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Friday June 6, 2008

Musicians, museum make beautiful music together

by dan pine
staff writer

Think “cello” and “Jewish” and the first thing that comes to mind might be Woody Allen playing cello in the school marching band (from 1969’s “Take the Money and Run”).

That was then. Erik Friedlander is now.

The New York cellist-composer is participating in the Aleph-Bet Sound Project, one of several inaugural exhibitions at the new Contemporary Jewish Museum. It will run through January.

Curated by composer John Zorn, the Aleph-Bet Sound Project is a series of musical miniatures by an eclectic lineup of artists, from rockers Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson to synth pioneer Terry Riley.

Each was assigned one letter of the Hebrew alphabet and asked to compose something based on it. While long a fascinating subject to kabbalists, the aleph-bet proved equally intoxicating to the project’s composers, all of whom are also invited to perform their pieces live at the CJM. The project is supported by a grant from the Guzik Foundation and an anonymous donor.

For his compostion, Friedlander chose the Hebrew letter nun. Out of that one little letter grew his piece, “The 50 Gates of Understanding.”

A somewhat ironic title, since Friedlander had no idea how to proceed when he first accepted the commission.

“I knew I should grab some books and start reading,” he says. “I used my letter to generate some ideas about how to approach the material. In Jewish numerology, nun, the 14th letter, equals 50, so I decided to do 50 miniatures.”

Friedlander came up with a 14-note motif, reworked it 50 different ways and bunched the arrangements in seven groups of seven, scored for a drums, piano, bass and cello.

But what’s it all about?

“The 50 gates of understanding is a self-evaluation, self-improvement cycle the Israelites went though,” he says, referring to a talmudic take on the Exodus. “To receive the understanding, they had to improve themselves.”

His work, like those of the other Aleph-Bet composers, will be heard in the new CJM’s 65-foot-high Stephen and Maribelle Leavitt “Yud” Gallery. The New York-based Friedlander is one of the featured artists in the first round of the project; David Greenberger, Laurie Anderson, Chris Brown, Jewlia, Z’ev and Lou Reed (of “Walk on the Wild Side” fame) each composed a piece and have been invited to perform live.

This is not Friedlander’s first Jewish-themed work. In recent years, he recorded a pair of CDs for John Zorn’s Jewish music label, Tzaddik Records.

Friedlander, 48, grew up with no religion — his mother is of Italian extraction, his father Jewish-Finnish. He describes his forays into Jewish music as an act of “rediscovering an aspect of my heritage.”

Born in New York City, Friedlander was the son of artist and photographer Lee Friedlander, known for his many album cover shots for Atlantic Records. His home was always filled with music, but mostly jazz and R&B.

By age 8, Friedlander discovered the cello, and by his late teens he was good enough to study music at Columbia University. He went on to play with symphony orchestras and Broadway pit bands, as well as on jingles and soundtracks.

But the artist in him wanted something more. He joined in on sessions with artists such as Laurie Anderson and Courtney Love, and also started his own groups. By the 1990s he became a fixture in Manhattan’s jazz scene, known for expanding the possibilities of improvising on the cello.

“Cello has benefited by being one of the last [instruments] to come out of the closet,” says Friedlander. “We’re not associated with Le Jazz Hot or bluegrass or swing. Cello is in the midrange where everyone lives.”

And he adds that the cello’s rich resonant tone fits well with Jewish music.

“There is something kind of vocal about string playing,” he says. “It can be emotional, and takes off in a cantorial way, with all the melismas and embellishments.”

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