When the Jewish sound of Montreal was Moroccan Remembering Samy Elmaghribi ’s musical influence in a new book by Christopher Silver W hen you think of Montreal Jewish cul- ture, your mind may turn to smoked
of a shared musical heritage. As the author explained to Avi and me, Elmaghribi “was a Moroccan artist of few equals in the mid 20th century. He was the biggest thing in Morocco in his time, and not only in Morocco, in Algeria and Metropolitan France as well.” This was news to me; Rabbi Finegold, as it turns out, listened to “Samy” tapes on family road trips. Prof. Silver did not initially set out to go into academia, but a happenstance 2009 encounter with Moroccan Jewish music at a Casablanca record shop piqued his curiosity, and ultimately allowed him to follow a “very untraditional” academic path. He explained, “I have a PhD in history and my primary source material were century old records, shellac records spinning at 78 RPM.” While the Montreal connection does not fully explain Silver’s presence at McGill—the academic job market also played a role—he told us that he has “quite a few students who come from the Moroccan Jewish community, who end up writing these incredible research papers on their family histories. The materials they’re working with are their family papers: photos, documents, and interviews.” This gives him hope that Montreal might become “a hub,” not just “of Moroccan Jewish hist- ory,” which it already is, but “a hub for schol- arship on the Moroccan Jewish community.” In the excerpt of Recording History that follows, Christopher Silver delves into Samy Elmaghribi’s glory days before he got to Montreal. - Phoebe Maltz Bovy
meat and that narrower, sweeter version of North American bagels. If you get more precise and think of Jews, music, and Mont- real, your thoughts could drift to Leonard Cohen. But they might just as easily land on Samy Elmaghribi. Born Salomon Amzallag, he became a musical legend in his native Morocco and be- yond. After emigrating to Canada, he wound up the cantor at the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, where, among other things, he officiated at my Bonjour Chai co-host Rabbi Avi Finegold’s parents’ wedding. The Samy Elmaghribi story is a window into several broader ones: about Jews and music, about North African Jews and post- colonial independence movements, and—of particular interest to The CJN’s readers— about Jewish Montreal. Elmaghribi is one of several captivating figures in Christopher Silver’s book, Record- ing History: Jews, Muslims, and Music across Twentieth-Century North Africa . Professor Silver is the Segal Family Assistant Professor in Jewish History and Culture at McGill, and was a guest on our podcast episode about Mimouna, the post-Passover celebration originated by Maghrebi Jews. Recording History is both exciting new research on music itself, and an unexpect- ed history of North African Jews and Jew- ish-Muslim relations, through the framework
54
Made with FlippingBook Digital Proposal Creator