Tag #127665 - Interview #89861 (Dan Mizrahy)

On holidays, I sometimes went with my father to ‘Cahal Grande’ [‘The Great Temple’ in Ladino]. It was spectacular. A monumental building, with marble floor and pillars, with lavishing chandeliers and an organ whose sounds magnetized me. They sang traditional tunes at the Great Temple. Josef Rosensteck was at the same time the Romanian Opera’s choir master and the organist and choir conductor of the Spanish temple in Bucharest. The main cantor was Alberto della Pergola, an Italian singer hired by the community of the Spanish Jews in Bucharest. The services at ‘Cahal Grande’ turned into real musical shows that were quite impressive. At that time, the ‘master of ceremonies’ was Great Rabbi Sabetay Djaen, who had been born in Argentina and had been brought here to fill this particular position, which he did with a lot of stateliness.