Gali Atari/photo: PR
Not long ago I met a British concert critic, and we exchanged impressions and experiences as colleagues in the profession.
At some point he asked me what was the worst show I've ever had to write a review for, and after a short deliberation I remembered Don McLean's concert in Ra'anana, in June 2018. McLean's setlist was particularly stingy, skipping classics in favor of unsuccessful covers.
The sound was terrible, his guitar was out of tune and most of all, he seemed to be disrespecting the audience, as he chewed gum and didn't even try to keep up with the song "Vincent", one of the most beautiful songs ever written by a human being.
It was like hearing a karaoke performance of Don McLean songs, performed by a musician who doesn't sound like Don McLean, and doesn't even try to perform the songs properly.
When I told the same Brit that the Israeli audience was upset that McLean did not perform the song "Genesis", he admitted that he did not know the song.
It turns out, therefore, that the mournful song about the creation of the world became a hit mainly in the Holy Land.
I remembered this conversation and McLean's terrible performance during Gali Atari's performance yesterday at the Culture Hall.
Not only because Gali chose to open the show with "Bereshit", Rachel Shapira's Hebrew version of that wonderful Don McLean song, but because it was the complete opposite of that infamously remembered show.
It's not just the polished and polished production (and it was definitely polished and polished), not just Gali's precise performances, not just the exciting choice of guests - but mainly the fact that on the big stage of the mecca of Israeli music, Gali gave everything for her audience.
Just before I continue to review the show itself, I would like to make a short stop for a technical clarification: I call Gali Atari by her first name not because I know her personally.
Naturally when I wrote about Don McLean I referred to him as "McLean", and just as naturally I refer to Gali Atari simply as "Gali".
The reason for this is not gender, but lies in the familiarity that Gali creates in her audience.
It's hard to spend two hours with her songs, which even in the vast space of the Culture Hall become intimate, and not feel as if you are actually old friends.
We know the songs, and we know her.
We also know her sisters.
We know her nephew.
We know her niece.
The latter cried a lot just recently, when dastardly terrorists broke into her house and murdered her husband.
Gali Atari has been part of the Kahl Israel family for more than 50 years.
We call family members by their first name.
Gali Atari and Manny Bagar/Shlomi Pinto
How do you know you just left a huge artist's show?
You can name all the big hits that were left out of the show, yet you realize you can't complain about the song list.
Last night's celebratory show at the hall included no less than 28 songs, all of them hits, and yet some classics were left out such as "Esmeralda", "Nepal", "From summer to dream" and my personal favorite, "Chestnuts from the fire".
How many artists are there in Israel, or in the world, who can omit from their stylist an iron sheep property on the scale of "Summer to Dream"?
That's how it is when you have so many good songs in your personal arsenal to choose from.
The order of the songs was carefully chosen to give a balance between Gali's deep ballads, compared to her rhythmic and pop songs.
It was important not only for the flow of the show, but against the reality that was knocking on the walls of the culture hall from the outside, with the big "Bring Them Home" sign that is placed above the culture hall these days.
Even inside the hall it was difficult to escape the reality of the war, when Gali told the audience that the celebratory show, which marks her belated 70th birthday, was the first event her niece Shi-Li had attended since October 7.
The audience rose to its feet and received the massacre survivor from Kfar Gaza with applause.
Gali performed the song "Atzelano Bagan" by Shi-Li, itself a memorial song about a fallen soldier, while the giant screens projected family photos of Shi-Li and her late husband, Yahav Viner.
It's a song that deserves the status of the Hall of Culture, it's a shame that it got there under such tragic circumstances.
More exciting moments were recorded when Gali invited surprising guests to the stage.
Leah Shabat emerged on the stage during Gali's performance of "A song that will bring you love", which Shabat wrote.
The joint performance upgraded the song and blew the audience into the sky.
Saturday was left for a joint performance of "Red Sun", which received a renewed groove injection.
And it's blue and white
The device that changes everything you knew about refreshing and firming the facial skin
In collaboration with Premier
Atari and Shabbat/Shlomi Pinto
Another emotional peak was recorded when Gali invited Manny Begar to the stage, to perform a "farewell duet" - which the two had not performed for over 40 years.
In general, Gali Atari's early rock period does not receive enough respect in her shows, and the songs from the period of joint work with Yaroslav Yakovovich, some of which were real-time hits, have been pretty much forgotten.
The joint performance with Manny Begar, in which both of them suddenly looked - and mostly sounded - like young and kicking rockers, made me want more.
Towards the end of the show Hit Radaf Hit and Gali performed all the songs in a duet with the audience, who knew all the words by heart.
There are over 9 million inhabitants in Israel, and probably everyone has seen Dizengoff 99. Everyone knows how to hum the chorus of "Long Way" from that movie.
This is also the reason that the moment we all hear the beautiful words written by Thelma Eligon Rose, about the song of the wind on the water, which has many shades, we all think of one specific movie scene starring Gali Atari, Anat Atzmon and Gidi Gov.
Well, what are you playing it, you know which scene I mean.
Gali of course knows what everyone is thinking, and chooses to address the elephant in the room.
"Has anyone here not seen Dizengoff 99?", she asks the audience and immediately answers: "Those who haven't seen it, no big deal, you don't have to."
Laughter breaks the tension in the air as she puts her hand on her heart and says: "With a hand on her chest, what do you see there, you can think."
At this moment, Gali points to the giant screens and offers to project the segment in question to the entire audience, for a moment the audience falls into a trap, then Gali returns and continues to sing the big hit.
Gali Atari and Roi Bar Natan as Atari/Shlomi Pinto
It seems that Gali saved the biggest surprise for the encore, when the first and all-too-familiar notes of "Hallelujah" began, with Gali on stage wearing the same dress she wore at Eurovision in the Nation Buildings in Jerusalem.
But it's not Gali, it takes the audience a few seconds to realize that it's Roi Bar Natan, who gave his ripping imitation of "Aretz Terahed" (her name?) live.
After two hours with the real thing, it's hard not to appreciate even more the precision in the nuances that Bar Natan captured.
The show concluded with a performance without musical accompaniment to "I have no other country".
A song written about a different war, from an album whose theme song was written about a different massacre, but it seems to fit any era, any time.
The audience that stood on their feet and sang the words loudly along with the singer on stage gave the impression that this was a national anthem, not a song by a favorite pop singer.
At his will, Ehud Menor's text is a protest song.
In his will, it is a national mourning song.
Yesterday he was just a temporary mourner, in a show that was full of spiritual transcendence.
It was the triumph of music, by someone who, in the absence of other original lyrics, admits that even at 70 she is still strong of spirit.
More on the same topic:
Atari waves