If American Jewish popular culture is any indication, Kol Nidre is the one prayer American Jews happen to know well. Over the years, they’ve encountered it on long-playing records, like those produced by the Victor Talking Machine Company in the 1920s, and at the movies, where the cinematic plot hinged on whether the not-so-loyal son of a cantor would do his father proud by chanting “Kol Nidre” instead of “Swanee.” I’m referring, of course, to evergreen productions of “The Jazz Singer.”
Even such American songbirds as Perry Como and Johnny Mathis found the doleful sounds of Kol Nidre hard to resist. Como crooned his way through the Aramaic text, while Mathis’s version appeared alongside “Ave Maria” in his 1958 album, “Good Night, Dear Lord.”
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