Born on the 4th of July (Bris scheduled for the 12th)

It would have been nice if, in honor of July 4^th, U. S. Independence Day, I wrote a sweeping, lyrical tribute to my American Jewish heritage. But as hard as I tried to come up with something awe-inspiring – combing through anecdotes about the Alamo and the text of “New Colossus” – I kept coming up empty.

I’m just not a sweeping, lyrical kind of guy.

So putting my Emma Lazarus pretensions aside, I picked up my headphones and dove into a realm where I feel infinitely more comfortable: making playlists.

Starting with a couple personal favorites – the Beastie Boys’ “Root Down”; Lenny Kravitz’s “Always on the Run – I began choreographing a music/video fireworks show featuring tunes written, composed, and performed by American Jews.

The resulting playlist has a little bit of everything: swingin’ Jews (Benny Goodman), funky Jews (Kravitz, Carole King), epic Jews (Copland, Gershwin), falsetto-singing, chameleon Jews (Bob Dylan), and two awesome-hair-1970s-music-royalty Jews on the same stage (Barbra Streisand and Neal Diamond).

Hey, it may not “huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” but it’s got David Lee Roth scat singing in ass-less chaps. Happy Jewish 4^th of July.

NOTE: This is by no means an exhaustive list. Feel free to add suggestions for tunes that I’ve left out.

David Lee Roth, “Just a Gigolo”

Lenny Kravitz, featuring Saul Hudson (aka Slash), “Always On the Run”

Benny Goodman, “Roll ‘Em”

Robert Zimmerman (aka Bob Dylan) and Johnny Cash, “One Too Many Mornings”

James Brown performing Leiber and Stoller’s, “Kansas City”

Barbara Streisand and Neil Diamond, “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers”

Paul Simon, “Call Me Al”

Aaron Copland, “Fanfare for the Common Man”

Bette Midler, “Wind Beneath My Wings”

Carole King, “I Feel the Earth Move”

The Beastie Boys, “Root Down”

George Gershwin, “Rhapsody in Blue”