Stories of Music Lesson

Living Jewishly, Singing Globally: <br /> The Origins and Movement of Moroccan and Persian Jewish Communities
Living Jewishly, Singing Globally:
The Origins and Movement of Moroccan and Persian Jewish Communities

Links to lesson documents found below

This lesson is an exploration and celebration of the very rich music and culture of the Moroccan and Persian Jewish communities. It shares the stories and music of favorite musical artists from Morocco and Iran of the last century, and contemporary music of Moroccan and Persian Jews.

Through this lesson, learners will understand that:

  • All Jewish communities, including the Moroccan and Persian communities, reflect and refract their sociocultural locations, and react to local historical, economic, and political realities. This remains true for the Moroccan and Persian Jewish communities in the United States today.
  • At the same time, all Jewish communities, including the Moroccan and Persian communities, broadly share Jewish religious culture and history, and maintain Jewish values and aspirations.
  • Nonetheless, discrete Jewish communities, including the Moroccan and Persian communities, may express their Judaism through different musical genres, styles, and modes, sometimes adopting local cultural forms, sometimes expressing themselves in local languages in addition to Hebrew, and sometimes developing practices that are not shared by other Jewish communities.
  • The culture of the Moroccan and Persian Jewish communities, including music, practices, food, language, and more, continue to provide personal enrichment for members of those communities.
  • Moroccan and Persian Jewish music today reflects the sociocultural locations in which it is found (often the United States and Israel) and reflects as well an ongoing negotiation, even tension, between honoring the past and thriving in the present.

Learners will listen to the music of Zohra El Fassia, Morteza Neydavoud, Qamar, Salim Halili, Neta Elkayam and many others.

All the while, they’ll ask themselves:

  • How do Moroccan and Persian Jewish communities reflect their own separate historical experiences in their music?
  • In what ways do Moroccan and Persian communities exemplify the lives and concerns of all Jewish communities?
  • How have Moroccan and Persian communities, including communities here in the United States, adopted and adapted local culture in expressing their Jewish identity?

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We are deeply grateful to the two people who wrote these lessons:

Lorry Black, DMA, Associate Director, Lowell Milken Center for Music of American Jewish Experience
Rabbi Dr. J.B. Sacks, Educational and Curriculum Specialist, Stories of Music; Rabbi, Congregation Am HaYam (Ventura, CA)

Special thanks to Dr. Samuel Torjman Thomas for his ongoing guidance and support of our writing team.

Our gratitude extends to the pedagogic advisors and reviewers of this lesson:
Mark Kligman, PhD, Mickey Katz Endowed Chair in Jewish Music, UCLA
Dr. Susan Helfter, USC Thornton School of Music
Rabbi Devin Villarreal, Thrive Educational Services
Dr. Samuel Torjman Thomas, City University of New York
Dr. Galeet Dardashti
Rav Hazzan Ken Richmond, Temple Israel of Natick