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From the collaboration with Eric Einstein to the great hit of Beehive: the great works of Yitzhak Kleftar | Israel Hayom

2022-12-09T05:20:46.514Z


The great creator who passed away is responsible for countless works • From Gali Atari's female empowerment anthem, through the song he loved the most to the hit that actually became identified with David Broza • Take a few minutes and enjoy


It is difficult, and perhaps not really necessary, to explain the importance of Yitzhak Kleftar, who died at the age of 72 last night (Thursday), to Hebrew music.

No need because the songs speak for themselves.

These will also live many years after him, even if some of them are not even directly linked to him in the collective cultural memory.

Clifter's impressive and huge catalog of work includes songs he composed as part of the groups Churchill, Ahriat Yamim and Hive, along with those that established him as a successful solo artist in his own right and of course the huge amount of compositions he gave to other artists.

From "I love chocolate" which he composed to the words of Jonathan Geffen as part of "The Sixteenth Lamb" to Gali Atari's female empowerment anthem "What you love".

From "I have a birthday" which he played as part of his activities with the end of days, through "If you are around" ("My town") which he composed for Arik Sinai to the iconic "Free imagination", which he wrote and composed for himself and for himself.

His contribution is immeasurable.

But it is possible and appropriate to engage in songs, and also in stories and the background to their creation.

Tuned Tone

Although the band that boasted that name and in which Clifter worked in the late 1970s did not survive for too long, the song that earned the name was deeply inscribed in Israeli culture.

He appeared on the only album recorded by the band and in an interview on the occasion of the release of his book of songs, Clifter recently revealed that this is his favorite of his many songs.

In an interview with "Israel Today" he will say that for him this is a masterpiece and a moment of personal record.

"'Intentional sound' is my masterpiece," he said.

"It took me a year to write it. Like all his songs, they wrote it for an ideal personality, not for a real person. I like the version that Eti Levy did for him. He sings beautifully, a good singer."

By the way, not many know that the line "When a tree in the garden is confusing, it doesn't hurt to fall in love" contributed to the song by none other than the poet Yona Wallach.

It takes time

By the way, it's pretty amazing to think about the amount of great songs the band wrote in the short time they existed.

The media, they will say in interviews, did not give them much exposure, they did not even know how to digest the music created by the group.

One of them is the laziness anthem "Taking Time".

Jonathan Geffen did say that he wrote the song about Clifter himself, but Clifter claimed that he did not know it was about him and that in any case he is not lazy at all but "a man who works very hard".

In April 2020, at the height of the first wave of the Corona epidemic, members of the legendary (and growing) sketch group "Zah Zah" performed a cover version of the song, which was suitable for a time when humanity was sick at home, with very little certainty and lots, really lots, of free time.

Bedouin love song

At the end of the 1970s, Clifter found himself in a financial crisis.

An offer from Jonathan Geffen to compose the songs for the show "Living Room Conversations" helped him and also gave birth to "Bedouin Love Song", a song that deals with a couple torn between the desire of the female character to settle down in him while the male character is interested in the nomadic life.

In the show, Clifter sang it together with Yael Levy, before he left and was replaced by David Broza).

It was a great success in the song charts of Network C (it even took first place in one of the weeks) and became, like quite a few other songs composed by the legendary guitarist, an Israeli classic.

In a way he defined as surreal but exciting, the first time he heard the song on the radio was while he was hospitalized.

A ballad for the naïve

More from the Geffen-Clifter composition, performed by Yael Levy.

Geffen explained that it is a "song of feelings of guilt about the man's absences", which he wrote during the period when he performed with Danny Litany every evening (and from there continued to hours of debauchery in bars).

The women, at this time, were waiting at home for them to return.

Yael Levy will say that when she recorded it, she herself was even more naive than the woman in the song.

Over the years, you will discover, understand it differently and continue to perform it in her performances.

My love is not his love

Another song written by Jonathan Gefen and composed by Yitzhak.

He appeared on Clifter's first solo album, "Yitzhak" released in 1981 and launched his solo career, which provided quite a few gold hits.

For the musician it was a sharp but welcome transition to the front of the stage.

Although some of his songs were played on radio stations, especially "My love is not his love", the sales of the album were considered disappointing.

And just like "Taking Time", about a year ago the members of "Zah Zah" performed a performance of it that made many smile and reminded the world what a great song it is.

She's so pretty

In the first years of the seventies, Clifter was already considered a well-known and respected guitarist.

But it was his joining the Beehive band in 1973 that made him a household name.

The members of the band who were called "the Israeli Beatles" became living legends together and separately, and Klepper was no different from them.

In an interview with Maariv, the guitarist will tell years later about how he joined the band.

"Danny Sanderson, who knew me as a studio player and heard about me, invited him to his house," he said.

"Efraim Shamir and Gidi Gov were also there. They played me some of their songs and suggested that I join the band. It was different from anything I had known up until then and not my forte. But I liked it and I joined."

A wise decision, as it turns out, that will lead to the creation of "Yo Ya", "Tango Frogs", "The Fool's Song" (in which he even received his own solo piece for the first time) and of course "She's so beautiful", which he composed to Sanderson's words and is considered a source of pride for him .

"Efraim Shamir heard two melodies I composed and he recommended me to combine them," he said in the same interview.

"And thus one song was born, which with a text by Danny Sanderson became one of the most played of Beehive."

In fact, before they were welded together, "She's So Beautiful" was the opening of one song, while "All Week" originally opened another song.

Fragile, likes to be at home, I have love, sits on the fence

A series of temporary hits was created by the fruitful collaboration between Klafter and the late Eric Einstein. And to think that they were almost never written. In the early 1970s, Klafter played with Einstein as part of his backing band, but when asked by Eric, almost ten years later, to write With him - Clifter hesitated.

He valued himself to some extent as a player (and at this point he also did not experience himself as particularly successful) but not as a composer.

"I argued to him that I don't know how to write or play music.

I was critical of myself.

I didn't think I was good enough to play with him," he said.

"He said - come, write already and at most play badly."

So I went and played badly.

We made three albums together.'

Einstein's work of persuasion did its job and the result is some of the most important songs in the career of the two.

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Source: israelhayom

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