Arts & Entertainment

MUSICAL MARATHON I ON

"I just knew there was this
group called the Jews and I
had to become part of it."

Y-Love

The
Sweetest
Sounds

2011 JCC Stephen
Gottlieb Music
Festival Schedule
of Performances.

I Elizabeth Applebaum
I Special to the Jewish News

African-American, observant Jewish and
one of hip-hop's rising stars, Y-Love is
set to appear at the seventh annual JCC
Stephen Gottlieb Music Festival.

Elizabeth Applebaum

Special to the Jewish News

his is Yitz Jordan's story so it
begins with a beat, a steady
rhythm that pulses straight
through the heart.
The words come next, and they are
shaped to the beat: curving and popping
and whispering, sizzling and swirling, diz-
zying and beautiful and bright.
Yitz Jordan's mother was Hispanic and
Catholic, his father was African-American
and Yitz was raised Baptist. Faiths of all
kinds permeated his Baltimore home so
that "I went through religion like other
kids went through baseball cards," he says.
By the time he was 7, Yitz knew he wanted
to be Jewish.
Today, Yitz Jordan, 30, who performs
under the name Y-Love, is one of Jewish
hip-hop's leading stars. His songs start with
the rhythm, then comes a flow of words,
and everything is infused with his love of
Judaism, God, the world and mankind.
Yitz Jordan, together with Diwon,
Stereo Sinai and Pitom, will be in Detroit
on March 27 in a Progressive Music
Showcase, held at the Berman Center for
the Performing Arts in West Bloomfield

and presented by the Jewish Community
Center of Metropolitan Detroit's Stephen
Gottlieb Music Festival.
The festival runs March 23-April 3 in
both West Bloomfield and Oak Park. See
the schedule that accompanies this article
for a full list of performers, venues and
ticket prices.

Seeing Stars
A TV commercial wishing viewers a happy
Passover was Jordan's first encounter with
Judaism. He immediately felt drawn to the
religion and began "drawing six-pointed
stars on everything," he says. His biggest
advocate was his grandmother, Clara
Lopez, who herself had been interested in
Judaism and bought young Yitz "my first
menorah and my first Chumash."
At 14, Jordan attended a lecture on anti-
Semitism, where he made friends with a
number of Jews, which ultimately led to
further study and then his decision to con-
vert and become observant.
"It was an instinctive thing:' he says.
There was no soul-searching, and "I wasn't
asking myself the big questions of the uni-
verse. I just always knew that I'm here for
a purpose, and there was this group called
the Jews and I had to become part of it."

Jordan's next stop was Ohr Sameach, a
yeshivah in Jerusalem where "my chevru-
sah (study partner) was a rapper from
Long Island named Cels-1 (David Singer)."
Like virtually every student, the two
men found learning the Gemara, filled
with complex rabbinic commentar-
ies and analysis, overwhelming. After
one particularly challenging afternoon,
Jordan and Singer headed off to lunch.
Suddenly, Singer "drops a little beat box
and motioned to me to say what I had
learned." Jordan responded with the text,
uttered to the drumming rhythm.
And that, he says, "is how Jewish hip-
hop started for me. I used hip-hop and
free styling as way to learn Gemara."
The teachers had no problem, but some
of the other students told Jordan that hip-
hop is "treif music" and asked, "How could
you bring this into a beit midrash (house
of study)?" he remembers.
"They told me it was like shatnez
(combining wool and linen, prohibited by
Jewish law) — that you don't mix hip-hop
and Torah."
Until one day when the class was learn-
ing particularly challenging material that
discussed property ownership. Jordan and
Singer had it memorized in no time.
"How did you do it?" the students asked.
Jordan told them: "We learned to a beat."

t 7 years
old,
most
children are play-
ing with crayons
and dolls and
blocks and toy
cars.
Marvin
By the time he
Hamlisch
turned 7, Marvin
Hamlisch already
was studying piano at the Juilliard
School of Music.
Composer, conductor, entertainer and
multiple award-winner Hamlisch will be
the first guest of the 2011 JCC Stephen
Gottlieb Music Festival and the first
to appear in the new Berman Center
for the Performing Arts at the Jewish
Community Center in West Bloomfield.
(Prior to his JCC performance, Hamlisch
will appear live at 8 p.m. Tuesday, March
22, in the Detroit Public Television-
Channel 56 studios, hosting Marvin
Hamlisch Presents the '70s: The Way
We Were.)
Hamlisch is just one among an
extremely diverse collection of enter-
tainers from different genres of music
— from jazz to classical to family enter-
tainment.
Tickets to the festival may be ordered
at www.jccdet.org or (248) 661-1900, or
maybe purchased at the front desk of the
JCCs in West Bloomfield and Oak Park.
(A $2 service charge will be added to the
cost of each ticket for all paid events, with
the exception of the Mark Bloom Family
Concert, ordered online or by phone.)

Opening Night
with Marvin Hamlisch
Wednesday, March 23
7:30 p.m.
Berman Center for the Performing Arts,
West Bloomfield
Lower Tier/JCC Member: $60
Lower Tier/Nonmember: $70
Upper Tier/JCC Member: $45
Upper Tier/Nonmember: $55

—

Love Is The Answer
In 2001, Jordan settled in New York. One
evening, he went to the popular Orange
Bear Club in Brooklyn where, on a whim,
he signed up to perform during open-
mike night. Each guest was allotted 15

This Is Y on page 40

Sweetest Sounds on page 40

k,larch 17 2011

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