. good morning. welcome to "mosaic." i'm honored to be your host this morning. the arts in our world are a way for to us communicate with one another and enrich our lives. we're thrilled this morning to have representatives from the contemporary jewish museum and later on the 29thjewish music festival. welcome to james leventhaa. well it to "mosaic." >> thank you so much for having us. >> let's jump right in. tell us what's new at the contemporary jewish museum. >> well, are there's so muchment let's start with the exhibitions and stuff. my job to talk about what we have on the walls, we recently opened arthur shake and the art of the higada, which is an

incredible exhibition of an entire 48 pages of an illuminated higada created in in the 1930s. it's able to tell the story of both the israelites exodus from egypt as well as sound an lairm for what was happening in europe at the time and the rise of naziism across the land. so he really incredibly was able to blend these two stories through his art and images. >> so how would you explain the word higada to viewers who know what that word is in a way they've heard it before but are not sure what it is. >> sure. it's the book used during the passover sadir, which is the ritual dinner, that is held once a year & passover is eight days. the sadir is usually held on the first and second nights and then again on the final night.

the higada is the book that gives the instructions for the sadir. it includes passages from the bible. it includes instructions on ritual. it includes songs. many times it includes illustrations. >> so i think we have a couple of pictures to show folks about examples that are in the exhibit. what is this? >> this is a page that illustrates the four questions. and one very critical part of the sadir tradition is dialogue and the asking of questions and the retelling of the story through conversation. so this page shows the passing on of the story from one generation to the next. >> wonderful. i think we have one other image to show. >> it's an illustration of the four sons who are used as sort

of the archetypes of people who need to learn the story. it's supposed to represent all of mankind and these different types it. so what is really important about this page is that we have the wicked son is illustrated similarly to a german aristocrat referencing naziism. you can see that he has a mustache that's similar to hitler's mustache. so this is one of the ways that schick was able to draw a parallel to his contemporary society in europe. >> in his contemporary time, how was he regarded doing this kind of art and this kind of in some ways truth telling, some might use other words for that.

>> sure. >> but not without risk in art. >> well he was very well known for his political propaganda. he was hired by many popular magazines and periodicals to illustrate to make cartoons. they were all very critical of the axis powers during world war ii. the higada was really his life's work. he had a really difficult time getting it published. it took him years to find someone who would be willing to publish it because of the strong message and political c it tent. so in the end he was able to put together a group of private donors who founded a press for the purpose of publishing the higada. >> the contemporary jewish museum has been a cultural asset in san francisco for so many years and really attracts people from all over the bay area, tourists from all over the

country and the world. i'm wondering when the contemporary jewish museum looks at making a decision about an exhibit like the arthur schick exhibit and other ones that we'll talk about later, what goes into making that kind of a decision to put something into a museum for folks to come into and interact with? >> there are a couple important ways that we measure projects when we think about them. first, it's quality. second, i think, is scholarship. and then i think third and fourth, but of equal importance, is impact on community, and then also making sure that there are significant opportunities for multigenerational sharing of knowledge. the schick exhibition provides a perfect opportunity for that. one of the things that's also nice, especially quince dent with this particular episode, is in terms of community work. we had a hugely successful opening for the exhibition with over 600 people in attendance.

anthony russell led up a group of performers who did classic yiddish songs, terrifically well received. it's really a wonderful thing as with almost any kind of community space but especially it at the museum to really see it transformed into a place that's so energized and we throw really good parties. >> we'll take a quick break. we'll be right back. ,,

. welcome back to "mosaic." we're in the middle of a wonderful conversation with james leventhal, deposit director at the contemporary jewish museum. welcome back. we were talking about the place of the jewish contemporary

jewish museum and also an exhibit with arthur schick. i know there are a couple of other exhibits to let folks know about. we have some pictures. let's start with that exhibit. >> ok. so one of our most exciting exhibitions of the season is called designing home, jews and mid-century modernism. i don't know if you have noticed recently the sheer excitement over mid-century design and we were looking at this phenomenon and recognizing there were so many jewish architects, designers, patrons, advertisers who were contributing to the success of this design movement. and so we have organized the show with a wonderful curator out of new york. we are focusing on the contribution that jews made to

design in the mid-century. >> we have another visual i think we'll show folks. what is this? >> well, this is a wonderful image because it's very pert then to us in the bay area. it's an ike her home. many people will recognize eichler homes as joseph eichle are r was a developer in the bay area. he was not an architect. he hired ark it tects that were working with glass walls, in the style and trying to make these homes accessible and available for all. so we have many developments here in the bay area. and,ichler was jewish and a very important supporter of this movement. >> it's interesting. i'm thinking that for any ethnic group rntle whatever their race or class or religion, often times they make an impact in a

field because there is a gap in that field and they see the gap and they move into it. i'm just wondering if you know in the field of ark it tech tour and home design if what we now call mid-century design was at that time something that was considered not favorable to the ark it tech tiewrl establishment and the jute issue community saw that gap and moved into it. and that way helped to actually define as we think of quite an important architectural movement and the way homes are designed and lived in. >> that is a really fantastic point. we see what was happening at this time was many jewish architects were immigrating from europe. they had to flee the nazis. many were working at the bow house in vienna, came to the united states and saw this opening. they were able to take the lessons from the bow house and the practices they were using

in europe about functionality and material, and they came to the united states and had this freedom that they didn't have before. donald makes a wonderful point in his essay in that in europe people were forced to assimilate through blending in and following what was happening. but coming here to the united states, there was a freedom to take the lead and really look forward and so the title of the essay is actually avant garde is neither about jew nor gentile. it's about looking forward. so i think it's a really lovely story that will be told and these people were not working in isolation, of course. there were jews, there were gentiles, there were people people working in this field. but we saw that the jews really took the lead and for both --

we saw earlier a cover of every day arts quarterly, i believe. and that featured both images of jewish designers work and also we had supporters of these publications and of the museum programs that were jewish. and so there is this whole network it the in the way that the ideas were distributed and the exhibition will talk about all of that. and have beautiful objects on view. >> james, we have just a moment left. can you let us know a little bit more about the general programs at the contemporary jewish museum for folks to know about. >> another very interesting segue into the later seg sment in between these two exhibitions on april 19 we'll be hosting our fifth annual out of order sadir. we'll do this during the week of passover. the museum will be free for the entire week of passover. it's a special evening event that saturday evening. anthony russell will be participating and helping host

what will be our roast of moses. there will be a dinner followed by an important dance, large scale event and a nice way for to us think about ritual together, a series of important public programs and lectures throughout the summer that are also will culminate in one of our night it at the jewseum programs. we'll have a pop-up shop in the museum's gift shop during the time. >> thank you so much for being with us. we'll say goodbye to james and lily and welcome the 29th jewish music festival guests in a moment. here's information on how can you access the contemporary jewish museum and visit them.

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. good morning. welcome back to "mosaic."

i'm honored to be your host this morning. we're in the middle of a wonderful conversation about the arts in the jewish community. i'd like to introduce you to anthony russell, a performer and yiddish singer in our community, and andy mushkin, interim executive director of the 29th jewish music festival. welcome. >> thank you. >> thanks. >> what's new at the 29th jewish music festival? >> so much is new. we've just come off of a very successful four performance run of a yiddish musical with english supertitles. it was put together by a very talented local group of yiddish singers and actors. we had four performances at the jewish community center of the east bay which is the fiscal sponsor of the jewish music festival. and we had almost 800 people come in to see live yiddish theater. it's amazing. we moved from that to the spring jewish music festival starting

march 20 with a show at yoshi san francisco with an israeli rock star who is performing the music of his grandfather who was an iraqi pop star and song writer in the 1930s and 40s. we go from that to saturday, march 22, at freight and salvage in berkeley with a show by the afro semetic experience, a wonderful jazz band from the east coast that blends well really african-american music and jewish music. we have a similar but an even more unique blend of music coming the next night at the jcc east bay with our friend anthony doing a show which we can talk more about later called convergence with the great bay area trio. we move a few days later to thursday, march 27, for a

performance by alicia joel rabins, a wonderful singer had-songwriter who has put together a one woman show. it's a fascinating suite of songs that looks at issues, societal and perral, raised by the bernie madoff issue. two more shows. she'll perform again saturday evening at jcc east bay with her band girls in trouble which does indy rock and folk songs based on women of the bible. we end the festival with a show by ben sidron, a great jazz man, pianist, singer, record producer and p.r. host, author and scholar, about jews and the great american songbook. so in the sense we start with the great iraqi songbook, and twin the great american songbook. >> what a comprehensive, diverse group of folks coming to the

bay area for all this music. another neerks you are among them. >> yes. >> we'll show in a moment a clip of some of your work. set that up for us now. >> i conceived of this piece convergence as being an illustration of two parallel histories, so a jewish history from the 19th century and parallel african-american had history also from the same period. so what i do is i combine what i would call root the music from each culture, that would be the religious songs, spirit actual songs, work songs, in order to create the simultaneous history. >> wonderful. let's take a look. we'll see more information about the jewish music festival. we'll take a break and then return. let's take a look knew the anthony's piece. ,,,,,,

. the jewish music festival runs from march 20-april 1. its website is jewish music

festival.org. you can reach them at area code 510-848-0237, extension 126. welcome back to "mosaic." we're in the middle of a wonderful conversation about the 29th jewish music festival with the interim director andy mushkin and anthony russell, a performer and yiddish singer. we ended our last segment with a little clip of anthony singing. i'm wondering if you can let us know a little bit about how you put together yiddish music and african-american music and come up with the ways in which you perform, in which you bring the music to the public. >> in that particular instance, jow issue cosmology is full of narratives and stories and songs about moses. that particular song is an israeli folk song about moses hitting a rock and water

springing out from the torah. and likewise, in the african-american cosmology are there are a many of stories about most. there is this very famous song in which moses and the israelites are evokeed. so i combined both songs so it was this continuous narrative about moses, about the israelites, and about water. and by doing that, i'm kind of telling one story from two different sources, simultaneously. and that's kind of the space i'm traversing in this piece convergence. >> and for you, how do you explain the power of music to transcend culture, illuminate a it particular culture and create it that kind of em pawity of one culture to the other which seems it to be part of what you are doing with this particular

piece. i'm just wondering in the backdrop for you as an are theist how you think about articulating those things in the way that you did. >> well, music, and i would say especially jewish music and african-american music, have the proportions of an emotional time machine when you hear it, you are taken to a particular emotional moment that is imbued with history, with belief, with culture, and as both kinds of music share these things, it was a natural progression for me to try to combine them at the points at which they overlap which are any number of points. it helps of course to be both african-american and jewish nrd for this to happen in order to have these texts, this music and these emotions all it in the same place. so in a sense this piece is an externalization of an ongoing

conversation that i have within myself. >> anthony, -- andy, i know that anthony is one performer in the music festival and not unusual to what music festival brings for us to the community at large. i'm just wondering in the world of jewish music festivals around the world, it seems that what we have near the bay area represents diversity that isn't particularly duplicated in other places. >> well, i think that's true. that's always been an underlying motivation of the festival, one that was pushed by our director who is on leave this year. we're always look to be bring in the widest range of music possible and not focus on any one kind because that's really the story of jewish music. jews have lived all over the world. jewish music really is world music. we've been everywhere. we've always blended it with the

cultures we've heard around us to come one a particular new form of music. >> it's wonderful. and is the 29th jewish music festival, it's taking place throughout venues throughout the entire bay area. >> that's true. both at yoshi's in sphssments spha. main public library and back in berkeley at the jewish community center of the east bay and at st. john's press it tierian church. >> wonderful. it runs march 20 to april 1. people can go on the website jewish music festival.org for more information. >> that's right. if you want to reach me, extension 118. >> great. wonderful. 510-848-0237. steption 118. thank you so much, andy and anthony, for being with us. we ask you so many questions here on "mosaic" for you to hear from our guests. we had like it to end by asking you your viewers a question. the question is this, in a

world that needs so much healing, if you could change one thing about the world, then what would it be? thank you so much it for being with us here on "mosaic." ,, good morning nelly! woah. hey! have you ever tried honey nut cheerios? love 'em. neat! now you on the other hand... you need some help. why? look atchya. what is that? you mean my honey wand? [ shouting ] [ splat ] come on. matter of fact. [ rustling ] shirt. shoes. shades. ah! wow! now that voice...

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. welcome to "bay sunday." great to have you. i'm frank mallicoat. we begin with our weekly pitch. if you have a show idea, we'd love to hear from you. go to our facebook page, post a comment, tag your organization. it would be nice if there was a mentoring program for high school students in the bay area that would increase their chances of graduating high school to nearly 100%. moving on to college as well. building leadership skills and empowering their peers, how about providing education to those that have little or no hope. it's going on right now. it's the work of our next guest. please welcome mr. jay hursten. good to have you. give us a snippet. >> our mission is to break the cycle of poverty, illiteracy an