ENTERTAINMENT
Psalmist with a Guitar
1
t's good for business,
but Peter Himmel-
man doesn't want
any part of it.
The folk rocker
writes songs about
the soul, spirituality
and man's relation-
. ship with his fellow
man. But he does not
want to be classified
as a spiritualist, a
psalmist or anything
that might mean he only writes
music for the religious. That's not the
point.
"Spirituality isn't some anomaly
or some puzzle. It's as real as that
apple over there," said Mr. Him-
melman, 31. "The music touches
everybody; I don't care if you listen
to it and wear a bunch of crystals."
There is no question, however,
that Peter Himmelman has touched
a nerve. His music, said the New
York Times, is "unabashedly
earnest, searching for moral revela-
Peter
mmelman
brings
Judaism
to
mainstream
rock.
NOAM M.M. NEUSNER
Staff Writer
tions or longing for human
closeness." Another reviewer said
Mr. Himmelman is the first
songwriter since Cat Stevens to deal
honestly with idealism and spiri-
tuality.
Peter Himmelman is direct,
sometimes blunt, when he talks
about his music. He rejects cliches,
both spoken and musical, which may
be one reason why his music never
gets played on "format" radio. In an
interview, he attacked a description
often made of his music: that it is
Mystical.
"When you think of mysticism,
you think of something beyond the
world," he said. "But the apple is as
mystical as you can get: There is no
division, in a sense, between the
physical and spiritual."
A rock star talking about spiri-
tuality? Peter Himmelman sees
nothing wrong with it. An observant
Jew, Mr. Himmelman sees Judaism
as a way of life, something that
seeps into his music as much as his
personal life.
(He is also Bob Dylan's son-in-law,
but refuses to answer questions
about him, citing Jewish law on
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
73