Faced with the prospect of his imminent betrothal to the daughter of the village chief, Yakob flees at night through the mountain
“Yakob” is a ballad in rich, lyrical Yiddish, set to a distinctive melody in several parts, each section providing a musical backdrop to the tension of the story. The song tells the true story of a lonely bochur (Reb Yaakov Potash) singing at nights in the fields of Tajikistan, where he escaped during the Holocaust. Yakob’s niggunim are songs of longing for his parents’ home and the world of the yeshivah — “Ramban, Rambam, Rabbeinu Tam, nisht du of der velt ah bessereh taam…” — while his persona is a mystery to the peasants around him. When faced with the prospect of his imminent betrothal to the daughter of the village chief, Yakob flees at night through the mountains.
Rabbi Henoch Potash, son of Reb Yaakov Potash
Yom-Tov Ehrlich wrote this song in honor of my parents’ wedding in 1946. Reb Yom-Tov was probably the first person to converse with my father after his harrowing escape from Tajikstan and the imminent marriage to the chief’s daughter.
My father left this world at 53; he never bragged, and he never really sat down to tell us his stories. What we do know comes from what he told his friends immediately after the war, and from small snatches of information that he told my older brother or me.
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