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Friday March 2, 2007

Hip-hop, Judaism converge when Y-Love takes stage

by stacey palevsky
staff writer

Y-Love wants you to put your hands in the air.

He’d also like peace in the Middle East, for young American Jews to be emboldened and not turned off by their faith, and for people to understand that he’s black and Jewish — and isn’t renouncing either.

“I’ve gotta be me,” he said. “It would be nice to make a choice between my black and Jewish culture, but God didn’t give us that option.”

This is hip-hop, Y-Love style.

By night — except on Shabbat, of course — the rail-thin Chassidic Jew from Flatbush, N.Y., engages diverse audiences with hip-hop beats and multilingual rap music. By day, he’s known as Yitzhak Jordan and works as a computer programmer in Brooklyn. He said Torah, Judaism and hip-hop are “the braided challah of my life.”

The performer and musician brought his unique blend of Judaism and hip-hop to San Francisco last week for two performances, one at the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco and the other at Bruno’s music club, where he was one of several panelists asked to talk about the intersection of hip-hop and Judaism, an event planned by the JCC and American Jewish World Service. About 30 people attended Bruno’s discussion, and 200 were at the concert, both of which also featured S.F.-based Felonious, a rap/rock outfit reminiscent of the Roots.

Jordan grew up attending a black Baptist church in Baltimore with his Ethiopian and Puerto Rican parents. He converted to Orthodox Judaism in 2000, then became Chassidic. It was this spiritual journey that led him to discover his talent for rapping in English, Yiddish, Hebrew, Arabic and Aramaic.

“I started rhyming in yeshiva [in Israel],” Jordan recalled. He and a friend found that freestyle rapping about Talmud helped reinforce its teachings.

Jordan realized upon returning to New York that his unique cultural background gave him an equally unique opportunity. With a microphone, turntable and a stage, he could teach Jewish concepts to non-Jews, and teach Jews about hip-hop, a traditionally black music form.

“HaShem blessed me with the ability to do both,” he said.

Jordan wore a black suit and white-collared shirt, untucked, with tzitzit hanging underneath. His sprawling smile was bright against his mocha-colored skin. When he spoke, it was as though a sound engineer blended black vernacular with a Yiddish/Brooklyn accent.

Erez Shudnow, known professionally as DJ Handler, provides Y-Love’s back beats, on stage and in the studio. Jordan also consults with his rabbi before recording or performing any new songs. He wants to make sure the lyrics are, in a sense, kosher, since his left-leaning political views and interest in secular music can put him outside of the Chassidic norm.

During the engaging and honest panel discussion, Jordan and the other musicians talked at length about why hip-hop is a natural vehicle for social action and justice, both tenets of Judaism.

Members of Felonious, Jordan and Shudnow all agreed that mainstream media and pop culture has transformed hip-hop into a diluted form of its original incarnation. Jordan called it a “de-volution.”

“In the suburbs, hip-hop is a dance class. It’s not a thriving freedom culture anymore,” said Dan Wolf, a member of Felonious and the director of the Hub, a JCC initiative for 20- and 30-something Jews in the Bay Area.

They all agreed that breaking the mainstream mold isn’t easy. Nonetheless, Y-Love and Felonious agreed they’re committed to the idea that hip-hop music is “bigger than just me,” Wolf said.

And even though hip-hop and Judaism is a newer musical cocktail, Jordan said the modern music is very much tied to old traditions.

He reminded the audience about when Moses parted the Red Sea, and the Israelis crossed to the other side to watch the Egyptians buried in water.

“What was their first reaction? They broke into song,” he said. “Miriam and the women used a tambourine and drums. Words and rhythm — essentially hip-hop music — even 6,000 years ago.”

Rap on, Y-Love.

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