WOODY GUTHRIE'S JEWISH CONNECTIONS (AND MUSIC)

Woody Guthrie's Jewish legacy
Legendary folk singer and composer Woody Guthrie left behind a little-known legacy of Hanukka, Holocaust and Jewish children's songs, and the inspiration was Yiddish poet Aliza Greenblatt, his mother-in-law. Guthrie's hidden Jewish music is now being exposed by his son, Arlo, 57, whose own career exploded in 1967 album Alice's Restaurant. Arlo, who will present some of his fathers' Jewish work together with his own son Abe and the Klezmatics band in an LA concert next week, recalled in a recent phone interview what it was like growing up as a "Jewish kid" in Brooklyn with his famous dad and his mother, Marjorie Mazia, a professional dancer and Woody's second wife.

In preparation for Arlo's "Hootenanny Bar Mitzva" in 1960, his parents hired a "sweet young rabbi" as a tutor. The rabbi's name was Meir Kahane, who went on to become the extremist founder of the Jewish Defense League and the Kach political party. "Rabbi Kahane was a really nice, patient teacher, but shortly after he gave me my lessons, he started going haywire. Maybe I was responsible," laughed Arlo.