Credits Due

With Yaakov Brown

You hear it at simchahs, you know the chorus and even the harmony. But who’s niggun is it? In an era of viral tracks and borrowed melodies, the people who composed the background music of our lives are often forgotten, leaving us asking:

WHO WROTE THAT TUNE?

I’d love to know who composed the songs that signal the special time when Adar comes around. In our house, the music is “Mishe mishe mishenichnas Adar marbim, marbim, marbim besimchah oooooo mishenichnas Adar oooooo marbim besimchah,” and its non-identical twin, “Mishe mishe mishe mishe mishe mishe mishe mishe mishe mishenichnas Adar,” with the same tune that’s also sung to “V’nahafoch v’nahafoch v’nahafoch v’nahafoch v’nahafoch hu.”

For my boys, Purim means endless happy rounds of “Chayav inish libesumei…” as well as the song my teachers in elementary school used to sing with us thirty years ago, “Vayehi bimei Achashveirosh…” And in the world of my preschoolers, the teachers are still singing “Chag Purim, Chag Purim… hava narisha rash rash rash…”

Who composed these Purim classics? I can’t find the composers listed on any album covers.

B.N.

Yaakov Brown answers:

It’s not surprising you can’t find the composers easily. On album covers, these songs are usually attributed as “traditional,” which is one way of saying that no-one really knows.

Regarding the first “Mishenichnas” you mention: The tune is a traditional American folk song called “Pick a Bale of Cotton.” It was originally a slave-era plantation work song to make the work less monotonous and the Southern heat more bearable. The popular version was first recorded by Texas state prison inmates James Baker and Moses Platt in December of 1933, and from then on it has been covered by many performers. When did it reach the Jewish community and “convert” into a beloved Purim song? That, I do not know.

Regarding the second one, “Mishenichnas Adar,” also sung as “Venahafoch Hu,” goes down as “traditional.” There is no known background story of interest that I am aware of.

The tune for “Chayav Inish”? That was taken from a Hungarian folk song composed by a fellow named Jenő B. Fehér.