Monday, April 26, 2010

Israeli Cowboys. In Elton John Glasses. And the Real Thing.

As my long time readers know, I have a serious thing for Jewish cowboys, and, by extension, Israeli cowboys. This weekend I stumbled across a fantastic video that was posted to the 4Law Israeli Music History website. It's got it all. Cowboys. Mustaches. and Matti Caspi. Who could ask for anything more. Dayenu!

The First Israeli Hebrew Cowboys Movie "The Red River Valley" - "Emek HaNahar HaAdom"


I got a little additional information about this jem from YouTube user Boazgu2, the maintainer of the site. According to him...
The video is part of 50 minutes video. Made by Dan Biron a man today in private sector. As he worked in officially Israeli TV1 during the Eighties. His wife Sari Raz still works also today in TV1. Between the actors and singers in this clip.
I would still love to know more about the context of the film. Was this a TV show? And who's idea was it to mix the quasi-period outfits with the weirdly new-romantic band outfits? Love it.

Zeitgeist being what it is, this morning I also ran across a great short clip about Jews in the American west (including Jewish cowboys). It's part of a new documentary produced by the Jewish TV Network called "The Jewish Americans." It aired on PBS back in 2008, but you can pick up the DVD on the JTV website.

Hattip to Yiddish dance instructor Steve Weintraub for emailing the KlezmerShack mailing list about the 4Law website. I'd already linked to it, but hadn't visited for quite a while. And hattip to the 4Law site, which is weird, clunky, and filled with enough Israeli music history to keep me busy for weeks.

For more of my obsession with Jewish Cowboys, see... Lil Rev: Fiddler on the Roof Meets Oh Brother Where Art Thou, Jewish Cowboys Part 6: Bucky Goldstein, Jewish Cowboys Part 5: Shir HaBokrim, the Song of the (Israeli) Cowboys, Jewish Cowboys Part 4: Harold Stern, Manischewitz Cowboy, Mare Winningham's "Refuge Rock Sublime", Jewish Cowboys Part 1: Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys, Jewish Cowboys Part 2: Scott Gerber, Jewish Cowboys Part 3: So Called's "You Are Never Alone")

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