Livenyomin Omar | Episode 1 premiere with Avraham Fried | A COL Podcast

Hello, everyone. Today we’re launching a new podcast that will appear here on COL every week. We’re delighted to have Avraham Fried, a giant of Chassidic music, with us for our first episode.

Guest: Shalom aleichem. I’m happy to be here. Much success.

Interviewer: Amen. Wonderful.

Interviewer: We met many years ago, and now, after all these years, we’re meeting again on this platform.

Guest: That’s right, it really has been many years.

Guest: You once wrote an article about me, something like that.

Interviewer: Yes, yes, I interviewed you for “Bina Labayit.” It was a special interview in which you spoke as a father to your children—not as a great singer, but as a singer who is also a father.

Interviewer: Now we’ll talk on a podcast, not in an article. But hopefully, with Hashem’s help. I want to ask you a question, one you may not have been asked lately: How does it work that, after so many years, you still hold such a strong place—I’d say at the beating heart of Chassidic music? Without naming anyone else, you’ve stayed at the top. How do you think that happens?

Guest: Well, I’ve never thought about it. What a good question. You work hard, daven a lot, and look for good material. And the spark that lights the fire is the sense of shlichus. As long as there’s an opportunity, and the Creator gives you strength, a voice, and energy, you have to do something.

Interviewer: Speaking of your voice—is that something you work on? Do you have to keep working on it, maintaining it on a daily basis?

Guest: Every day.

Interviewer: How much time does it take?

Guest: The body, too... you have to take care of it.

Interviewer: But how much—do you work on it for two hours?

Guest: Yes. I’m very tired right now, very tired. There was a show last night—“Laila Hakodesh,” “Chaim, Chaim Shebeirach,” a mizmor...

Interviewer: Outdoors?

Guest: Yes, near...

Interviewer: Amazing!

Guest: [unclear]—there. I jump around and work hard up there, and it takes a lot out of me. So you have to prepare for it; there’s no other way. It doesn’t just happen. Every day takes work—staying in shape, staying healthy, with Hashem’s help. And there’s also a particular way to warm up and open up the voice.

Interviewer: How much time a day does that take you?

Guest: Every day, every day. It doesn’t have to take hours—half an hour here, twenty minutes there, so everything is warmed up, not dry and cold.

Interviewer: Do you do that with the help of professionals, or do you already know the techniques?

Guest: I don’t go to professionals for it. Maybe—but I already know what to do. I do it at home. I’m in the kitchen, and whatever’s going on in the kitchen, I’m there shouting.

Interviewer: Sometimes here in the hotel, too?

Guest: Sometimes here in the hotel, too, yes. I actually look for a room where I won’t disturb the neighbors when I sit there shouting at night or in the middle of the day.

Interviewer: I remember being with you once—many years ago, maybe close to 30 years—at a performance in Tzfas. We arrived much earlier, two hours before, and I was sitting in the hall. You were backstage. Suddenly I heard sounds. I couldn’t understand it: these very strange sounds kept getting higher and higher, louder and louder. I wondered what was going on. At one point I caught Eli Yisrael and asked him, “Tell me, who’s making those sounds? Who got in here?” He told me, “That’s Avraham. He’s warming up.” I said, “Are you sure it’s him? It doesn’t sound anything like him.” I’ve never stopped marveling at it since.

Guest: Exactly, exactly. It’s a must before every performance. You know, it’s like a studio recording—you need strong backing for something that will go out into the world and last. So it takes work. But the feedback from the audience, when you succeed—you hear stories that you strengthened someone, saved someone, helped someone, brought joy to someone who wasn’t well, and so on—that puts wind beneath your wings.

Interviewer: You mentioned “a studio recording.” It’s actually been a very long time since a new album came out. Does that mean we’re in a different era now, when only singles come out?

Guest: That’s true, that’s true. But you should know I’m in the studio almost every week. I’m working, I’m recording. The material hasn’t come out yet—there are now a great many spiritual songs.

Interviewer: Will it come out soon, with Hashem’s help? Is there a target date?

Guest: I don’t like working with a deadline.

Interviewer: A deadline?

Guest: Yes, the Rebbe said not to give a deadline, a specific date. But the material is there. I still need to finish a song or two, and it will be released, with Hashem’s help.

Interviewer: Is there a particular concept? What will it be like?

Guest: Songs. Good songs, with Hashem’s help.

Interviewer: You know, several styles have emerged over the years. Somehow you’ve kept your own style, but you’ve also connected with the more current style, which I’d say is shorter, bouncier, more upbeat.

Guest: There are different approaches. Some say you have to move with the times, and others say: Stick with what brought you success; don’t change. So I’m trying to follow that approach.

Interviewer: Yes, yes.

Guest: Because someone like me, for example—I’m not so young anymore...

Interviewer: I grew up on Yossi Green’s songs—those long songs, like “Shabbos Noam,” “Tanya,” “Aderaba.” Today they’ve largely given way to a different style.

Guest: I’d say he doesn’t write things like that anymore.

Interviewer: Really?

Guest: He’s afraid to, apparently.

Interviewer: Really? Are you in touch with him? Tell me—has anyone done something like “Aderaba” lately?

Guest: By the way, we’re working together now. There are several of his songs on the album.

Interviewer: No, I mean works like those. Is there anything along those lines?

Guest: Honestly, I don’t know. I believe a good song is a good song, even if it’s six minutes long. It’s not the end of the world. If it’s interesting, with lyrics and a good melody, I certainly wouldn’t be afraid to record a song like that. On the other hand, young people today prefer something with more of a beat, something more engaging. So you need that too—but you have to be careful about what works and what doesn’t, not to cross the red line, so it still has Jewish warmth.

Interviewer: I wanted to ask what you think about today’s music and dance music. They’ve really broken through and reached entirely different levels. It’s a slightly provocative question, but still.

Guest: And the people who do that and succeed—if they have an audience that comes out...

Interviewer: That wants it.

Guest: Of course, absolutely. But I don’t come at it with—how do you say it—I have to do what I feel is my shlichus, my role, and preserve that. Others do what they feel they need to do with modern music, with today’s sound. I feel I can still bring audiences what brought me success, while adding something more suited to this generation here and there.

Interviewer: Yes, you yourself have come a long way. I remember your first performance—I think it was your first not only in Israel but anywhere—at the Siyum HaRambam on Pesach 5748.

Interviewer: You stood there as a young, shy man, I’d say, and barely moved onstage. Today you dance from one end of the stage to the other. It’s something else.

Guest: That comes with experience, with time.

Interviewer: Where did you learn it?

Guest: It’s all Hashem’s kindness. Where did I learn all these things? On the job. I didn’t take lessons in how to stand or how to make an easy entrance. Boruch Hashem, I’ve had many years to learn what to do. Maybe people used to talk about this more, and today they talk about it less—maybe because they’re less involved with it: this world, the world of music, is a world with many tests.

Interviewer: That’s true, it really is. People like you often face difficult tests, and they have to know how to make a decision. I’m talking about tests, about temptations that come from all sorts of directions—what to preserve, what to give up, which audiences to reach.

Guest: You have to hold on to what’s good. As for what isn’t good—there’s no reason to be afraid. The main thing is not to let all the audience reactions go to your head, or words like “superstar” and “star” and all that nonsense. You have a gift—use it to do what’s expected of you, and don’t be a fool. That was the wisdom.

Interviewer: Over time, despite your black kippah and unmistakably Chareidi appearance, you’ve grown very close to the religious-Zionist community. That’s not something to take for granted. It might even have seemed surprising to some people, but it’s been very successful.

Guest: Yes, very much so. I’d say that’s my audience.

Interviewer: And what do you think made that happen?

Guest: They feel something; they feel a neshamah. They love soul, heart, and joy, so we connected.

Interviewer: I’m going to ask you a slightly difficult question, but let’s try. The fact that you perform not only for audiences with separate seating, but also for mixed audiences—did you wrestle with that? How did you reach that point? I mean, are you at peace with it? If you have to account for it in the World to Come...

Guest: Yes, then I’ll have to think about what to say—what the grounds for permitting it were, what I was thinking. It happened in stages. At first I said an outright “no,” and then I became more flexible.

Interviewer: You didn’t put that into practice?

Guest: There was once a group that I heard wasn’t willing to perform for a mixed audience—that was their first performance. Today they’re very big in that field.

Interviewer: That used to happen, yes?

Guest: Right, well. So at first I told them I would do it on condition that it wasn’t mixed. But over the years of performing, things changed—it wasn’t up to me. I felt that if I wanted to reach an audience, the whole world, I had no choice but to agree.

Interviewer: Nowadays some even say women shouldn’t come to wedding ceremonies at all, so... Tell me.

Guest: But what I’m saying is, if the day comes when I’m held to account for what I did before mixed audiences, I’ll accept it with love.

Interviewer: So what are your red lines? What would you say “no” to?

Guest: I’m not willing to sing a duet with a woman.

Interviewer: You’re talking about the audience...

Guest: It’s our audience, but they aren’t religious—some of them want to sit separately. I’m not going to be overly chassidish at their expense. That’s how they are; that’s their life. Fine, I’ll leave it to them.

Interviewer: To them? In front of whom?

Guest: I’ve thought about it, yes. It’s a question, of course, but performing in front of men and women together—that’s not a problem.

Interviewer: Over time you connected with Israeli singers and broke new ground there. You also started taking on Israeli songs, and you’ve performed with some very, very well-known Israeli singers. How did that come about?

Guest: First of all, it started with a small part of “Shem Elokim.” I got that song from [unclear], and to this day...

Interviewer: To this day?

Guest: To this day, for many years now.

Interviewer: He gave it to you, or did you buy it from him?

Guest: No, he sent me the song.

Interviewer: Really?

Guest: Yes, he sent me the song. And I said to him, “Wow, what a song.”

Interviewer: Did he have you in mind for it?

Guest: I don’t know why he thought of me. I have no idea. It’s hard to say why he didn’t record it himself—he sent it to me, sent it to me...

Interviewer: I don’t have anywhere that... You don’t sing it...

Interviewer: So are you saying that from then on, you got requests to do more Israeli songs?

Guest: From then on I got requests: “Come on, do more Israeli songs.” I’m not entirely comfortable with that. I’m not an Israeli singer; I’m a chassidic singer. But as more and more requests came in, I made a whole album of Israeli songs called “Shebalev.” It’s good material. I love Israeli songs. As a child, I used to listen to Yehoram Gaon on the radio at home in New York.

Interviewer: Did you ever perform with him?

Guest: Yes, sort of... So I did it. To be honest, I’m not entirely comfortable with the fact that today many chassidic singers sing with Israeli pronunciation. Everyone wants to be an Israeli singer.

Interviewer: I don’t hear it that way. Why do you say that? Because you feel they’re going too far, stepping outside their natural bounds?

Guest: But if it’s one or two songs, fine. I don’t hear Israeli singers trying to sing like chassidim, with chassidic pronunciation. Chassidic Israeli singers sing like Israeli singers, but here you have to be who you are. You start with things on the edges, so be careful where they lead you. All right, I made a whole album of Israeli songs. I love every one of those Israeli songs very, very much, but I’ve done my part with that.

Interviewer: Still, you did make a change. In the past you sang sacred songs, and you sang only with your own pronunciation. Today, for certain audiences, you do at least sing in Hebrew—with Israeli Hebrew pronunciation. Was that hard for you? Let’s talk for a moment about Tzama: at the beginning, at the first Tzama performances, did you sing with Israeli pronunciation or not?

Guest: You do what you have to, yes, I...

Interviewer: Because there are performers, let’s say, from the chassidic music world, at one level or another, who say, “No, I’m staying as I am. You’re not going to change me.”

Guest: Right, right, I agree with that. But they told me it would be better for our audience if they heard you sing with Israeli pronunciation.

Interviewer: Maybe let’s go back to the source. You made albums of Chabad niggunim twice—two albums?

Guest: Four.

Interviewer: Wow, you’re saying four?

Guest: Yes, that’s right. “Niggun HaBaal Shem Tov,” “Shem Tov,” “Ana Malkeinu,” “Yankele”—yes, right, right, right. They were successful. Every day people ask for more.

Interviewer: When will there be more?

Guest: Not just from Chabad—Chabad will come, Chabad.

Interviewer: Put out more Chabad material—that’s very interesting. Not long ago I was at [unclear] a sheva brachos, and someone from the community said to me, “Come on, let’s do a deep Chabad song, not just ordinary songs—a deep song.” [unclear] I said, fine, let’s do a deep Poltava Niggun, with yearning and cries, and we played the Poltava Niggun. We play it here—by now, every day, it’s nothing new.

Interviewer: Ah, all right.

Guest: It did me good. It went into my heart; I was immersed in it.

Interviewer: Beautiful. That’s to your credit.

Guest: Yes, there will be more down the road.

Interviewer: You know, we were talking about Tzama. Some people criticize Tzama, saying it changes the niggunim a little, loses something of them, doesn’t preserve their authentic purity. What do you say to that criticism?

Guest: It’s true, it’s true. Anyone who wants to preserve the authentic versions shouldn’t take this material, shouldn’t come to Tzama. But what Tzama does is a revolution; it’s an experience. Anyone who hasn’t seen Tzama has never seen a performance in their life.

Interviewer: What do you mean—in terms of how it stirs the audience?

Guest: Yes, the way the niggun... First of all, it’s all mine, it’s a shame... Right, absolutely, yes—that makes up for it: the way the audience leaves uplifted in spirit. It’s a spiritual experience. They use all kinds of contemporary things—lighting and screens and physical effects—but through them they bring out the spirituality. Last year we did twenty Tzama performances. It’s unbelievable; it’s beyond nature. Every time it was full, with tremendous interest, two thousand people or even more—young people, men, women. It’s unbelievable. It’s fire, a spiritual experience. There’s nothing like it.

Interviewer: Wonderful.

If we’re talking about Chabad, you’ve also managed, within Chabad itself, to rise above the disagreements, as they say. You get invited by all the circles and camps in Chabad. Nobody—you’re not labeled; you don’t belong to any particular group.

Guest: That’s something I had to work on, something I had to wrestle with. I mean, not just doing what I want to do.

Interviewer: And didn’t you sometimes encounter all sorts of conditions, with the person inviting you saying, “Only if you leave this in,” or “Only if you leave this out”?

Guest: There are things like that, yes. Many years ago, I remember being shocked when they told me, “Don’t sing ‘Moshiach Now.’”

Interviewer: Wow. Ah, yes, at first Moshiach wasn’t so...

Guest: No, it wasn’t so... What, Moshiach can’t come today?

Interviewer: How significant is the fact that you’re a Chabad chossid to your role, your shlichus, what you do day to day?

Guest: What makes my day is when I hear people in Chabad tell me, “Avraham, your music—we don’t just love your music, your messages, your heart—we feel that you’re carrying out a shlichus.” That makes my day. If they feel I’m a shliach, that says everything. I had a performance in Florida on Chanukah. After the performance, someone sent me a clip. A child says, “Dad, listen”—you can hear me in the background, and the child asks his father, “Dad, but do you daven to Hakadosh Boruch Hu?”

Interviewer: Listen, that’s it. There’s nothing to add.

The guest: When people feel it’s a shlichus, that’s a sign I’m doing something good. I think about it; it isn’t simple. Once I was talking with Yossi Green about one of his songs [?], and he said something beautiful. He likes to illustrate things this way—you know him. He said: Every morning, the Levi’im take their places for the service in the Beis Hamikdash, and there’s a conductor. Someone comes in with his nose a little in the air, and the conductor tells him, “Not you. You’re on the bench today. You have to show up every day.” Only someone who really shows up can do it. In other words, to move people, you have to be moved yourself. Even if you’re doing twenty shows, you have to be fully in that feeling. You can’t take it for granted.

The interviewer: That’s true. You have to come prepared. It doesn’t matter if you have a headache, you haven’t slept or eaten, there’s a problem here or there—the audience isn’t concerned with that. You have to show up.

The guest: They came to hear you. First of all, they’ve put you there. You say, “Top, top,” but it’s the audience that puts you where you are. You could sit at home, sure, but people come to a show after they’ve made you the top act. They’re expecting something: “Okay, what are you going to do for us tonight? We came to Tzfas, we came to Tiberias—what are you going to do for us this evening?”

The interviewer: You have to be at your best.

The guest: Exactly, so you have to give. If you’ve brought me there, I have to give you something—I don’t like just standing there. Sometimes you do better, sometimes less well. You’re human. It doesn’t depend only on your voice or how fit you are; it also depends on the audience. Sometimes you can come to a show tired, without much energy that day, but the audience just... lights you up.

The interviewer: Just lights you up.

The guest: Then you could go straight from bed to the stage. You know why? An enthusiastic audience—you feel you don’t have to do anything. The electricity is already on, as they say, and the audience is already shouting and waiting for the fire. That’s it, you’re there.

The interviewer: That’s happened to you.

The guest: It just keeps going higher and higher.

The interviewer: Has the opposite ever happened? You arrived and the audience was indifferent—the kind of crowd that just turns up and thinks that’s enough—and you have to work at it: “Come on, folks, do something”?

The guest: I’ve left a show feeling, “I didn’t connect with the audience.” It’s hard. It doesn’t feel good at all. Baruch Hashem, it doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. I maintain that the audience makes the show.

The interviewer: If the audience is good, the show will be better—the audience’s fire.

That’s very interesting. You said something along those lines to me many years ago, I remember. You said that to protect your family life—today, baruch Hashem, the family has grown, you’ve married off children, and, baruch Hashem, you have time to yourselves—but back then you told me that you were very careful, for example, to get home for Shabbos whenever you could. Does that still guide you?

The guest: Not so much today. They’re all grown up, baruch Hashem, so it’s not as critical to come home for Shabbos. But if it’s a long trip...

The interviewer: Back then it was for the children.

The guest: That’s eased up a little. I can also be away... Hashem has been kind to me.

The interviewer: You told me then that you really hoped that—

If I said yes to every phone call I get, I’d be doing concerts every day. But there were times when I asked beforehand, when there was illness—[unclear]. I managed it at the very last moment.

In my opinion, that’s the secret of all the success, not the shows and the advertising and so on: people feel that I’m there for them, and it brings them joy amid their pain and suffering. That’s using the gift. It’s like [unclear] on the cake... that’s it.

>> Yes, that’s something else. That brought joy. There are people I’m in touch with through music; I come to them, and it simply strengthens them.

>> It simply gives them strength.

>> Yes.

The interviewer: In your younger years, you received special attention from the Rebbe, direct blessings from the Rebbe. I remember—you may find this hard to believe, but I remember you once telling me that you were afraid of flying. You wrote to the Rebbe, right? The Rebbe told you... what exactly happened?

The guest: The Rebbe answered me. First of all, I had a terrible fear of flying.

The interviewer: A fear of heights, something like that?

The guest: When the plane started bouncing around, I’d get so frightened that I’d say to the Creator, “If You stop the turbulence, I’ll finish the whole Tehillim.”

The interviewer: Yes.

The guest: And within a second it would stop. Okay, You did Your part—now I said every word of the whole Tehillim. More than once.

The interviewer: And then you wrote to the Rebbe.

The guest: Yes. I wrote to the Rebbe: “I have to fly; it’s part of how I earn my living.” The answer was: “He should say Tehillim himself, in the order of the letters of Eitan, and, quite simply, a small kosher note [unclear].”

The interviewer: Wow, that was the answer?

The guest: And baruch Hashem, by now I... I fly, I fly a lot. The fears are no longer...

The interviewer: Gone?

The guest: Yes, I’m not afraid anymore.

The interviewer: And the fact that at every show you make a point of putting 20 dollars in the tzedakah box—was that also an instruction you received?

The guest: The Rebbe didn’t tell me I had to do it at every show. What I knew was that on the night I received the blessing—

The interviewer: Was that at dollars?

The guest: Yes.

The interviewer: Yes.

The guest: Yes. He gave me a dollar and told me to give tzedakah before and after, as a way of thanking Hakadosh Boruch Hu that it had gone well. So I took it upon myself—why do it only once? Let’s do it—

The interviewer: Every time.

The guest: Every time. And why only in my room? Let’s do it publicly.

The interviewer: In front of everyone.

The guest: Yes. I come to every show with the pushka.

The interviewer: The pushka.

The guest: Yes.

But the greatest thing I received from the Rebbe—I was a bochur, [unclear]. He would give bottles of mashke to shluchim.

The interviewer: Right, yes.

The guest: [clears throat] I was a bochur passing by then. I received the wine and thought, “Okay, I’m done.” Then I see the Rebbe standing there with a bottle of mashke. He gave it to me, said a word to me, and that was it. I... that’s how I understood it.

The interviewer: So you knew you were a shliach?

The guest: I knew, I knew, I knew that this was my shlichus.

The interviewer: Wow. Is there anything else we haven’t talked about that you’d like to say now?

The guest: I want to thank the audience for giving me the opportunity to feel the gift I’ve received from the Creator. They listen to me, come to the shows, buy the material and enjoy it. Without people, where would Avraham be? Just some Avraham in the marketplace. So I’m here for them, and I hope in the future to give them what they expect of me.

The interviewer: Beautiful. We’ll end on that note. Thank you very much for the time you’ve given us. And thank you for joining us and listening. With great respect, let me also thank the people who worked on this: Yosef Trabelsi and Yosef David Suissa, who were with us. And thanks to Yossi Rivkin, CEO of COL.

We’ll see you here in the next episode of the podcast. Join us then.