Last night, JTA staffers Ben Harris and Uriel Heilman attended different events here in NYC, celebrating the 60th anniversary of Israel’s founding. Having had to turn down an opportunity to attend last night’s big concert at Radio City, I sat down with them both to find out what I missed.

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With shows like “In Treatment,” Israel is finally starting to carry its weight in the U.S.-Israel pop culture relationship. And how do we return the favor? Check out this piece of news from the Forward…

A consortium of Tel Aviv-based producers, talent agents and TV distribution specialists recently announced auditions for the first-ever Hebrew version of the play, which is based on the 2006 Disney Channel movie about teen love ignited during a session of karaoke. Despite its culturally specific setting — an American high school populated by such figures as a popular jock and a competitive drama club tyrant — “High School Musical” proved an international smash hit, viewed by young people in 100 countries and becoming one of the top-selling DVDs of all time. …

The musical will be adapted, appropriately, by someone whose last name means “song” — Smadar Shir, a children’s book author and journalist also responsible for a number of youth-oriented plays. Shir, who is the writer of two weekly columns in the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot, has also translated into Hebrew versions of “Aladdin” and “The Little Mermaid,” and the stories of Mark Twain. She’ll have limited creative leeway in adapting her newest project, which, according to contractual agreements with Disney, must hew as closely as linguistically possible to the original.

The student paper at Youngstown State University reports on the record deal signed by 18-year-old Jewish freshman Jonathon Tepper:

Tepper, aka Throwback the Jewish King, has just signed a major record deal to New York’s top independent record label, Affluent Records, which has a few other artists such as Outlawz, Dead Prez and Hood Surgeon.

“It’s an all-star line up, and a perfect fit for me,” said Tepper.

As far as being from Youngstown, Throwback raps that people hate on the Yo’, but he’s proud of where he comes from. In his songs, he focuses on misconceptions of a city back on the rise. …

Tepper describes his rap style as unique. He enunciates his words and embraces stereotypes about Jewish people.

Click here to visit his My Space page and listen to a clip of his music.

Listen to an excerpt of the new piece of Jewish music that Sue Fishkoff reported on yesterday.

The Forward has hooked up with The Jewish Channel to produce three shows: a round table featuring the paper’s staffers, an interview show with J.J. Goldberg and a movie-themed program with arts & culture editor Alana Newhouse.

In one recent segment on Newhouse’s show, she and the TJC crew looked at the Jewish-Rastafarian documentary Awake Zion.

tjctv.com/blogs/are-dreadlocks-the-new-peyos/

I fear I must take leave of the Winehouse blogging, before I cast myself a one trick pony. But before I do, I just wanted to share with you that Amy took home five Grammy awards yesterday: Record of the Year, Song of the Year, Best New Artist, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, and Best Pop Vocal Album.

Now you know why, despite her antics, her fans are willing to put up with her: She’s got talent. Here’s hoping she’ll take this as inspiration to clean up her act.

[Update] Here’s the video of last night’s performance:

Mike A. Kelly/Creative Commons

Pop songstress/tabloid fixture Amy Winehouse is contemplating recording a Chanukah album. Her producer, Mark Ronson, recently told Rolling Stone:

“We’re talking about making a holiday record, with Christmas songs on one side and Hanukkah songs on the other,” Ronson explained. “She’s got songs called, like, ‘Kosher Kisses’ and ‘Alone Under the Mistletoe.’ She was kind of f–king around, but I was like, ‘You have all these amazing records to play for Christmas, like Motown and Carla Thomas and the Charlie Brown Christmas, and unfortunately, us Jews have nothing that cool to listen to. So we should do something.”

Yet despite the buzz around the project and around Winehouse’s Jewish identity in-and-of-itself, according to Paul Lester, a contributor to London’s Jewish Chronicle, the singer refuses to grant the Chronicle an interview because she wishes to remain disassociated from the Jewish community.

(more…)

Here are two keepers: a preview of Adam Sandler’s upcoming flick about a top Israeli commando who wants to become a hairdresser and British pop singer Lauren Rose performing her version of Hava Nagila, which is climbing to the top of the charts in England:

UPDATE: JTA’s resident music buff, Jacob Berkman (that’ll get fellow writer Ben Harris steamed), says Rosen is simply ripping off this guy’s holiday-timed Hava Nagila from two years ago.

Here’s a message and video link from Y-Love, the self-described Hiphop activist:

I wanted to give you a heads up on a breakthrough Jewish music video which hit YouTube last night. DJ Handler and Shemspeed.com arranged a musical mashup in front of 1,200 fans at Irving Plaza last night never before seen - the Idan Raichel Project with special guests, Matisyahu and Y-Love.

What is Shemspeed? Mordy Shinefield, the Forward’s music columnist, explains. Here’s the Web site’s account of the big night:

Idan Raichel and dj handler are all set to perform at Irving Plaza when Shemspeed’s good friends Matisyahu and Y-Love let us know they are coming through. We suggest that all of them do a song together. Everyone is psyched and the second they hit the stage it is like a bomb of excitement went off with the sold out thousand+ crowd! Here is what went down!