October 9th, 2020. Shabbat (and Simchat Torah) is almost here
Put on your dancing shoes and get ready for Belf’s Romanian Orchestra and travel back in time more than one century
Hello! How are you? You see, there are many recordings of pieces of Simchat Torah but in Music Before Shabbat there are no concessions! The older the better. I have to confess that the first time I listened to any Simchat Torah piece it was by the Klezmatics and I had no idea about what those words meant.
And another confession: at the bottom ? you’ll find not only one, but two videos, and the second is a concession… Check it, it is lovely too and it will introduce you in the mood of dancing.
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What is Simchat Torah
Dancing with the Torah?¿?¿? ?
Who were those “Belf’s Romanian Orchestra”?
I was expecting to find the bio of Mr. Belf… Hehe, no way. At the website of the Audio Portal of Community Radios, accredited to the “Radaktion Jiddische Kultur – Dr. Juliane Lensch und Clemens Riesser, Radio RUM-90,1”, I found this:
“Belf’s Romanian Orchestra – Rumynski Orkestr Belfa, an early document of historical recordings of klezmer kapelies from Eastern Europe. Not much is known about this band. Neither the line-up nor where the klezmorim performed. Not even the first name of the leader of the “Belf’s Romanian Orchestra” V. Belf is known. But it is certain that these are very early recordings from Eastern Europe. These recordings were made between 1908 and 1914, i.e. before the First World War, and are probably the first recordings that are still known to us today.”
Despite that, there are a lot of recordings by this orchestra and it is very influential on the current klezmer artists. According to Kurt Bjorling on Musiker.org:
“The ‘Belf’s Romanian Orchestra’ is a quartet consisting of clarinet, two violins, and piano. They recorded at least 60 pieces for the Syrena record company from 1912-14. Syrena was a Russian-owned record company operating in Warsaw before the First World War. These records are rare today, but they were highly influential, in both America and Europe, at the time they were made and distributed. These same recordings have also been highly influential in the ‘klezmer revival’ of today. The Belf Orchestra recorded at least 28 pieces for two other record companies, Amur and Extraphon, but none of these are yet known to exist in any collection.”
Do you want to learn more about Sirena record company?
Check this page at Belfology.
This is nowadays 33 Piękna street in Warsaw, where Sirena Records settled their first pressing plant ?
In The Fiddle Handbook, by Chris Haigh, he say:“Belf was actually from the Ukraine; the use of the word Romanian was probably more of a marketing ploy than anything else. […] These recordings offer one of the chief surviving insights into the repertoire and style of Old World klezmorim.”The author refers to the work by Jeffrey Wollock: “European Recordings of Jewish Instrumental Folk Music, 1911-14” in the ARSC Journal, volume XXVIII / i 1997. (Association for Recorded Sound Collections)
Do you want to listen to more pieces by the Belf’s Romanian Orchestra? Check this page at the Internet Archive.
In the Bandcamp of Bivolița Klezmer, band from Connecticut, they mention that:
“Romanian apparently signaled “Jewish” in the record market at the time, and also the more elaborate, developed music of the klezmer “south.” Many of the 42 Belf sides are of the slow dance form khosidl—which is almost unknown in the American discography and represents a large shift in the musical tastes of immigrant Jewish communities. These pieces show the introspective side of the khosidl genre, which developed as way for secular, Misnagdic Jews to incorporate an element of Hasidic spirituality into what became a highly individual, expressive dance form.”
What is that of “Misnagdic”? Misnagdic are considered the oposition to Hasidism. Learn more on this page of the University of Calgary.
If you play yourself, there are many transcriptions of the recordings by the Orchestra, at the page Belfology, by Alan Fendler and Roger Reid. This is the transcription of our today’s selection.
I found this picture at the website of JewishBoston. The artist is Chana Helen Rosenberg, born in 1946 in UK and settled in the historic city of Be’er Sheva (Israel). It represents the celebration of Simchat Torah.
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Simkhes Toyre, by Belf’s Romanian Orchestra
Simkhes Toyre, by Zibrok Trio
Zibrok Trio is composed by Boris Winter on violin, Laurent Derache on accordion and Youen Cadiou on double bass. The lady on the film is an actress, Maud Gentien, no a musician from the trio. As far as I know they don’t have much recorded production neither a special relationship with Jewish music but this piece is quite enjoyable and… it is time to dance!
I hope you’ll like it and, if so, feel free to share it and invite your friends to join us.
It is as symple as sending … this link to sign up.
Araceli Tzigane | Mapamundi Música
To know more about our artists, click here.
The “à la Bechet” refers to Sidney Bechet, a black composer, clarinetist and saxofonist from New Orleans, born in 1897 with an innate talent for music that would develope from a very young age. He is widely known, but if you want to learn more about his biography, check for instance 
David started in classical music and recovered the music of his ancestors in his early 30s, when he became curious about his ancestors. His grandparents arrived to the USA from Eastern Europe at the end of XIX century and, after the religious prosecution they had suffered, they decided to leave all that behind and to talk only English.
The band is active and I have just asked them what is this piece about. So, Lidiya is the mother of the clarinetist of the band, Gal Klein (in the picture, without glasses, the other man is the co-founder, Amit Peled). He made the piece for her 50th birthday.
Before ending, I want to announce the initiative of the restless team of Sephardic Stories: Sephardic Collection, in which they are producing new contents and interviews, that you can find in their 
Over there, as he was unable to read music, it was difficult to enter in an orchestra, so he made his living playing mainly in weddings. Soon he became known for his eccentricities, like wearing extravagant clothes (sometimes he dressed like Uncle Sam with christmas lights or even with his pants down) and playing back to the audience to hide his fingers’ technique. He raised an earned reputation of gambler and a drinker and his behaviour would prevent him for keeping a regular job in any band. So, from 1920, he worked under his own name, he proclaimed himself as the King of Jewish Music and in 1926 he recorded one of my favourite pieces of the History of klezmer: Von tashlach / New Year’s Prayer at the River. Enjoy it here below.