The Music

** My sincere aplogies: the music links on this page aren't working. One day the site will be updated with full working music links, I promise! **

"Shalom Everybody, Everywhere"

There is music up on Nabugoye Hill, the geographical and, in many ways, the spiritual center of the Abayudaya of Uganda. A circle of teenagers from the community has formed around a large boulder that sits just feet from the square, open, red brick Moses synagogue. There is one guitar in the community, and everyone wants to play. 

Eighteen year old Rachel has had the guitar for a while, strumming the chords to a song the community plays to welcome visitors. The others sing along; their sweet African harmonies cascade down the hill and spill out toward the nearby city of Mbale. Most of the other youth can play as well, but Rachel doesn’t hand off the guitar until her uncle, "Rabbi" Gershom Sizomu, appears. Gershom grins as he takes the battered instrument in his hands. Its wood is chipped, the strings are so old they only make dull, toneless twangs. Still, Gershom when strums the first chord of the melody he wrote for Adon Olam everyone appreciates the song’s beauty. The lyrics are the same traditional Hebrew that congregations around the world recite to end their services, but the music is lively, cheerful and very African. 

Music is an essential part of Jewish observance. In the Jewish communities of Africa, Jews use song as a way to express their love for the religion they practice. Without access to European or Israeli music, the Abayudaya and the House of Israel community of Ghana have developed their own Jewish songs. In some cases they have put their own African melodies to the text of accepted Hebrew prayers. In others they have written their own lyrics and blended them with beautiful African tunes. Everyone is part of the "community choir" – everyone knows the songs. 

The Abayudaya have recorded their own CD, "Shalom Everybody Everywhere," a wonderful collection of their own songs sung in local languages like Luganda and Swahili and traditional Hebrew tunes set to their own original melodies. When Jay visited the House of Israel community in Ghana he made the first recording ever of their music. The community of Rusape, Zimbabwe, are planning to record a CD of their own music, and other Jewish communities in Africa no doubt are next in line. The music of African Jews is an extraordinary example of the way that culture and religion intertwine and come to life in the form of song. 

You may find a copy of Shalom Everybody Everywhere through Kulanu. The Abayudaya's more recent CD, Abayudaya: Music From Jewish People of Uganda, is available through Amazon.com. You may listen to "Kuvhurwa kwe Ark" from the Rusape, Zimbabwe community on the Rounder Records website, and/or purchase the Rounder compilation The Hidden Gate: Jewish Music Around the World. A future version of this site will include links to music from the Abayudaya, the Rusape community and the House of Israel community in Ghana.