Link: Funny, It Doesn't Sound Jewish - New York Times.
Check out the whole article and mp3 samples....
Reboot Stereophonic's first project, to be released Tuesday, is a reissue of the Irving Fields Trio's 1959 experiment in Jewish-Latin fusion, "Bagels and Bongos." Mr. Fields, now 90, began singing Jewish music at 10, in the choir of the renowned cantor Yossele Rosenblatt. By the age of 18, he was touring the Caribbean as a cruise ship pianist, soaking up rhythms - rumba, pasodoble, cha-cha, merengue and so on - from stops in Cuba and Puerto Rico. After returning to New York and taking up a residency at the Crest Room in the Waldorf-Astoria, Mr. Fields would often rejigger standards by adding Latin rhythms.
His first single, "Miami Beach Rumba" - with lyrics in both English and Spanish - was released in 1946; Mr. Fields's label at the time made him adopt a Spanish name, Campos el Pianista. He eventually reclaimed his performing name (if not his birth name, Isidore Schwartz) and found that his audiences were grateful to hear familiar melodies over danceable rhythms. "There was no negative response on either side," said Mr. Fields, who has made his home on Central Park South for 40 years. "The music blended beautifully together."