Regina Spektor to return for encore Israel concert

Jewish Russian-born, New York-based folk singer-songwriter to play August concert at ancient Roman Caesarea Amphitheater.

By LAUREN IZSO
Regina Spektor (photo credit: YouTube screenshot)
Regina Spektor
(photo credit: YouTube screenshot)
Jewish American folk-singer Regina Spektor is returning to Israel for a performance at the Caesarea Amphitheater on August 24.
“I am so excited to get the chance to come back to Israel this summer with another show!” Spektor wrote to her fans on her Facebook page.
The much anticipated 2013 summer tour will promote Spektor’s new album, What We Saw from the Cheap Seats, and will include stops in Britain, Hungary, Sweden, and Germany, before she arrives in Israel.
Her August concert at the ancient Roman Caeasarea venue which was built more than 2,000 years ago, will have quite a different atmosphere than the first time she performed in Israel in 2007. Spektor played two shows at the popular Tel Aviv Barby nightclub which were sold out in a matter of days.
The Russian-born singer-songwriter is based in New York City, but has never shied away from her Jewish roots and connection to the Holy Land, having played at many Jewish advocacy events throughout America and being known for including biblical Jewish references in her music. She has developed a faithful following of young Israeli fans.
In 2008, she performed on the National Mall as part of celebrations of the 60th anniversary of the establishment of Israel. Two years later she was back in the capital performing at a White House reception before the Obamas to celebrate Jewish American Heritage Month. She has blown a shofar onstage and performed Hannah Senesh’s “Eli, Eli” in Hebrew. On the cover of the “Begin to Hope” CD, she is wearing a visible Star of David pendant.
In 2009, in the midst of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead, launched in response to Palestinian rocket fire from Gaza, Spektor penned a post on her MySpace page defending the Jewish state and criticizing what she saw as unfair media coverage of its actions.
“Israel has been shelled,” she wrote. “It has been hit with rockets for years… There is no government in the world that would not protect its citizens from attack. That’s unlawful.
And it’s not sticks and stones, as many of my friends and relatives who live in Israel know. It’s rockets,” Spektor posted.
She also attended a Jewish middle school while growing up in New York, and briefly studied at a New Jersey Yeshiva.
Spektor will be introduced by opening act, Only Son, the music of New Yorkbased songwriter Jack Dishel, who is scheduled to open the show at 9 p.m., and will follow with a fashionably late main-event performance at 10 p.m.
Unfortunately, the name of her new album has no correlation to ticket prices for the upcoming show, with tickets ranging between NIS 199 and NIS 350.