ourstory:kleztory

A few years ago, your mom and I were going to visit our friend who had
moved to Outremont. As we were driving, we passed schools, parks, police
stations, bakeries, and all I could think was that it all seemed
familiar. As cliche as it sounds, it was the most distinct feeling of
deja vu that I have ever experienced. I couldn't help but feel as though
these were the sights, sounds and smells of my past. But they were not
my own. What I was recalling was actually a collective past. Not simply
because I had grown up listening to the legends of Outremont high and
its surroundings from my mom, aunt and uncle. Those, often tall, tales
certainly left an indelible mark on my consciousness. But what I was
feeling as I drove further down Van Horne than I ever had at that point,
was a distinct feeling that I, not as a person but as a people, had not
only been here before, it was where I belonged. Now this all seems like
a prelude to an eventual move to outremont but that was never in the
plans. Instead, Hutchison street became the symbol of a history that was so
within reach that I had an obligation to myself and to my past to
revisit it from time to time.
Fast forward to tonight. Two
tickets to a special evening with L'Orchestre Metropolitain end up on my
desk and two hours before the show, with little knowledge of what I am
going to see, I call you a babysitter and decide to take your mother to Place des Arts. My initial drive was to take seat in the brand new,
grandiose and breathtaking Maison Symphonique. The new venue is
stunning, a star of the show in and of itself. Having spent a few extra
minutes with you (after all, it is your seventeen month birthday), we
arrived no more than a minute too late to take our rightful seats within
metres of the orchestra, dans le choeur. We were banished to foldable
chairs in the back row until intermission. We took in the eclectic
sounds of a tribute to cosmopolitan Montreal, ranging from an orchestral
piece showcasing the ehru, a Chinese cousin of the violin, to a
beautifully revived klezmer tune overlaid with the tragically moving ode
of a mother to her orphaned child by 28 year old victim of the nazis,
Leah Rudnitsky. Every 10 minute orchestral piece was beautiful in its
own way and your mother was surprised by how much she was enjoying it,
even saying that we have to make a point of coming back. Intermission
came and we eventually claimed our fantastic seats, facing the
conductor, almost as though we were made to be involved in the
production. What happened next was magical. The second half of the show
featured Montreal ensemble Kleztory backed by the orchestra. Within the
first few notes I instantly felt right at home, as though this too was the
music of my childhood, not merely that of my people. And I use the term
people quite loosely here, seeing as this was klezmer music. This was a
folklore rooted as much in roma, Russian and Hungarian culture and it
was Jewish. My people, after all, are a warm blooded people from North
Africa and Spain before that. But my point is that music transcends
geography, history and stereotype. The most beautiful of these orchestrated works once again referred to this ancestral Hutchison street. In the same way that the traditional
henna music of morocco pulls at something unique in me, so too does
Matisyahu on MTV Europe in an Italian hotel room and the music that I
was being swept away by tonight. In the beautiful land of my birth, that to what seems surprising is also the land of your birth, I feel myself distanced daily from my ancestral roots and I wonder what your magnetic north will be. Will it even be pulled by music or will it be pushed by something that I can't even relate to? Somehow this brings me very little distress but much anticipation to meet a future version of the tiny human that I survey in his sleep, as even tinier guitars bounce over his head.