Name: My Heart is in the East
Start: 2025-11-12T12:45:00+01:00
Location: Dorpsstraat 59, 2712 AD Zoetermeer, Nederland

Entree: Free, donations collection at exit
For more information visit:
https://www.herbergoudekerk.nl/concertagenda.php
Throughout the middle ages the Sephardic community in the Iberian peninsula flourished as a cultural go-between for both Christianity and Islam. Elements of the two contrasting cultures found their way into Sephardic community everyday life seeping into its poetry and music.
In response to the mandate of 1492, requiring all Jews in Iberia to convert or submit to exile, mass emigration ensued.
“My Heart is in the East” unfolds the deep yearning of the Sephardic community both for the east as well as for Spain and Portugal, a crushing effect of a double exile.
The programme highlights Judeo-Spanish vocal and instrumental musical repertoire.
This is our homage to Spain (Sephard in Hebrew), its Moorish roots and its rich Sephardic and Christian heritage, a melting pot of the West and the East.
“My Heart is in the East '' swings from celebration of these thriving communities, to their musical traditions, and grief of forced expulsion.
Singer and storyteller Michal Bitan will take the audience on a journey to the past through songs spanning multiple centuries, by Alonso Mudarra, Jose Marin, Luys Milan and a wealth of traditional Sephardic songs. In these pieces you can hear and experience how the various cultures influence each other, for example the Moorish and Sephardic colors in the Spanish Romances by Mudarra and Milan and lively hispanic harmonic progressions full of melancholy drama in the Sephardic songs.