The Arts

One Poet Mourns Earth; Others Sing Songs of Immigration

The 14th season of Jewish Poets—Jewish Voices launched last Monday evening with an outstanding program that attracted 70 attendees on Zoom. It opened with poetry read by local psychologist and poet, Richard Alan Schere. A sample of his offerings, Echo, can be read below. It is a poem that should be on the desks of all politicians as they contemplate their actions regarding climate change. Other Schere poems showed a lighter side with a fine-tuned sense of humor. Schere has made recordings and his work is in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C. We were fortunate to have such an accomplished poet open our series.  [Eileen Wingard]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Eileen Wingard, San Diego County

Dolly Parton Inspired the PJ Library Program for Jewish Children

Jewish books from the PJ Library are mailed free every month to 680,000  Jewish children to be read to them at bedtime by their parents or guardians.  Yes, you can thank Harold  Grinspoon, the Massachusetts real estate entrepreneur who funds much of this philanthropy, along with Winnie Sandler Grinspoon, his daughter-in-law who serves as president of his Foundation. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Judaism, Lifestyles, USA

Sampling Israel’s Ethnic Groups and Restaurants

Author Ethan Michaeli is an American journalist with a knack for schmoozing with people wherever he goes.  While he lives in Chicago, his older brother and parents live in Israel. He travels frequently to Israel to see his Hungarian-born parents and his brother, and whenever he does so, he likes to go touring around the country, meeting people from as many different backgrounds as possible. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Middle East, Travel and Food

Gaming Site, ‘Torah Live,’ Enlivens Jewish Education

Torah Live’s graphics, animation and film level are highly professional and their team of men and women includes over thirty scriptwriters, animators, video editors, and sound and special effects artists. While the world was in lockdown, Torah Live kicked in big time. Since Covid over a million and a half videos have been viewed, and the website has been accessed by 168,000 active users. It has hundreds of thousands of viewers from around North America and the world, including in Moscow, Paris, London, Australia, and South Africa, and including 117 in San Diego, a number the Torah Live people hope will continue to grow. {Toby Klein Greenwald]

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International, Jewish Religion, Middle East, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, Toby Klein Greenwald, USA

‘She The People’ Comedy Heads West to San Diego

This cutting-edge comedy has been delighting audiences in Toronto, Boston, Washington DC, and Chicago over the past three years, and now the Lyceum will host this group of world-famous comedic stars.  The Washington Post described this show as a “funny, fiercely political comedy-sketch show.” This script is written and performed by an all-female troupe and pokes fun at the female experience, attendant stereotypes, and common experiences. [Eva Trieger]

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Eva Trieger, San Diego County, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, USA

Five Imaginative Teenagers Win Young Playwrights Honors

While so many dreams were dashed in this crazy pandemic period, Playwrights Project refused to succumb to any hurdles. The 37th consecutive annual California Young Playwrights Contest was held, and held vigorously, with great response! The actual in-person celebration won’t occur until January 22, 2022, but the cat was let out of the bag to a select few (ahem! this reviewer) last Saturday night.  And quite an evening it was. I was made privy to the top five young writers, aged 13-17. I have covered this competition in the past, and I am never left with a sensation anything short of amazed and humbled. [Eva Trieger]

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Eva Trieger, San Diego County, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

Tel Aviv Opera Produces a Truly Magical ‘Magic Flute’

A performance of ‘The Magic Flute’ in the evening led us to spend a day in Tel Aviv, enjoying the view of the sea from the restaurant on the sun-drenched promenade, partaking of the aesthetic delights on offer at the Tel Aviv Museum (including the delicious cakes in the coffee-shop there) and ending with a highly innovative performance of the opera. [Dorothea Shefer-Vanson]

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Dorothea Shefer-Vanson, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

Novel Paints Stresses on Cheerleaders Who Take a Knee

This Young Adult novel focuses on the friendship between Eleanor  (Leni) Greenberg, who is Jewish, and Chanel  (Nelly) Irons, who is African-American.  Although they are members of different religious and racial groups, the two have been fast friends since childhood.  However, the friendship comes under stress during their senior year of high school when Leni is chosen as the team’s captain, even after being out most of the previous year with an injury, and Chanel, a natural leader of the team in the interim, has been passed over. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison

San Diego Symphony to Play at Nine Venues in Upcoming Season

The San Diego Symphony today announced its winter-spring 2022 concert season, offering 31 performances of classical and contemporary masterworks and chamber music from January 15 through May 28. Presented as “Hear Us Here,” the season will give the San Diego Symphony the opportunity to bring its music to a wider audience, with concerts performed at nine venues in the city and across the County, including the Symphony’s newest venue, The Rady Shell at Jacobs Park. [San Diego Symphony]

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Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, San Diego County

Chanukah with Some Stereotypical Yiddish Characters

In a style reminiscent of Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs of Disney fame, this book, reissued for Hanukkah, features a series of unidimensional characters with Yiddish names: Noshy Boy, Kvetchy Boy, Shmutzy Girl, Klutzy Boy, Shluffy Girl, Shleppy Boy, Kibbitzy Girl, and Keppy Girl. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish Religion

Novel Depicts Survivor’s Search for His Family

Dr. Julius Matthias, the chief protagonist of Michelle Mazel’s previous book, has managed by the skin of his teeth to escape deportation by the Nazis from his hometown in Transylvania. His wife, who had refused his entreaties to leave the town together with him, was shot and killed by the invaders during the round-up of the Jews of the town. Many years before that Matthias had sent his grown-up children to France to study, and so, left on his own, he manages for many months to make his way on foot through the fields and forests of Europe, eventually reaching Geneva, where he has friends and a bank account. [Dorothea Shefer-Vanson]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Dorothea Shefer-Vanson

Memoir Relates How 2 Young Sisters- One Deaf, One Hearing – Survived the Holocaust Together

This joint memoir, intended for students in grades 3 through 7, tells the story of two young sisters — one hearing and one deaf — who survived World War II notwithstanding their transport as orphans from Bratislava to the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, where, a year later, Renee, the older of the two sisters, was near death from typhus when the camp was liberated by British soldiers. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, International, Jewish History