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Jazz Guitar

Miles Davis

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Jerusalem Jazz Musicians

Jerusalem Peace Wish

Suitably inspired, Bar went to Los Angeles and spent two years studying guitar, with the emphasis on jazz. "That was an experience," he recalls. "We had an orientation period at the beginning during which we'd go to hear concerts by the teachers. I remember starting out thinking I really had something to offer but I soon realized I had a lot to learn. Those guys were great musicians, and no one really knew of them."

With such a varied musical background it is not surprising to discover that the Yellow Submarine's output to date covers a relatively expansive range of genres. Avi Adrian's 2-CD Trio album is a mix of the acclaimed Jerusalem pianist's version of jazz standards plus some ethnically derived themes while Bar himself plays guitar on The Yellow Submarine Ensemble septet's recording. On the rock side, besides the Hamishpakha effort, there is a 2-track CD and a single from Amir Klugman and an ethnic flavored rock single from Meirav Siman-Tov

Bar began his love affair with the Yellow Submarine five years ago which, at the time, was not in the best of health. "The Submarine was a place you always heard about. It opened [in 1991] with a fanfare but had deteriorated. The Jerusalem Foundation started it up, they are still the main sponsors, but there were problems between the two people who ran the place." By the time Bar came on board it was basically a place where musician could rehearse, and little else. Today, the Yellow Submarine hosts around 15 shows a month, provides high school students with musical tuition as part of their bagrut syllabus, and offers rehearsal and recording facilities. "People generally don't know much about exactly what goes on at the Submarine," says Bar.

Over the past year or two the entertainment industry has tottered from crisis to crisis. The Camelot organization which, for six years, ran premises in Tel Aviv and Herzliyah and brought over an impressive list of foreign musicians, is just about keeping its head above water. The commercial record companies spend much of their time cooking up new projects, including numerous overtly consumer oriented compilations of practically every genre of music going. But, the Yellow Submarine has a distinct advantage over its rivals. "The Submarine is a public concern," Bar explains. "In today's harsh reality, it does not have the wherewithal to exist as a private organization. There is no place like it which is able to support itself financially - not in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv or anywhere else in the country or, possibly, anywhere in the world. You have places like Ronny Scott's [in London] and the Blue Note [in New York} but they make a lot of money out of the restaurants they have, and they charge a lot for admission. But, we are not a music club. We are a music center that operates from morning till night, that has to provide a solution for lots of things for a very small audience."

As a Jerusalemite who lived for a while in Tel Aviv Bar is keenly aware of the difference between the two cities. "It is not by chance that the Submarine was set up in Jerusalem. There is a music industry in Tel Aviv, but there isn't here. Any musician of above average talent will get out of here straightaway and move to Tel Aviv. Here, he won't have any work, except for teaching." Bar wants to do something to redress that situation. "I am trying to do build up a local music industry here. It's very much a step by step thing. The bagrut music department we have here is part of that. That's a unique facility. We also run a course for sound engineers. And the label is an important part of that too."

Bar is at pains to stress that the record label is not just an outlet for any local musician with material they want to record.. For him it is very much a matter of quality rather than quantity. Some might say you can't afford to be too picky in these troubled times. Bar may be an idealist, but he isn't naive. "We have to make money at the Submarine but that isn't our raison d'?tre. The music we put out has to be good."

You don't have to be a Harvard graduate of musicology to be alert to the subjective nature of the arts. Artists, critics and amateur art lovers alike have argued over the essence of "good" art for centuries. To paraphrase a well known adage, one man's Beethoven can be another man's Madonna. Many would say it is all down to taste and would question Bar's right to set artistic standards. He is aware of the Pandora's box he might be opening but sticks to his guns. "There has to be something that you can say is real, or good, music while the other stuff is rubbish. There are some basic rules which have to be honored," he proffers.

One of the local institutions which has a similar ideological objective to the Yellow Submarine is the Fact Records label which was established three years ago by Yoram Eliakim. While Bar says he respects Eliakim's efforts to provide Jerusalemite artists with an affordable means of recording their original material he is not entirely impressed with some of Fact's output. "I greatly respect the niche Yoram created and the work he has done. But, in musical terms, I have a serious problem with Fact. On the one hand he has Hadara Levin Areddy in his line-up. She really makes what I would call music. On the other hand, there are some things which people get excited over and which I have hard time connecting with. Take the Gummia Project - one of Fact's more mainstream projects - with Amir Kleiner and some other guys, for example. I'm not sure what it is all about. They are a bunch of guys who don't know how to play music. I think there has to be some kind of boundary beyond which you can't call the sound you hear music. I take that aspect very seriously at the Yellow Submarine. I pay a lot of attention to the artists' playing ability and level of musicianship." Bar says there is a lot more work to be done to breathe life into the Jerusalem music industry but he feels he has, at least, made a start.

Copyright 2002 the Jerusalem Post