The recordings by Isaac Algazi (b. I.zmir / Turkey 1889, d. Montevideo / Uruguay 1950) presented here are a precious testimony to Sephardi musical traditions in the last decades of the Ottoman period. Beginning in the 1920s there was not a single Jewish home in Turkey with a gramophone that did not possess Algazi’s records, and by the late 1930s he was known throughout Turkey and beyond as ne’im zemirot Israel (Sweet Singer of Israel; an expression originally used to refer to King David). Algazi was admired not only by Jews but also by Turks – who considered him one of their greatest musicians, honoring him with the titles of Efendi and Hoca (hodja = Master).
Algazi descended from a noble family tracing its origins back to Rabbi Salomon ben Abraham Algazi (I.zmir, ca. 1610 – 1683). He was the third in a line of chazzanim (cantors) starting with his grandfather, Chayyim Menachem Algazi, and continuing with his father, Salomon “Bulbülî” (Nightingale) Algazi. Algazi was educated in a vibrant atmosphere characterized by the conflict between traditional religious norms and modern thought within the Jewish community of I.zmir. He recieved a European-oriented education as well as orthodox religious instruction in talmud torah (elementary school) and at yeshivah (secondary school).
Algazi studied Jewish liturgical music under his father and Turkish classical music with the great Ottoman Jewish composer, Shem Tov Chikar (1840–1920). Besides Turkish music, Algazi was well acquainted with European music through the musicians, opera companies and music-hall troupes that often toured I.zmir. In 1908 Algazi was appointed chazzan of the central synagogue of I.zmir. In the aftermath of the turmoil caused by World War I and the Greek occupation of I.zmir, Algazi left in 1923 for Istanbul, where he served as chazzan and musical director at the “Italian” synagogue. During his stay in Istanbul, Algazi was active in the field of Jewish education and in fostering the relations between the Jewish community and the Turkish republic. Algazi was a supporter of the modernization efforts of the Republic’s founder and leader, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. He belonged to the young Turkish intellectuals with whom Atatürk used to confer for long hours, and he performed for Atatürk and lectured before him on the history of Turkish art music. He was one of the leading Jewish intellectuals in Turkey, and quoted liberally from Spinoza, Moses Mendelssohn, and Heinrich Heine in his writings. Algazi left Turkey in 1933, apparently as a reaction to obstacles created by Atatürk’s policy favoring Turks over members of ethnic minorities. He relocated briefly to Paris, where he served as chazzan in a Sephardi synagogue and completed his rabbinical education. From 1935 until his death, Algazi served as the spiritual leader of the Sephardi community in Montevideo, Uruguay, where many members were emigrés from I.zmir.
The Sephardi Ottoman music tradition
The chief characteristic of Ottoman Jewish music is its reliance on the makam system characteristic of Turkish art music. Makamlar are the modal frameworks which govern the melodic organisation of the compositions. Various parts of the Jewish liturgy are chanted according to specific makamlar. Moreover, some makamlar are associated with particular Jewish holidays. Within the makam tradition there are pieces in free rhythm while others have fixed meter. The organization of time in metered compositions follows the usűl, a repeated rhythmic cycle consisting of a fixed series of low and high pitched (drum) beats. The performance of Sephardi paraliturgical chants follows the structure of the fas?l, a suite of pieces in Turkish art music based upon the same makam which are the performed in a prescribed order. Within the fas?l, each piece has a fixed form and a different usűl which increases in speed from piece to piece.
The most important early creator of the tradition of combining religious Hebrew texts with Turkish art music was Rabbi Israel Najara (ca. 1555-1625), the greatest Eastern Sephardi poet of the post-Iberian period. In his song collections, Najara’s poem are accompanied by the names of the makamlar and melodies to which they were meant to be sung. Between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries, the involvement of Jewish poets in the Turkish art music tradition increased considerably, and they adapted their texts to the most intricate compositions by contemporary Ottoman composers. Algazi, too, wrote religious Hebrew poetry in a similar structure and style to those of his predecessors and set it to Turkish art music. He is thus one of the last links in a long line of Sephardi poet musicians in Turkey, who created an amalgam of Turkish music and Hebrew poetry.
Because of the importance of makam to Ottoman Jewish prayer, the reputation of a chazzan depended largely on his mastery of this musical system. The singing style of Turkish makam, as evidenced in Algazi’s recording, is characterized by a nasal voice quality, a preference for high registers and falsetto, breathtaking lingerings on single tones, a heavy vibrato, and virtuosic, rapid shifts between registers.
In addition to the chanting of the synagogue liturgy and paraliturgical events such as the singing of the Maftirim choir, other contexts for the performance of song within Ottoman Jewish life included life-cycle events as well as the social celebrations and gatherings which took place in the cafés which flourished in the Jewish quarters of large Ottoman cities by the end of the nineteenth century.
Algazi’s recordings
Isaac Algazi’s recording career spanned the period from ca. 1909 through 1929. He recorded numerous discs mainly for the Turkish branch of the Biritish label Columbia as well as for Odeon, both of which were among the largest and most active in the Middle East during the first decades of the twentieth century. Most of his recordings presented here were made from 1925 through 1929 using the electrical recording process. Some of the discs included were Odeon test records lent by members of the Algazi family and may not have been released commercially. On most of the recordings Algazi is accompanied by an oud (‘ud = lute), and on a few others by a kanun (zither). Track 14 features oud and violin, and the Zionist song, "Hatikhav", which is not on this CD, the oud and piano. The names of the accompanists are not mentioned on the record labels.
Algazi’s Jewish recordings can be divided into four main categories: liturgical music, paraliturgical songs from the repertoire of the Maftirim choir, religious songs in Judeo-Spanish and Judeo-Spanish folk songs. In addition, Algazi made a number of recordings of Turkish classical music. Because of the limited length of the 78 rpm recording format, Algazi sings in most cases only selected verses and stanzas from the various texts. Typical of the Eastern Sephardi tradition, the same melody might be used to accompany more than one Hebrew poem, prayer, or Judeo-Spanish text. Conversely, each individual prayer text or poem may have had many melodies associated with it.
Rabbi Isaac Algazi (Isaac Algazi Efendi)