainly during a visit to Córdoba and Sevilla, where the alleys seemed to tell me the old story of the long-gone local communities. I could imagine a flourishing and vivid community, which after 1492 had to flee in every direction, bringing its language and tradition into new places such as Greece and Bulgaria.

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The music tells the story of a troubadour – a folk singer, who passes from village to village, town to town in search of a certain song, while many fragments of other songs, prayers and chants appear before him. These include Jewish prayers, traditional Ladino – Judæo-Espagnol songs, talking, story-telling, as well as influences of the Christianity and Islam, since during the Golden Age in Andalucía all three religions have skilled to live peacefully and enriched each other.

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All the recorded fragments are fully authentic, giving stage to old men and women who have been asked to sing songs as remembered from childhood. They are/were probably the last link in a long chain, since these songs, language and expressions were not transmitted fully (if at all) to the next generation. I am grateful for the work of Dr. Shoshana Weich-Shahak who, as a life-long project had traced singers and possible informants, made these recordings with such dedication and passion and most kindly, allowed me to use fragments of them. Thus, the work as a whole is a passage through time, where voices, sounds, images from the past appear before our troubadour, who does not end his wondering until discovering his long-waited song – La Serena.

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In additional to the authentic recordings, one may find the sounds of soprano, oud, laud, recorders, viola da gamba, percussion and additional guitar, which were all recorded separately and went through a sound manipulation. This is in additional to field recordings that I have done in Spain.

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I would like to thank and credit the following people:
Monica Garcia-Albea, soprano
Lara Morris, recorders
Myrna Herzog, viola da gamba
Guy Kark, oud and laud 
Liat Cohen, classical guitar
Avi Agababa, percussion

Sound Track Editing and Mixing: Dmitry Lifshitz, Yossi Ron
Sound engineers: Eldad Berman (Tel Aviv), Marcus Fritzsch (Berlin), Pierre Fardel (Paris.)

Dr. Shoshana Weich-Shahak for her kind support and assistance in locating the authentic recordings.
The National Sound Archives (Jerusalem, Israel) 
Yad Ben-Zvi Library (Jerusalem, Israel) Sebastián de la Obra and Rosana de Aza – Casa De Sefarad (Córdoba)

Through the Alleys of Time has been commissioned by the Legacy Heritage Fund, through the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, with dedication to Guitarist Liat Cohen.

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Additional Information:

Tape includes authentic recordings of singers, story-tellers, sounds from South Spain as well as recorded soprano, oud, lute, viola da gamba, recorders and percussion.