Tracks
Liner Notes
Quita’l tas is a traditional Sephardi Hanukka song, sung here in an arrangement by Cheryl Bensman-Rowe. With its inventive, tasteful instrumentation that echoes perceived eastern and Mediterranean Sephardi sounds as part of a contemporary reworking, it nearly becomes a new song altogether. It belongs to a subcategory of culinary holiday and holyday songs in which, in this case, a festive meal inaugurates the entire month of the Hebrew calendar in which Hanukka occurs—perhaps a Shabbat meal closest to the month of kislev.
Lyrics
Sung in Ladino
Bring out the tray, put down the food.
The girls set the table in the month of Hanukka.
Let's feast again.
Take the chicken from the kitchen.
Give the soup to the neighbor,
So that the month of Hanukka may be sweet for her.
Let's feast again.
One takes ten measures of oil from a container.
The other takes ten handfuls of flour from a sack,
To make little cakes for Hanukka.
Let's feast again.
Credits
arranger: Cheryl Bensman-RoweComposer: Traditional
Performers: The Western Wind
Publisher: Transcontinental
Translation: Gerald C. Skolnik
