All India Radio has started its broadcast day with the same music every morning since 1936. The tune is distinctly Indian, with its droning strings and melancholy violin. But it was written by Walter Kaufmann, a Jewish emigrant from...
"Can you hear it?" Sarah Cohen whispers upstairs in the Paradesi Synagogue during Jewish prayers. Something is happening next door at the Hindu temple."
Indeed, the strange liturgy fusion between this congregation and the one neighboring is difficult to overlook.
"We...
We uploaded a video of Indian dancers performing Hava Nagila in a Bollywood-style staging in an Indian film in April 2010. It was Israel's time to reciprocate in April and May.
A Bollywood Dance workshop was held on April 29...
For India's Bene Israel "kirtankars," COVID-19 competes with Haman as the villain of the Jewish holiday of Purim this year. For the holiday, the kirtankars, a group of elderly ladies from Mumbai's Jewish community who sing kirtan, or traditional...
The Baghdadi Jews of India had their record labels in the cosmopolitan society of the 1930s, and the Iraqi-Jewish tunes performed by oud player Isaac David even found their way into Bollywood musicals. Sara Manasseh, a Mumbai-born ethnomusicologist, released...
This article examines the Babylonian Jews' religious music repertory (liturgical and paraliturgical) in the port city of Bombay (now Mumbai) in western India, based mostly on information gathered from informants in the mid-1980s in Bombay and the United Kingdom....
It had been a long time since anyone could understand the songs performed by the Nirit Singers of Israel, as the music was in an ancient language not spoken today. But people who witnessed their performance found themselves clapping...
After their army service, young Israelis are traveling to India in droves. Many who visit come back home with delightful stories and memories of their time in South Africa. Now, their parents are visiting with tour groups that feature...
Even before clients smell the wonderful aroma of spices drifting from the kitchen, a sign welcoming Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi welcomes them at a curry eatery in downtown Israel.
Modi's three-day visit to Israel, which begins on Tuesday and...
Rahel Musleah was born in Calcutta, India, to a family whose lineage can be traced back to Baghdad in the 17th century. This lady is going to lead you on a very interesting tour of Jewish India that incorporates...