Cross-Generational Song: Galeet Dardashti Duets Her Grandfather
Galeet Dardashti
2023
Credits
Galeet Dardashti (www.galeetdardashti.com).
In this video, Persian-American anthropologist and musician Galeet Dardashti introduces her album Monajat, where she duets recordings of her late grandfather, Younes Dardashti, a famous singer from Iran. Together, grandfather and granddaughter sing Hebrew and Persian Selichot, a collection of prayers about repentance recited before the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah. A Sephardic practice is to recite Selichot every day from the first of the month of Elul through Yom Kippur, often in pre-dawn services. Galeet’s rendition includes old and new musical influences from Middle Eastern, jazz, and rock traditions.
In what ways does Dardashti present her multi-faceted identity?
How do these cross-generational duets compare to using grandparents’ kiddush cups or candlesticks, cooking and eating grandparents’ recipes, and using words from ancestral languages?
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Creator Bio
Galeet Dardashti
A musician and scholar of Middle-Eastern Jewish music, Galeet Dardashti was born into a family of singers. Her grandfather Younes, a master of Persian classical music, was known as the “Nightingale of Iran.” Her father Farid was a popular young vocalist in Iran, and then later became a cantor, and her mother Sheila was an Ashkenazic folk singer. As a child, Galeet Dardashti lived in Los Angeles, while her father worked as a cantor at the Valley Beth Shalom synagogue. She earned a PhD in Anthropology and has taught at New York University and the Jewish Theological Seminary. She is also the founder and leader of the all-woman band, Divahn. Her album Monajat contains her original compositions, contains her original compositions, in which she mixed her own singing with samples of her grandfather’s voice.