Chad Gadya (One Kid)

The Jewish holiday of Passover (Pesach) commemorates and celebrates the exodus of the Jews from ancient Egypt. During the Passover meal, a traditional closing song is “Chad Gadya” (“One Young Goat,” often translated as “One Kid”), thought to have first appeared in print in 1590. Written in Aramaic (a close relative of ancient Hebrew), it has been sung not only in its original language but in the local vernacular, wherever Jews have lived.

Abraham Schwadron has collected recordings of unaccompanied singers rendering “Chad Gadya.” From his collection, he has selected twenty-five renditions in nine languages for this recording, representing a wide variety of tunes and musical styles.

The liner notes include the song’s history, a translation, and various allegorical explanations.

Track Listing

101	Aramaic	Abraham Schwadron	05:00
102	Aramaic / German / Yiddish / Yiddish / Aramaic / Aramaic / Aramaic	Leo Rosenblüth, Theodore Katz, Harry Abrams, Florence C. Lewis, Myer Fund, Moshe Moskovits, Ruth Rubin	09:17
103	Greek and Aramaic / Ladino / Aramaic / Ladino / Ladino	Greek singer, Ladino singer from Greece, Greek singers, Maurice Hasson, Morris Mizrahi	07:04
201	Russian / Judeo-Provençal	Bluma Jarrick, French singer	03:36
202	Aramaic and Italian / Italian / Aramaic	Fernando Belgrado, Colombo Vitaliano, Emanuele Weiss-Levi	04:08
203	Ladino / Ladino	Isaac Behar, Edwin Seroussi	03:22
204	Aramaic and Arabic / Aramaic / Aramaic / Aramaic and Ladino / Aramaic	Solomon Benchetrit, Bracha Zion, Khakham Ezra Mordekhai, Haim Ha Cohen, Raphael Yair Elnadav	10:21