INBAR BAKAL’S MUSIC TRANSCENDS POLITICS

The debut album by Inbar Bakal, ‘Song of Songs’, is a wonder and a revelation, with its lush harmonics and rich melodies. This also fills a much-needed niche within the field of Semitic-language music for those for whom Tinariwen is too raw, Algerian rai too slick, Rachid Taha too French, and Ethiopian music too… weird (comparisons to Niyaz are obvious, but they are mostly sung in Farsi, so non-Semitic… more later). The irony is that Inbar Bakal is neither Arab nor Tuareg nor Berber nor Ethiopian. She’s Jewish, an Israeli by birth, via Yemen and Iraq parentage. For those of you who don’t know, there is a pre-Diaspora scattering of ‘oriental’ Jewish people that is the result not necessarily of emigration, but of conversion. Ethiopia was a Jewish nation before its conversion to Christianity, as was Yemen before Islam. This is an important point to remember, since at that time, the similarities between them outweighed their differences and monotheism itself was the powerful belief (and economic benefit?) that defeated a plethora of lesser gods and their demands for tribute. Until the foundation of the Israeli state, Judaism not only survived but even thrived in enclaves within the Islamic world, far better than they fared in Europe in fact.

So Inbar Bakal helps bring Israel and its musical heritage full circle, back to its origins in the Middle East. She does this by looking for modern clues in ancient texts, adapting Yemeni melodies to Torah-inspired lyrics. Her songs are of ascendance, meditation, and worship, the struggles for Yerushalayim and the struggles of an unwilling bride in an arranged marriage. If photos of her at first seem oddly ultra-sexy, given the subject matter and background, notice that they also are extremely enigmatic, of a soul half-divided, an innate tension that plays itself out in song, half-crying and half-laughing. She one-ups Mona Lisa in walking an emotional fence with a combination of resignation and resilience, faith and humor, all lying just slightly below the surface, close enough to sense if not touch.

If Bakal has a talented band of diverse musicians, her chief collaborator on ‘Song of Songs’ is Grammy-nominated producer Carmen Rizzo, himself a co-founder of the Persian/Sufi/Indian-inspired group Niyaz. Thus the question arises as to whether we’re listening primarily to Carmen or to Inbar. This is the same situation as with other artist/producers such as Daniel Lanois or T-Bone Burnett. It doesn’t matter of course, certainly not on a studio album, as long as the music is good. And it is. Ms. Bakal’s voice matches the music perfectly. If this typically takes the form of a melancholy lament, I see no reason why it should always be so. It would be interesting to see how she would interpret more up-beat material. You probably don’t want to play her song ‘The Bride’ at your wedding. Somebody might change his or her mind.

There is another story here of course, one of politics. Ms. Bakal proudly served in the Israeli military, as all citizens must, but she even attained the rank of officer in the Israeli air force. The fact that she advertises this fact rather than obscuring it, all the while playing with musicians of other faiths, including Islam, is commendable. Maybe it’s naïve to think that music might accomplish what negotiations can’t, but then again, maybe it’s not. When you have movies like ‘Heavy Metal in Baghdad’ making the circuits and people in Zagreb camping overnight to be the first in line to buy tickets for U2, there’s obviously a power there that’s more than just muddy metaphor and silly simile. The new album by Inbar Bakal adds an important new dimension to the extant library of modern Middle Eastern music. I want more, and I want it live, but for now the album will suffice for a few more listens. That’s the ultimate test, which she passes with flying colors.