Storahtelling

Oy To The World

By Amichai Lau-Lavie

Storah On The Road

I didn’t know it at the TIME, but when the cabaret show about the mystery of the longest night of the year and the elusiveness of time was schduled for November 3rd – it was to be the night on which the clock changes, an hour is gained, and time, again manipulated. Amazingly, this show took place at Lannie’s Cabaret – in the basement of Denver’s famous clocktower…

Lannie’s cabaret looks like a Victorian Brothel, and feels like a cozy red velvet sitting room, where about 150 people doesn’t feel too croweded, as it indeed did not last night – full house!

OY TO THE WORLD started as Storahtelling’s Christmas Eve show and has since evolved and enjoyed several incarnaions, with last year’s version starring Rebbetzin Hadassah Gross. This year I was lucky and priveleged to have EVE ILSEN - a REAL Rebetzin and a fantastic vocal artist. EVE belted out tunes by George Harrison, Cole Porter, and even a homage to Bette Middler, accompanied by two very talented musicians – Ben Cohen on piano and Dirk Dickson on an upright bass. Me – I was telling stories – about light and dark, the journey from Christmas to Chanuka to Solstice, via Rome, Babylon, Jerusalem, a Yeshiva in NYC and a basement in Denver. All rivers go to the same sea, and all ancient stories and ritual celebrate the same miracle – light, sun, seasons changing like clockwork, year in and year out. Was it Einstein who called God ‘the great clockmaker’?

The longest night of the year is, techicnly, on the 21st of December, but I hope that last night’s show (repeated again next week on Nov. 10 in Boulder) gave the audience a taste for making the winter holidays – no matter what religion if at all –a chance to pause, take TIME OUT and find new ways of unwrapping the reason for the season.