“If I stay true to my core, singing what I really feel, then Hashem helps me out, sending the ideas and the songs my way”

When people tell URI DAVIDI that they love the theme and vibe of his new album ANI CHAI, he can’t help but smile. Because actually, he says, there was no theme or blueprint, no deliberate arrangement of songs around the concepts of hope, rebirth and Geulah. He worked on the songs one by one as the concepts came up, giving each in its own time over the past two years. The fact that the messages revolve around optimism and encouragement is more an inevitable reflection of the singer’s core values and persona than a premeditated theme.

“I don’t shop around much for material,” he explains. Rather, most songs evolved from ideas that inspired him — some of them general or even vague — which he brought to Yitzy Waldner to crystallize into songs. “Yitzy’s gift is being able to take a concept or message and craft it into a beautiful song,” says Davidi. “And as for my part, over the years I’ve seen that nothing is haphazard. If I stay true to my core, singing what I really feel, then Hashem helps me out, sending the ideas and the songs my way.”

Davidi feels that nowadays, it’s not just the music, but also the messages embedded within, that propel songs to success.

“The message of a song — the words, the lyrics — has to resonate with listeners. I would venture to say that if other meaningless words were set to the melody of ‘Echad Ani Yodea,’ or ‘Muchanim,’ for example, those songs wouldn’t go anywhere.”

These messages can resonate even when told in the simplest language, like many hits that have trended in recent years. Track three on this album, “Bye Bye Golus,” is a good example. While Yitzy Waldner’s melody and Miriam Israeli’s lyrics have a fun simplicity (reminiscent of Davidi’s popular “Nu Nu”), the arrangement takes the song to a new level.

“We sent some songs to arranger David Ihilevitz, but although this track wasn’t supposed to be one of them, he somehow wound up with it anyway,” Davidi relates. “When he got back to us with his ideas, Yitzy and I were taken aback. But I thought it over and decided that if Hashem made sure the song went there, there must be a reason. David made some changes to the melody, and his arrangements gave seriousness and depth to the song, changing it for the better.”

“Tivneh Olam,” the first song on the album, pulls listeners into the concept that destruction is actually a void to enable creation, like the emptiness that preceded Hashem’s creation of the world.

“If everything seems absolutely lost, think of the darkness before Hashem created the world, the “tohu vavohu,” Davidi says. “If you feel your world is gone/ there’s nothing left you can’t go on... / And you’re the one who’s going to build it anew...” This idea was born when an arranger made an off-hand remark to Davidi that his office was upside down — “in a state of tohu vavohu.” The casual comment sparked an idea in the singer’s mind, and working from that kernel, he and Yitzy Waldner built up a beautiful song of chizuk and inspiration.

The album also offers new Hebrew lyrics, with added depth, for Davidi’s song “Jump!” He produced this with Israeli audiences in mind, but interestingly, Americans have also enjoyed the adaptation.

Another powerful song, “Hinei Hageulah,” was offered to Davidi by Yosef Aharonoff, a Lakewood resident who found himself stuck at home in isolation for a week during the pandemic. He writes in an easy but well-phrased Hebrew of the longing he felt to see the arrival of Mashiach. It’s an uplifting song of yearning and certainty, with the distinctive sound of an accordion giving a folk feel to the music.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 942)