Analysis of Hayeled Sheli

As we start our discussion of Hayeled Sheli, let's look at our most Southeastern state, Florida. A big and diverse land mass, Florida was the subject of the Adams-Otis treaty which added southern territory to the United States south of the Carolinas and east of the Louisiana purchase. In 1845 Florida entered the union as the 27th state. To the right is the state flag and by the remnants of the confederate stars and bars, you should not be surprised to learn that the state seceded from the union in 1861 and reentered the union, with the other defeated Confederate states, in 1865. Although for most of its existance, the state was looked upon as too hot and too inhospitable, the availability of airconditioning has changed its reputation. Today, Florida has become a residence for seniors and has also developed as an Israeli dance stronghold in this country. The map leftmost in this montage, and the listing from Aura's web site in the middle, shows the different locations where organized Israeli dancing occurs weekly within the state. Note: these pictures (and any others in this script) can be enlarged by clicking on them.

Several local dancers spend the winter in Florida, and during this time they do what they do in the Philadelphia area, attend weekly Israeli dance sessions. Tanya Buchman, pictured at the top of this montage, has for many years wintered in the Miami area. This year she was joined by Jani and Rick Rosen. Jani is pictured at the bottom of this montage. We think that Jani attended the same session(s) that Tanya attended which includes the Boca Raton session at the Adolph and Rosa Levis Jewish Center led by Steve Weissman. Weissman's class attracts some 65 to 70 participants during the winter as dancers follow the sun south. During the summer attendance drops into the 20's.

One thing about Jani and Tanya: they study and remember the dances done at various sessions. One dance that caught Jani's interest in Florida is the subject of the rest of this script and even provided some content to another script on this web site. The dance in question is Hayeled Sheli and it has been a part of Weissman's Boca Raton session since 2008/2009 and it also is done at Peggy Elimelech’s session Sunday in North Miami Beach at the JCC as well as Connie Goldstein’s session in North Miami Beach at the MacDonald center on Wednesdays. Tanya remembers a teach of this dance in Florida as Weissman reviews the steps of this and other dances periodically in his class. We replicate the web site of the Levis Jewish Community Center in Boca Raton indicating the particulars for Steve's class.

Anyway, if you were to direct your attention to the anatomy script you would find that Grant, the leader of the Sunday morning Germantown session and the subject of this montage of pictures, began to teach this dance, Hayeled Sheli, at the end of January 2015. Succeeding weeks of instruction spread into February. We queried Grant, pictured in this montage, in early February as to how this dance was selected and his response was that it was recommended by Jani while she was still dancing in Florida over the winter and it seemed appropriate for his Sunday morning session when he looked at it. In quizing Jani, we found that she had seen (and learned) the dance in Florida - we think at the Boca Raton session - and had emailed Grant with the suggestion that he teach this dance. Since the dance, to our knowledge, is not done anywhere else in the Philadelphia area, Grant took it upon himself to retrieve the underlying music and spent time learning the steps. Here are some of the particulars to this version of music that Grant taught: Hayeled Sheli is translated as 'My Boy' in Hebrew, sung by Ohad Oteri, and the dance is choreographed by Eli Segal. But, there was plenty more mystery as to origin of the music and who supplied the lyrics as you will see.

When our editors were in the midst of preparing the specs for the aforementioned anatomy script, there was some consideration as to how this script might add to this website's then new emphasis on finding the underlying music and musicians of the local Israeli dance repertoire. For that project initial research into finding videos showing the dance steps in addition to any video showing the artists singing or performing was first done by looking at Aura's Israelidance.com web site. We've always acknowledged our use of this resource because no other web site has the information that is on her site. Like any such web site, including this one, a lot of work, both hidden and overt, goes into maintaining and enhancing web site controls and information. This allows users to access large amounts of data pertaining to most Israeli dances. And, for the English speaking dancers, there is nothing like Aura's database in existence as it has the largest amount of information about Israeli dance in English. If you are not familiar with this database (and this montage has several screen shots of the dance database portion of Aura's site), click here to access it. In 2011 or thereabouts, we created a script to document the ability to search for information on her web site and you can access our analysis in its use by clicking here.

So, with the addition of a new dance, a quick look at Aura's site was in order. We queried her database and you can see the result of our query for Hayeled Sheli pertaining to the origins of the underlying music. You can see yourself that the composition of the music is credited to Amaro Diyav and the lyrics are credited to Srolik Ainhoren. This web site is by no means an expert in Israeli music and its personalities. But neither name rang a bell and the name Srolik Ainhoren just didn't make sence. This was confirmed by a Google search which is displayed to the right in this montage. Notice that all the references, including our site, thediskcoordinator.com, originate from Aura's listing of Hayeled Sheli. In essence, there is only one original reference to Ainhoren. We had to assume that there was no way that a lyricist for a professional piece of music had only worked on just that piece of music.

A similar situation occurred when looking up the composer of the music, Amaro Diyav. We show the google search on this. It seems from this that the composer might be Egyptian and this provided the hint that, with the help from friends, broke open the mystery of the music of Hayeled Sheli. Playing with several different spellings on both Google and on youtube, we ran into what is shown rightmost in this montage. Here's a name we recognized and we could see where a transliteration of the original name might lead to the transliteration that resulted in the name Amaro Diyav.

Before we discuss our analysis of a famous Egyptian singer and how he factors into the story of Hayeled Sheli, we do want to provide a somewhat tangential discussion about US laws pertaining to ownership. For Israeli dancers of US origin, it is surprising that our type of dance music can be copied with such ease. In the US there is an ongoing question as to what is legal (and what is illegal) pertaining to the copying of music and musical performance. This is known as copyright and this protects US based music within this country. But, once outside of the US, copyright protection involves the question of reciprical treaties between countries. In the Middle East, no such treaties seem to exist so music seems to flow quite freely between borders.

Copyright infringement, and similarly the question of plagiarism, is not a moot issue in this country. It is an important issue that is in the news everyday! Recently the heirs of the late singer Marvin Gaye won a lawsuit against the creators of "Blurred Lines" for copyright infringement given that a jury felt that the introduction of the 2013 "Blurred Lines" was too similar to Gaye's "Got to Give it up" which was a track on his 1977 album "Live at the London Palladium. The settlement amounted to millions of dollars in direct penalties and a percentage of the profits of this later song. We have shown both album covers in this montage.

However, this is not the situation in much of the Mideast. In our research we were able to determine that the Egyptian singer, Amr Diab, whose pictures make up this montage, had recorded the song Qusad Einy, translated as "In Front Of My Eyes", in the early years of the 21st century. You can access this recording by clicking here (or using an option button at the end of this script). Listen to the music of Qusad Einy. It is the same as Hayeled Sheli. We now knew the origin of the dance recommended by Jani to Grant although the lyrics and singer were changed in the Oteri version. With no other information, at this point we wrongly concluded that Diab was the composer, lyricist and performer of Qusad Einy and therefore should be the the credited composer of the music of Hayeled Sheli. As you will see we were wrong in these assumptions, but first let's discuss this artist, an icon to the Egyptian public for over 30 years.

Many Israeli dancers are familiar with Diab's work. A favorite dance of other sessions is Amarin(e) with its interesting changes of timing and sequence of steps. This is a Diab song and you can see the video of this on Youtube by clicking here or using a button below. We've taken the liberty of providing some screen shots of this video in this montage. Amarine translates as two moons in Arabic and the sessions dancing this do it in Diab's original music which means in the original Arabic.

In other cases Diab's recordings have been translated to Hebrew and sung by Israeli singers. Such is the case of the Diab recording Tamally Mark transformed into the Israeli partner's dance of Ata BeLibi. Similarly, another Israeli dance, Ahuv Sheli, begins as Diab's Habibi ya nour El Ain. Diab is a singing sensation in Egypt being a pop star since the early 1980's and his career has apparently seen him earn seven world music awards (or at least as reported by Wikipedia where the leftmost picture originates). Not surprisingly, given his popularity in Egypt, Diab is also popular throughout the Arab speaking world as the rightmost picture indicates (the rightmost picture was taken during a concert in Abu Dhabi). But, in addition, his music has crossed borders and affected Israelis and Israeli dancing.

Before we discuss how and when Qusad Einy crosses the border to Israel, it becomes apparent as one does some research that Diab is not a composer. Similar to other pop idols in this country, or in Israel (and here we can reference Ofra Haza, Sarit Hadad and Eyal Golan), Diab sings the creations of others. Some composers may be writing songs specifically for Diab. But we would also assume that composers - aided by lyricists - create songs and make them available to whichever artists agree to pay fees for their use. So at this point, we still haven't figured out the legitimate composer and lyricist for this song, Qusad Einy, as it is known at this point. But, here is the lyrics in Arabic and in English. Notice that this is a song about the desire - the yearning - of a man for a specific woman.

As this music makes an impression in neighboring Israel it is decided that this song will be a track on an album being prepared by Ohad Oteri. That album will have a need for Hebrew lyrics and the name of the song is changed to "my Boy" in Hebrew. We assume there is a deliberate attempt to change the underlying meaning as the Hebrew lyrics of "My Boy" are very different in scope and meaning from the Arabic lyrics for Qusad Einy. We now understand who Amaro DiYav is but it is clear that he, under his real name of Amr Diab, is not the composer but the prior singer. You already know that we are having difficulty in determining the elusive Srolik Ainhoren who it seems has never done anything besides the new Hebrew lyrics to this song. We do know that Ohad Oteri is a younger singer, pictured here with his latest album cover, who releases his first album "Leshnois Sidrei Olam" approximately in 2007 (although other sources seem to indicate 2004) where we believe Hayeled Sheli is one of the tracks.

While our editors are preparing the Anatomy script, we decided to see if we could use other sources to determine the true composer of the music and the creator of both the Arabic and Hebrew lyrics to this song. In the end, although not through our own efforts, a well known resource known to many Israeli dancers in the US and thorughout the world came to our rescue. This is the Rikud line which is part of Yahoo groups. You can see from the information here that the group was started sometime in 1998 and continues to have close to 1000 participants. If you are a member of the group, and the moderator is quite conservative in allowing entry, you have an entry into querying many Israeli dancers with years of experience. Could it possibly be that the information we needed was known by one of the Rikud groupees?

One of the members of this Yahoo group is Rich Janis who attends almost all of the Israeli dance sessions in this area. Rich was a major contributor to the Sacramento session throughout the years that he was employed in California but returned to this area several years ago. Rich also attends multiple workshops around the world and through 2015 (We are creating this script in early July) has been in Ecuator and in Israel dealing with the Karmiel dance festival. Per our query to him, he takes it upon himself to find an answer to our many questions with an Email to the Rikud line members as you can see here.

And on May 19th, 2015 all our questions are answered in an Email from someone who has requested anonymity. You can see all the information in this Email as presented to our editor. Finally we can declare the full attribution for both versions of this song. In the case of Qusad Einy, the music was composed by Amr Moustafa, the lyrics are from Khaled Tag al-Din and the singer, as you already are aware is Amr Diab. The Hebrew version of the song would have the same composer, lyrics by Yossi Ben David and the singer is Ohad Oteri.

@Before dealing with Ben David's lyrics, we should mention that Mostafa is also a great talent and recognized as such in his native Egypt. Born Dec 31, 1979, it seems that in his early to middle twenties - 2001 through 2006 - he is singing his own compositions to great acclaim while winning multiple awards in Egypt for musician of the year. He is the author of at least two albums. The only thing we couldn't find is a video of him singing Qusad Einy but other sources on the internet seem to verify his authorship of this music.

Here are the Hebrew lyrics created by Yossi Ben David (aka Yosi Ben David on Aura's database). The rough English translation of these lyrics (none of the English translations we have found are literate enough to replicate here) indicates that these lyrics have a very different meaning from the original Arabic lyrics indicated above. Who knows why this is the case? You would have to ask Ben David for an answer.

As to Ben David, it seems that while working on Hayeled Sheli, he was also busy creating music for one of the most interesting Israeli partner dances choreographed by Dudu Barzilay and this would be At Sheli Ani Shelach. The steps were choreographed by Barzilay in 2008 and this dance was probably the most played and favorite partner dance of that year. In addition, a quick look on Aura's database pertaining both to lyrics and composition shows Ben David active (at least in terms of music used for Israeli dances) since 1998 averaging a little more than one dance a year both choreographed and composed. We would have liked to show you a picture of Ben David in this montage but we couldn't determine which of the Yos(s)i Ben David's indicated in a google search is responsible for these lyrics so we have concentrated on Dudu and his demonstration of this dance (along with his partner Meliss Jakubovic, of the Atlanta Georgia Israeli dance session) at the Totonto IsReal Israeli dance festival of 2008. And, below, there is a button to watch the video.

Speaking of Barzilay as we return to our analysis of Hayeled Sheli, Israeli dancers know the names of several famous choreographers such as Gadi Bitton, Rafi Ziz, Moshe Eskayo and the aforemntioned Dudu Barzilay. These choreographers can probably make a substantial living on the workshop circuit and in running classes. Barzilay is an example of this in being featured at the 2008 Toronto - and many other - workshop while running an ongoing dance session in Israel (we believe). But there is a set of choreographers, perhaps most, who have to supplement any dance activity earnings with other sources of income. One such choreographer is Eli Segal whose day job is being a DJ in Israel. You can access his web page by clicking here (although it's in Hebrew only) and see the pictures indicated here where he DJed a wedding (Eli is in the middle of the first picture doing his thing). But, when not doing his part in finalizing marriages, he is an accomplished choreographer in what we know as Israeli dance.

@This is not to say that Eli is not featured at different workshops. Here are some other pictures, again taken from his web site, that apparently pertain to a workshop in Europe where costumes were the order of the day. With his height, Eli does make a good Green Lantern impression.

Sometime in 2007 Eli begins to choreograph "Hayeled Sheli" and the dance is officially registered as an Israeli dance sometime in 2008. And now, seven years later, the dance is being taught to the eager dancers of the Sunday morning Germantown session. Although it is surprising that a seven year old dance would become popular, this is what has happened as Grant introduces this dance at his session after Jani sees this dance in Florida over the winter.

And, after all of this history to this dance, we now resume our narrative as Grant teaches Hayeled Sheli. As indicated in the anatomy script, from which the next two montages are copied, notice how intent Grant's students are on this Sunday morning. The dancers are required to pick up the dance sequence and the arm movements. While still prictures do not allow a viewer to see the nuance of the steps, we feel that you, the viewer, should really feel the effect of the arm movements in these pictures. Since the Israeli dance version pertains to "My Boy", one should be able to interpret these "cradling" movements. The last picture in this montage catches Grant getting ready to play the music. Now comes the major test for those attending the session.

And our dancers respond! For some, it is the second time they are seeing the dance, as Grant had taught this dance the week before, but for many this is their debut in performing this dance. Notice how the dancers follow Grant through the movements which is not surprising. As this script is written, Hayeled Sheli has become part of the session's repertoire and many, but not all, have memorized the dance steps to be able to perform with or without Grant's presence.