Yosef was born in the family of Yochai and Mozol Yakubov on November 29th in 1958 in the village of Krasnaya Sloboda in the Guba region of Azerbaijan. In 1975 he emigrated to Israel.
- Yosef, when I meet with gifted musicians who achieved a lot in the musical field, I am usually interested in their origins. To be more exact, the first contact with music always arouses curiosity. As a rule, it happens in the family. How did this occur in your case?
- I can say that I was born in a musical family. My father had a beautiful singing voice, but few people knew about it, as he never sang in public. And only his family and relatives sometimes had a good chance to listen to him in our family circle.
My mother also had a beautiful voice, but like my father she also sang at home if she was in a mood for this. Azerbaijani and Iranian music always played at home. I always listened to it, absorbed, and the most important thing is that I loved it. Apparently, this influenced the fact that I have become a folk singer.
- Where and when did you understand that you have a talent for this?
- I have sung as long as I can remember myself. I performed in public when I was in the second form. There were only two people in my class who had good singing voices. Certainly, our singing teacher immediately noticed and always gave us high marks.
My first performances were among children of the same age during school holidays. A bit later, when I was in the 8th grade, the director of the House of Culture invited me, and there I began to study singing seriously. Nissim Nisimova accompanied me with the help of the tar instrument.
And then, it was in the 9th grade, a special contest of talents named Music Banish took place in my town. Its main goal was to find out how well the Mountain Jews of Krasnaya Sloboda sing in the Azerbaijani language. I remember that I performed with dignity, and the committee members were satisfied.
- I have a question how songs in your native language were included in your repertoire...
- Being a child I also listened songs in Dzhuuri. Some sang them in a yard, some at weddings. I listened and memorized them. They were melodious, the lyrics were sincere, and they were easy to learn.
- Could you name any such songs and their authors?
- In those years almost every resident of our village knew songs with lyrics by Yasha Mashiyahov and Benjamin Isakov. ‘Sie chumgo' by Benjamin Isakov, ‘Dedey’ and ‘Salgym gleili’ by Yasha Mashiyahov.
God Muhoilov was a composer. For example, Ariel Rahamimov was both a songwriter and a composer. ‘Leng Hola’ and ‘Chukle aile’ were very famous songs.
Musa Israilov was the songwriter of the popular song ‘Duhtorgoy Gubei.’ Rashbil Shamailov was a songwriter of ‘A hisob ne gyurde giroshd, rafdi’ and "E, duhter."
- Tell us about any unusual performance in those years.
- I think it was a performance in the gardens of Khachmaz in front of rare guests, a foreign delegation which had arrived from Yemen. If I am not mistaken, they were interested in the apple orchards of Khachmaz.
- So, your family immigrated to Israel in 1975. It probably was not easy. Who took this decision at home?
- The matter is that those years my father was engaged in buying and selling goods in different cities of Russia. Then it was considered as speculation, and he lived in constant fear, knowing that at any moment troubles can come and his family will suffer.
My parents had seven children. They saw that not only the poor, but also the middle class peasants leave Krasnaya Sloboda, but also wealthy people. My father considered that our migration to Israel would be a solution to the problem for our family and there we will be able to live in peace and easy circumstances…
This decision was taken in this way. We sold our house and garden in the upper part of the village. Now this place is called Surete. In those times Jews were given lands in Red Sloboda.
And after a while we came to Vienna, where we were waiting our flight from Israel during several days. I will remember those days forever, as I celebrated the 17th birthday with my family during these days.
- So, your family emigrated to Israel in 1975. It probably was not easy. Who took this decision at home?
- The thing is that in those years my father was engaged in buying and selling goods in different cities of Russia. Then it was considered to be speculation, and he lived in constant fear, knowing that at any moment troubles can come and his family will suffer.
My parents had seven children. They saw that not only the poor, but also the middle class peasants leave Krasnaya Sloboda, and also wealthy people. My father considered that migrating to Israel would be a solution to the problem for our family and there we would be able to live in peace and easy circumstances…
This decision was taken in this way. We sold our house and garden in the upper part of the village. Now this place is called Surete. In those times Jews were given land in Krasnaya Sloboda.
And after a while we travelled to Vienna, where we were waiting for our flight to Israel for several days. I will remember those days forever, as I celebrated my 17th birthday with my family during these days.
- So, you emigrated to Israel when you were quite a young man. One of the first issues for you was how much you are needed here as a musician, wasn’t it?
- That’s true. And I understood it very soon when I saw the lack of singers and musicians performing Caucasian music. And it made me think seriously about a singing career.
We began to visit a variety of activities with the family: weddings, bar-mitzvahs. Every time during these festivities I was asked to sing something. Eventually someone said, gather musicians, create your own ensemble and perform with it at our weddings!
And I did it. I made the acquaintance of a particular musician, then we organized rehearsals in order to learn the necessary repertoire for such celebrations. Then I began to appear in public with my musicians, who played national instruments.
Sometimes we were invited to weddings, even when I was serving in the army.
We even had such an occurrence: my musicians told me that next Thursday we were invited to perform at a wedding. I served in the department of communication and it was impossible to receive furlough on Thursday.
The commander in any case did not want to let me go, and I said that if he didn’t let me go I would be killed. The commander heard different stories about the customs of the Caucasian Jews and decided to let me go in the end.
- Have you ever been a presenter of celebrations besides performances at weddings and concerts?
- I and my family moved to Germany in 1981, where we lived about 8 years. New audiences appeared there: Azerbaijanis who moved to Germany from Turkey, as well as those Azerbaijanis who left Iran after Khomeini came to power.
They all missed their native tunes. And music could console this nostalgia, when they were away from home. In addition, these concerts have always been an occasion for friendly meetings. My stage performances were always received warmly.
And once I had a chance to perform even at the Berlin International Congress Center. In the same period, in 1983, one of the Turkish recording studios released my first cassette tape named ‘Astaranum marali.’ I remember those times, as I travelled to almost all European countries.
In 1989 I returned to Israel and began to perform at community concerts, organized by municipalities of various cities in the country.
I often performed at large concert sites together with Sarit Hadad, Eyalem Golan and Lior Narkis. Performances in the Knesset and in Jerusalem at the opening of the permanent exhibition on the history of Mountain Jews of the Israel Museum in Jerusalem were very thrilling.
- Your first album was released in Israel in 1997 and then the others...
- Yes, and each of them was devoted to a specific topic. For example, one of them is called ‘Jerusalem,’ the next is ‘Omoreni, zu bie.’ I have an album where we used Rashb Shamaev’s lyrics. My last album is ‘Sen olmayanda,’ which was dedicated to the memory of the poet and journalist Rashbilya Zaharyaev.
- Listening to your performance, we can say that the Azerbaijani mugham with all its varieties is the basis of your performance. Nevertheless, there is something elusive that distinguishes your performance and makes it distinctive. What do you think about this?
- I can say one thing: when I sing mugham in my native language, it always has my Jewish soul. It changes harmony and adds new tones. My mother sang a lot of Jewish songs when I was a child. In total all these things became origins of my creative work.
- Joseph, what are you dealing with today? And what are your creative plans for the future?
- Today I work in the banquet hall of the shopping center European. I am sincerely grateful to my patron God Semenovich Nisanov for this. As for my plans, they are more social, rather than personal.
I'd like for the children of our community to be able to join our national music, play national instruments, sing in their native language and dances and participate in theatrical sketches.
It is necessary to create a cultural and educational center in order that specialists could work there. I presented this project to the president of the Foundation STMEGI, Herman Rashbilovich Zaharyaev, and he liked my idea. I want to thank him for the attention to his people, history and culture.
