The Music of the Jews: An Overview by Brian Barton 2014

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The Music of the Jews: An Overview

Brian Barton Spring 2014 Thesis submitted for the Fellowship Diploma of the National College of Music, London.

(FNCM)

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The Music of the Jews: An Overview Aspect This is an enormous subject for a thesis, as whole libraries of books have been written on the Music of the Jews, and especially over the recent past as a lot of new research has been made and new music written. I intend the do justice to the subject form the perspective of giving the reader a brief synopsis, or bird’s eye view of the outline of Jewish music over many centuries. There will be many areas of Jewish music where whole books have been written, and that I am able to only to cover in a superficially and brief way. I also seek in this thesis to answer the question, “What is Jewish Music?” In my concussion I will make reference to this question.

Although a Gentile I believe I have a litigate aim in attempting such a wide ranging subject.

I expect to treat the reader as a ‘musical tourist’ on a journey from the first mention of music in the book of Genesis together with music of the Biblical period of the 1st and 2nd Temples, of roughly 3000 years ago, to the modern day Synagogue worship; from the traditional folk elements of the distant past to present day Israeli secular music; from the emergence of, and the ‘so-called’ birth of Jewish classical music of the St Petersburg (Russian) School - to the re-

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creation of a more traditional Middle East sounding authentic Jewish music, from the Palestine Mandate period to the modern State of Israel period. Then there is the area of the Holocaust music to be addressed briefly, much explored in recent years by musicologists; there is also the area of Jewish composers who wrote ‘classical’ music that in its self was not specifically Jewish (for example Mendelssohn), and the the Jewish composers who wrote light popular music that also was not specifically Jewish (for example Richard Rogers and Irving Berlin); then there are modern Jewish composers who wrote Jewish music (for example Bloch and Bernstein), and finally, to end with, a look at the worship music of the modern day Messianic movement, its birth from and development from 1960’s.

How shall I deconstruct this thesis - for my own personal use and that of the reader? For my self, if ever providence affords me the opportunity to teach an outline course on the Subject of Jewish Music I have material that would serve, with additions, to make the the basics of a teaching syllabus. From the readers point of view for those who are uninitiated in the subject of Jewish music hopefully here they will here find a grounding and outline that might enable them to capture an interest, from this birds eye view, that might lead them to explore the subject further on the Music of the Jews.

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The Music of the Jews Brian Barton Contents PART 1: The Genesis of Jewish Music Chapter 1: Ancient Beginnings of Jewish Music p.7 Chapter 2: Book of Psalms and Music During the Babylonian Exile

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PART 2: Music of the Temples Chapter 3: Tabernacle and Temple Worship

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PART 3: The Development of Synagogue Music Chapter 4: The Beginnings of the Synagogue Worship

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Chapter 5: The Cantor, Cantillation, Jewish Liturgical Modes, Sung Prayers of the Synagogues p.21 Chapter 6: The Development of Religious Jewish Music in the Synagogues: from the 19th-20th Century - Introduction

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Chapter 7: Development of Music in the Synagogues - Continued, 19th and 20th Centuries p.27

PART 4: Jewish Music: Traditional, Secular and Folk Chapter 8: Israeli Folk Music p.30 Chapter 9: Historical Sources of Israeli Folk Music p.33 Chapter 10: The St Petersburg School and the Society for Jewish Folk Music p.38

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Chapter 11: Klezmer

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Chapter 12: Sephardic-Ladino

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Chapter 13: Mizrahi and Dancing

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PART 5: Jewish Art Music and Jewish Music in the Land Chapter 14: Introduction

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Chapter 15: Music in the State of Israel p.50 Chapter 16: The Second Generation of Israeli Art Composers

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Chapter 17: The Emancipation of Jews into European Musical Life p.55

PART 6: Jewish Music of the Holocaust

Chapter 18: Holocaust Composers and Musicians

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Chapter 19: Jewish Musical Life During the Holocaust p.67 Chapter 20: A Question of Balance?

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Chapter 21: Musicians in Exile from the Nazis

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Chapter 22: Musicians who stayed in Nazi Germany p.76

PART 7: Messianic Music Chapter 23: The Messianic Movement and Music 78 Chapter 24: Messianic Jewish Musicians (i) Maurice Sklar

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Chapter 25: Messianic Jewish Musicians (ii) Paul Wilber

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Chapter 26: Messianic Jewish Musicians (iii) Joel Chernoff p.84 Chapter 27: Messianic Jewish Musicians (iv) Karen Davis

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Chapter 28: Messianic Jewish Musicians (v) Barry and Batya Segal p.86 Chapter 29: Messianic Jewish Musicians (vi) Merve and Merla Watson

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Chapter 30: Conclusion and Final Summation: ‘What is true Jewish music?

Appendix: Some Examples of Jewish Music from Different Periods Notes

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Works Cited

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The Music of the Jews Brian Barton

PART 1 The Genesis of Jewish Music Chapter 1 Ancient Beginnings of Jewish Music 1 Today the beginning of Jewish music is, to some extent, shrouded in mystery, and what is not, is only really known by what the Bible tells us. The first mention of music, a musical instrument and a musician is in the Book of Genesis, his name was Jubal: And Adah bore Jabal. He was the father of those who dwell in tents and have livestock His brother’s name was Jubal. He was the father of all those who play the harp and flute.

And as for Zillah, she also bore Tubal-Cain, an instructor of every craftsman in bronze and iron.

(Genesis 4:20-22 KJ) Here we also see the three primary professions on earth the Lord first introduces us to, (apart from the tending of the Garden of Eden, which Adam did), these professions are: those who work with livestock (Jabal v.20), the musician (Jubal v. 21) and the craftsman in bronze and iron Tubal-Cain v. 22). From this we might deduce that music ranks rather high in God’s estimation.

I will now outline a few passages in the Jewish scriptures where music is spoken of either as worship and thanksgiving to God, or for entertainment; for the Bible shows us that music is primary for worship and also for entertainment. This view was reenforced to me when I studied J.S. Bach’s life and found that he had written, in German, in his German Bible: “Music is for the glory of God and the recreation of the soul.” Perhaps this is why, I for one, would consider J.S.Bach the greatest of the great composers, as his focus in writing music was in the service of God and for the Glory of God.

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Music as an entertainment is first mentioned in the passage of the Bible, Genesis 31:27, in which Laban says to Jacob, after Jacob has just fled from Laban with Rachel and Lear: Wherefore didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me; and didst not tell me, that I might have sent thee away with mirth, and with songs, with tabret, and with harp?

The tabret (or trimbrel) was probably a hand held percussion instrument of some kind rather like a small tambourine. This passage of scripture shows us that music is for entertainment, specifically in this case, to honor a bride leaving her childhood home.

In Exodus 15:1-17, we read the song of Moses in which thanksgiving and praise is offered to God for deliverance in crossing the Red Sea, “I will sing to the Lord for he has triumphed gloriously....” Straight after Miriam takes a timbrel in her hand and goes out with the women, who also have timbres in their hands, to offer praise to God: “Sing to the Lord for he has triumphed gloriously! The horse and the rider he has thrown into the sea!” (Ex. 15; 20,21) In the Book of Leviticus we are introduced to the shofar, (a rams horn - in some translations called a ‘trumpet’ - not however strictly a musical instrument), that is blown by the priest on the feast days of the religious Jewish calendar. In the Book of Numbers 10:1-10, we are introduced to the silver trumpet, which again may not strictly be a musical instrument as it is used primarily for giving signals for the Hebrew camp to arise and continue their journeying in the wilderness and blown only by priests The shofar comes into prominence when Joshua, in chapter 6:16, is told by the Lord to send the priests and people seven times around the city of Jericho on the final day of battle for the city. In the Book of Judges (11:34) the daughter of Jephthah comes out to meet her father, after his victory, with timbrels and dancing.

Again in the book of Judges we have the first great heroic song of the Bible, which is the Song of Deborah: “Israel’s leaders took charge, and the people gladly followed.

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Praise the LORD! “Listen, you kings!

Pay attention, you mighty rulers!

For I will sing to the LORD. I will make music to the LORD, the God of Israel.

(Judges 5:2,3 NLT) In the first book of Samuel 10:5 we discover, that as well as singers in the Temple, the prophets were also musicians in early Biblical times; for when Saul returned from his encounter with the prophet Samuel he mets a groups of prophets on his homeward journey:

“When you arrive at Gibeah of God, where the garrison of the Philistines is located, you will meet a band of prophets coming down from the place of worship. They will be playing a harp, a tambourine, a flute, and a lyre, and they will be prophesying.

(1 Samuel 10:5 NLT)

Jumping over to the time of the Kings we find David driving away evil spirits from King Saul by playing the harp, when King Saul had moods of depression: And whenever the tormenting spirit from God troubled Saul, David would play the harp.

Then Saul would feel better, and the tormenting spirit would go away.

(1 Samuel 16:23 NLT) Here we have a first perhaps, in the area of a musical therapy session, and this is conducted under what has become known as the Psalmist anointing - the power coming from God in the music to drive the evil spirits away. When David brought the Ark of the Lord up to Jerusalem he did it with dancing and the sound of the Ram’s horn, (2 Samuel 6:15); and when David established the Ark of God in the tent or Tabernacle of God in Jerusalem he personally paid for the musicians out of the kings treasury, for several thousand singers and musicians to minister in worship and prayer before the Lord Night and Day 24/7, (Chronicles 16:4-6).

We also read in 1 Chronicles 15:16:

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David...ordered the Levite leaders to appoint a choir of Levites who were singers and musicians to sing joyful songs to the accompaniment of harps, lyres, and cymbals.

In 2 Chronicles 5:12-14 we again read how King Solomon dedicated the temple of God in Jerusalem, and during his celebration, as the musicians played and came into unity of worship, that the glory of the Lord fell on the Temple, and the priest could not stand in the strong manifest presence of the Lord: And the Levites who were musicians—Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun, and all their sons and brothers—were dressed in fine linen robes and stood at the east side of the altar playing cymbals, lyres, and harps. They were joined by 120 priests who were playing trumpets.

The trumpeters and singers performed together in unison to praise and give thanks to the LORD. Accompanied by trumpets, cymbals, and other instruments, they raised their voices and praised the LORD with these words: “He is good! His faithful love endures forever!”

At that moment a thick cloud filled the Temple of the LORD. The priests could not continue their service because of the cloud, for the glorious presence of the LORD filled the Temple of God. (2 Chronicles 5:12-14)

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Chapter 2 Book of Psalms and Music During the Babylonian Exile Perhaps the greatest inspiration for music is seen in the Psalms, the majority of which were written by David, during the period that the Tent, or Tabernacle, stood in Jerusalem housing the Ark of God, at which time there was continuous worship and prayer offered up to God. This Tabernacle stood for 40 years. There were however a good number of Psalms written at times earlier in Israel’s history before the Tabernacle was erected, and are found in other parts of the Old Testament.

The Psalms embrace a wide gambit of emotions from high ecstatic praise to the deepest of low moods of despair, that David and others experienced, nevertheless God always came through and triumphed for them over all discouragements!

And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD. (Psalm 40:3 KJ) O sing unto the LORD a new song: sing unto the LORD, all the earth.

(Psalm 96:1 KJ) How the Psalms were rendered in the Temple is a matter of conjecture, no doubt some were sung, some were recited and others were cantillated according to the nature of the words or a particular festival or high holy day they applied too. The question we then ask again, who really were the singers in the Temple? The Bible records that the Levites and sons of Kohath (Korah) were perhaps the main body of singers: And the Levites, of the children of the Kohathites, and of the children of the Korhites, stood up to praise the LORD God of Israel with a loud voice on high.

(2 Chronicles 20:19) Some Psalms are addressed to be sung by Asaph, Heman, Ethan and Jeduthen and the sons of the Levitcal families of Gershom, Kahat and Merari.

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When the first wave of the Children of Israel returned, from the Babylonian captivity to Israel, first under the leadership of the Ezra the priest, and about 50 years later a second wave under the leadership of Nehemah, it is recorded singers returned with both waves on each occasion: The singers: the children of Asaph, an hundred twenty and eight.

(Ezra 2:41 KJ) The singers: the children of Asaph, an hundred forty and eight.

(Nehemiah 7:44 KJ) That there was also instrumental music in the Temple worship is also revealed; and in this respect we may quote specifically Psalm 150 where we met a whole group of instruments in common use in the temple an which may also have been used to accompany the singers or those who recited of the Psalms: Praise Him with the sound of the trumpet; Praise Him with the lute and harp!

Praise Him with the timbrel and dance; Praise Him with stringed instruments and flutes!

Praise Him with loud cymbals; Praise Him with clashing cymbals!

(Psalm 150:3-5 NKJ) Above we have quoted the New King James version, the New Living Translation might render the list of instruments differently and perhaps more to the precise point, in NLT the trumpet is referred to as the ram’s horn (meaning the Shofar), the lye is called a lyre, the timbrel referred to as a tambourine. 1 Music During the Babylonian Exile When the Children of Israel were deported to Babylon (c 586 BCE after the destruction of Solomon’s Temple) their Babylonian captors required them to sing the songs of Zion - but they did not desire to do so: Beside the rivers of Babylon, we sat and wept as we thought of Jerusalem.

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We put away our harps, hanging them on the branches of poplar trees.

For our captors demanded a song from us.

Our tormentors insisted on a joyful hymn: “Sing us one of those songs of Jerusalem!”

But how can we sing the songs of the LORD while in a pagan land?

(Psalm 137:1-4 NLT) It was during the Babylonian Exile, which lasted for about 70 years, that the synagogue system was started among the Jews, however music was not permitted by the Rabbis as a part of synagogue worship at this time, as the sorrow of the lost of Jerusalem filled their hearts.

That music was a part of the Babylonian culture we do gather from Daniel 3:5; When you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipes, and other musical instruments, bow to the ground to worship King Nebuchadnezzar’s gold statue.

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PART 2 Music of the Temples Chapter 3 Tabernacle and Temple Worship (c 1000 BCE-70 CE) Worship in the Tabernacle of David Present day synagogue worship, and the study of Jewish religious music really goes back to the Tabernacle of David about 1000 BCE, which we have already mentions briefly, and is where Jewish religious worship really started. David established night and day worship and prayer, 24/7, in this Tabernacle; which, in fact was simply a tent in Jerusalem, where he placed the Ark of God. The Ark of God was simply a wooden box that contained the stones on which God wrote the Ten Commandments, (2 Samuel 6, 1 Chronicles 13-16): "He appointed some of the Levites as ministers before the ark of the Lord, even to celebrate and to thank and praise the Lord God of Israel: Asaph the chief, and second to him Zechariah, then Jeiel, Shemiramoth, Jehiel, Mattithiah, Eliab, Benaiah, Obed-edom and Jeiel, with musical instruments, harps, lyres; also Asaph played loud-sounding cymbals, and Benaiah and Jahaziel the priests blew trumpets continually before the ark of the covenant of God." (1 Chronicles 16:4-6)

Before David’s Tabernacle was erected, worship had been in the form established in the Tabernacle of Moses, which had been solemn and serious with the sacrifice of animals; but in the Tabernacle of David on Mount Zion a new pattern of worship developed: a sacrifice of praise and worship with musical instruments, joy, dancing, singing, kneeling, bowing the body, clapping; worship became an act of the whole person not just the intellect, neither was there a veil before the Ark, the Ark was exposed an open so anyone might look at it, unlike the Tabernacle of Mose where is was hidden behind a veil. 1

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David loved music, he was a singer and a player of the harp, (1 Samuel 16:23), he wrote most of the book of Psalms during the 40 year life of the Mount Zion Tabernacle; he was a continual worshiper of God, he danced with great abandon before the Lord, (2 Samuel 16:14); the Lord called him “a man after my own heart,” because David understood the emotions of God’s heart more than anyone else, and the Psalms express the full range of emotions from highest joy to deepest despair. David also was the first to understand that worship was a sacrifice, (Heb. 13:15), and that God inhabits the praises of His people. (Psalm; 22:3) David knew the power of music and worship, and how it enabled him to see the glory of God, in the Psalms David wrote: “...to see thy power and thy glory, so as I have seen thee in the sanctuary,” (Ps 63:2).

As we mentioned earlier, David paid out of the kings treasury for thousands of singers and players of instruments to worship the Lord night and day, “...then David appointed singers accompanied by instruments of music, stringed instruments, harps and cymbals by raising the voice with resounding joy....”

(1 Chronicles 15:16-24).

From David’s zeal to lead his people in spiritual revival through the tabernacle worship in seeking the Lord’s presence, we see how God blessed and prospered the nation during his reign and many victories in battle came to Israel. 2 David’s Tabernacle functioned until Solomon Built the Temple in Jerusalem, when Solomon became King after the death of David.

Worship in the Temple of Solomon When Solomon completed the building of the Temple in Jerusalem, the Ark of God was moved into the Holy Place in the Temple and a great dedication service was held. Worship in Solomon's Temple was both by animal sacrifice and with voices and instruments. Worship with music continued in the Temple as that which had been established in the Tabernacle by David, Solomon's father. As also was mentioned earlier, Second Chronicles 5:11-14 records how, when

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the Levites, singers, musicians and priest were ‘as one’ worshiping the Lord the glory of God filled the house: “...indeed it came to pass, when the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the LORD, and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, and praised the LORD, saying: “For He is good, For His mercy endures forever,” that the house, the house of the LORD, was filled with a cloud, so that the priests could not continue ministering because of the cloud; for the glory of the LORD filled the house of God.” Instruments used in the Temple worship at this time are somewhat unclear, however in Rothmuller, The Music of the Jews; an Historical Appreciation.

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we have this list, given in

Hebrew which I list here, in their English translations: Kinnor

A Harp or Lyre - a plucked string instrument probably with 12 strings. It is the national instrument of Israel still today.

Ugav

a flute or shawm - a wood instrument

Tof

a small tambourine-type instrument often played by women

Machalat

The nature of this instrument can not be established

Non-musical instruments Shofar

Ram’s horn

Pa’amon

Bells

Chatzotzerah The Silver trumpet which God told Moses to make and used to signal the onward movement of the Hebrews in the wilderness and at other festival times - blown only by priests.

The tabret

was probably a small hand held percussion instrument

(or trimbrel) As the history of Israel progressed many of the kings from David’s line were not faithful to God, and the Temple and its worship was often abandoned for the worship of the idol gods of the

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nations around Israel. Some few Kings were faithful to a measure, and small revivals, or victories in battles, came as the result of a King leading his people in prayer and repentance before a battle, for example 2 Chronicles 20: 1-30 records the Battle King Jehoshaphat and the people of Israel fought against Four Kings; at the word of the prophet Jehoshaphat sends out the musicians and singers in the front of the army, and as they sing and worship the Lord their enemies are destroyed:

And when he had consulted with the people, he appointed those who should sing to the LORD, and who should praise the beauty of holiness, as they went out before the army and were saying: “Praise the LORD, For His mercy endures forever Now when they began to sing and to praise, the LORD set ambushes against the people of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir, who had come against Judah; and they were defeated.

(2 Chronicles 20:21,22) Finally, due to the continual sins without any repentance of most of the Kings of Israel, God judged the nation, and in its fall to the Babylonian Empire and the Temple of Solomon was destroyed in 586 BCE, and the people taken into slavery in Babylon.

Rebuilding and Worship in the Second Temple (516 BCE-70 CE) The Second Temple replaced the first Temple of Solomon which was destroyed in 586BCE when the Babylonians captured Jerusalem and took the population into servitude in Babylon. When Cyrus became King of Persia, he allowed the Jews, who were held in Captivity to return to Jerusalem. 4 A small number of Jews returned to Jerusalem, the first wave under the leadership of the priest Ezra and work was started on rebuilding the temple. Temple worship continued; in Ezra 2:41 it is recorded that there were 128 singers who returned with Ezra, later in Ezra 2:65 it is recorded that there were 200 men and women singers.

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Nehemiah led a second party of returnees from Babylon about 40 years later to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. At this time it is written in Nehemiah 7:67 there were 245 men and women singers, they were so numerous that they built villages around Jerusalem to accommodate them, as is written Nehemiah 11:29; and by the kings command they were given a certain quota of food each day, (Neh. 11:23).

Bob William's, minister for the Rose Hill Church of Christ in Columbus, Georgia writes on Bible Lessons Worldwide Ministry,

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quoting from Abraham Idelsohn 6 what the Rabbis say in the

Mishnah, 7 concerning the worship in the Second Temple, and: "After the priests on duty had recited a benediction, the Ten Commandments, the Shema (Deut. 6:4-9), the priestly benediction (Num. 6:22-26), and three other benedictions, they proceeded to the offerings," after which, "one of them sounded the ‘Magrefah’... the signal for the priests to enter the Temple to prostrate themselves, whereas for the Levites that sound marked the beginning of the musical performance. Two priests took their stand at the altar immediately and started to blow the trumpets...

After this performance, they approached Ben Arza, the cymbal player, and took their stand beside him, one at his right and the other at his left side. Whereupon, at a given sign with a flag by the superintendent, this Levite sounded his cymbal, and all the Levites began to sing a part of the daily psalm. Whenever they finished a part they stopped, and the priests repeated their blowing of the trumpets and the people present prostrated themselves." 8 Between 20-18 BCE Herod enlarged and restored the second Temple and it was finally destroyed, as Jesus prophesied, in AD 70 by the Romans.

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PART 3 The Development of Synagogue Music Chapter 4 The Beginnings of the Synagogue Worship The synagogue system came into existence mainly during the Babylon captivity (c 583-16 BCE), as a place for meeting together for study of the Scriptures. During this time in Babylon the Jews had no Temple in which they could offer daily sacrifices in worship to God. It was also during the Babylonian Captivity that the Great Assembly of Jewish leaders in Babylon finalized and formalized the order of public prayers, that was, and is still used in the Synagogues today.

The synagogue meeting system crystallized during the Second Temple period under the leadership and influence of Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai. Synagogues became a type of portable place where any community of Jews, no matter where they lived in the world, could collect, study the scriptures together and worship and crystalize a community - this together with the keeping of the Sabbath was a great means of preserving the Jews during the centuries of their diaspora. 1 At first, after the fall of Jerusalem and the deportation of the Jews to Babylon, singing in the synagogues was banned, however this did not last too greater length of time and soon the singing in the synagogues returned - though for a time the ban persisted in secular life. This was probably due to the sadness of the events associated with the fall of Jerusalem. Certain other reasons have been suggested by scholars 2, for example exposure to the pagan Babylon society, the Rabbis seeing the teaching of the Law as being more important, also another reason may have been that from about the 2nd century BCE the Pharisee party became very dominant in the Synagogues, (as came be seen from the Gospels accounts also). Further evidence comes from the writer of the 137th Psalm himself, previously quoted, and probably not written by David:

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By the rivers of Babylon, There we sat down, yea, we wept When we remembered Zion.

We hung our harps Upon the willows in the midst of it.

For there those who carried us away captive asked of us a song, And those who plundered us requested mirth, Saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

How shall we sing the LORD’s song In a foreign land?

(Ps 137:1-4)

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Chapter 5 The Cantor, Cantillation, Jewish Liturgical Modes, Sung Prayers of the Synagogues The Cantor When music returned to the synagogues chanting the prayers, psalms and the scriptures became the dominant form of music in the synagogues for many centuries, and in this connection their developed a leader of the chanting who became known at the Cantor, who also would lead a choir in the larger synagogues. A chant is a musical form in which a number of syllables are sung to each note of a short melodic line that is repeated over and over again throughout the passage of the words. The cantor would take well known melodic patters, or make up his own melodies for the chanting of the scriptures or prayers, thus developing his own style of singing. Chanting of Psalms was often done antiphonally with two choirs, or one divided into two to lead the congregation. Rabbis generally did not allow women to sing - so all music was male led by men and boys. Chanting was monophonic - a single melodic line with no accompaniment or harmony added. Scales would have differed from place to place depending on what part of the world the synagogues was in, and the local folk music culture used in the area, as this often influenced the Cantor's musical creations. In the western word the tempered scales would have had dominance.1 Cantillation Within Jewish religious music perhaps the most striking and distinctive feature is Cantillation.

Cantillation is a system of whereby the cantor or leader singer of a synagogue sings out the a declamatory form of the weekly text of the Torah, (a passage from the first Five Books of Moses) and the Prophets (Nevi’im). The cantor uses pre-existing musical phrases. This process enables the true meaning of the text to be preserved in the Hebrew language. The tradition of Cantillation has grown up over many centuries.

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To understand the true nature of cantillation we must put aside the western idea of a composed composition. The musical phrases are chosen according to the text and book of the Bible being cantillated. There is no rhythm, as is understood in western music, but a certain ‘flow’ that comes about as different musical motives are combined together; this process is called cantillation. The cantor, in order to sing the text correctly, has to chose a number of musical motives for the text according to a set of rules, musical considerations are not the priority here but the text, and generally for each text their is a limited choice of musical motives available. This process where by the text overrides musical considerations is called “logoebic.” Although there is reason to believe that cantillation goes back as far as Ezra in the Bible times - about 2,500 years ago - most melodies used today are no older that about the 15th or 16th century. 2 Jewish Liturgical Modes: A set of musical modes are called ‘Nusach.’ Nusach can refer either to a set of modes or melodies but also to a set text or prayer. These modes or melodies link the prayer to a time of year or day when they are played or recited and also indicate what prayer is to be sing or recited.

Originally the Cantor used to sing their own melodies within these modes, but later these melodies became standardized as did the prayers associated with the melodies. The Three main modes are called: Ahavah Rabbah, Magein Avot and Adonai Malach. However still today the practice of improvisation is used with these modes. 3

Prayers of the Synagogues The prayers of the Synagogues were considered a vital part of the worship and were chanted the chanting being led usually by a Cantor and if available a male choir. The Cantors usually sang a florid and melodious style of vocal line with much agility either of their own devising in the early days before the modes became formalized, or taking on influences form the local surrounding musical culture’s melodic lines. After the formalizing of the prayers during the Babylonian captivity by the Jewish leaders, the following forms emerged and remain until this day in the modern synagogues which we will briefly survey:

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Piyyut: - a Jewish liturgical poem that is sung or chanted but may also be spoken. A lot of Piyytim are poetic in character and often follow the order of the Hebrew Alphabet at the beginning of each line, known as an acrostic. The best known is Master of the World (Adon Olam). It is sung at the end of most services in the Synagogue after the Shema,

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or during the

morning ritual when the Tefillin 5 is put on.

Zemiros: are Jewish Hymns sung in Hebrew, Aramaic, Yiddish or Ladino. They may be sung at Jewish holidays or at the Shabbat meal on Fridays or any other day. Some were written by the Rabbis during the Middle Ages, while others may be well known Jewish Folk songs of a ‘spiritual’ nature.

Nigun: religious songs sung by groups that involve both voice and instruments - but there are no formal words; syllables such as bim-bim-bam or ai-ai-ai are sung. Two well known ones are Erev Shabbos Nigun, and Rebbe Nachman's Lecha Dodi Nigun. They may take the form of a lament or of joyful happiness.

Pizmonim: Traditional Jewish songs most associated with Middle Eastern Sephardic Jews 3 - but are known also among North African and the Jews of Iraqi. Texts may come from the Old Testament or have been composed by poets. They are songs to praise God that contain traditional teaching and are often sung at religious rituals or festivities such as circumcisions, weddings Bar Mitzvahs or other ceremonies. Some of the melodies are quite old but others may be popular Middle Easter melodies.

Baqashot: are a collection of songs, and prayers sung by Sephardic Jewish communities during Shabbat, from dawn to dusk, but also may be recited during the long weeks of winter. The practice of Baqashot started in Spain and spread to the Middle Eastern Jewish communities and then to the communities in countries around the Mediterranean. The popularity of Baqashot probably came as the Kabbalistic religious Jewish communities who embraced it from the religious town of Safed in Palestine.

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Chapter 6 The Development of Religious Jewish Music in the Synagogues: from the 19th-20th Century.

Some Background introduction: The Need for European Jewish Emancipation 1 During the period of the Middle Ages in Europe almost all countries would not allow Jews to have full citizen rights, they placed restrictions on where they could live and the jobs they could do. Jews were banished from England in 1290 and not allowed to reside in England again for 350 years, they were driven out of France in 1394, and Sweden-Norway would not receive them and in 1492 Spain drove the Jew out with the Spanish Inquisition. Between 1350 and 1450 the Jews were driven out of Germany, Italy and the Balkan states. During all the Crusades from 1096 to roughly 1320 the Jews were terrorized, tortured and murdered, by so-called Christian Knights Crusaders who were on their way to liberate Jerusalem from the Turks.

However from the founding of the Kingdom of Poland in 1095 Poland was the most tolerant country to Jews in Europe; and 1262 the King of Poland issued a decree that allowed Jews to live in the Kingdoms of Poland and later Poland-Lithuania. Jews flocked to Poland, and during the Middle Ages Poland became known as ‘Paradise of the Jews.’ Around the middle of the 16th Century, it is believed that about 3/4 of all world Jews at that time lived in Poland. In 1795 Poland was partitioned and restrictive laws were introduced to Jews; meanwhile at the same time Russia also banned and pushed all her Jews to the the Pale Settlement, an area which stretched southward through Poland, Lithuania down to the Ukraine.

It was not until the effects of the Reformation began to be felt in other European countries that doors for Jews began to open again in the European countries. In Britain for example Oliver Cromwell opened the door to the Jews in about 1650. The Jews needed emancipation and in

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God’s divine time it was coming. In 1858 full legal right were resorted to Jews in England, in Germany 1871, Sweden-Norway 1835, Italy 1861, France 1791, Spain 1910 and in Russia 1917.

As a side note it should be said that during the 2nd World War, as a result of the partitioning of Poland between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, about 90%, or 3 million Polish Jews, were killed in Poland and another 3 million non-Polish Jews were killed. It was also noted by the Israeli War Crimes Commission that less that 0.1% of Polish Jews collaborated with Nazi’s agents against Jews, and that the Polish population had the highest number of any nation’s population that helped rescue the Jews. 2 Enlightenment and Jewish Reform The development of music in the Synagogue during the 18th to 20th centuries in Europe was heralded by the influence of the Age of Enlightenment, which in turn influenced what has been called Jewish Enlightenment, a liberal Reform movement in Germany known as Haskalah in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The Haskalah

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movement, which to a large extent embraced the

theories of the Age of Enlightenment and enlarged it within a Jewish context, in turn spread to the majority of Jews in the Shtetl village-townships of the The Pale Settlement areas in Eastern Europe.

The Age of Enlightenment came about in Europe roughly at about the end of the 17th century bringing with it a new radical thinking embracing reason and scientific knowledge over faith and religion. Science and logic demand tests, evidence and proof before conclusions could be reached. As Gentile society changed so it affected the Jewish communities. Jewish communities started to want more secular education, more study of Jewish history, more use the Hebrew language in studying the critical elements of the science and poetry of the Talmud (Old Testament) and Mishnah (the written form of the Oral Laws), deeper involvement in Gentile European society with a grater push for more involvement in politics and with political and legal emancipation. This movement was termed Haskalah (meaning enlightenment, or education).

Moses Mendelssohn, the philosopher and grandfather to Mendelssohn the composer, was a significant leader in the Haskalah reform movement in Germany. At the same time the

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Ashkenazi Jews started to split in to various factions of denominational beliefs. 4 Some of the most well known denominations of Jewish religious beliefs today are: Orthodox Judaism, the the Conservative movement, Jewish Renewal, Reconstructionist Judaism and Secular Humanist Judaism. Rather than the Rabbis taking the lead in reform, it was the layman who took the lead, as the Rabbis led lives much apart form the general population, studying the Torah, while layJews met the Gentile society head on in daily life.

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Chapter 7 Development of Music in the Synagogues: 19th and 20th Centuries The Hassidic masters teach that it is through melody and song that the gates of heaven are opened. Our deepest longings, our greatest joys, and our most profound sorrows are borne on music's wings toward the ‘Shomeiah T'filah,’ the One who Hears Prayer. 1 The First Reform Synagogue 2 As the Reform movement developed the Orthodox synagogue service began to look very antiquated against the more modern Protestant church services with tuneful hymns, robed choirs and colorful concerts of Bach and Mozart for example, and with the use of organs and often orchestras. Synagogue services had many old ritual practices offering the congregations unaccompanied Eastern chants with melodies known only to the chazzanim (cantors) in an incomprehensible language (either Yiddish or Hebrew). Things had to change and the Protestant church services became the new model. Rather than the Rabbis taking the lead it was the laymen who took the lead in this mode of reform.

One early pioneer was Israel Jacobson (1769-1822), a rich merchant who built the first Reform Temple on the grounds of a boy’s school in 1810, introducing many innovations from the Christian model. Use of a bell to announce prayer, an organ, sermons in German, and the introduction of confirmation. Jacobson introduced a children's service with hymns tunes from the Christian hymn books, prayers were read and there was no need for a cantor.

At the same time a change was occurring in the use of the cantor (formally Chazzan); cantors were becoming less about leading he congregation in singing and more about composing, arranging old melodies in newer setting for the congregations to sing; this meant more and more cantors sought secular conservatoire training. Laymen, who were good singers, were asked to take the lead often in singing. Choirs were introduced and hymns started to replace the old chanted prayers.

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The First of the Great Cantor-Composers The first great cantor-composers were Salomon Sulzer, Samuel Naumbourg, and Louis Lewandowski. Sulzer held a post in Vienna, Naumnbourg in Paris and Lewandowski in Berlin.

Salomon Sulzer (1808-1890), was the chief cantor in Vienna and modeled his role on that of J.S. Bach. He was a great reform composer, singer, arranger and teacher, being a professor at the Vienna Conservatory. Sulzer advocated he use of congregational Choirs in synagogue services and set many old and new melodies to four part vocal settings in the manner of church hymns.

He made a strong statement about the use of the organ in services and although there was resistance he won the day, when at the formation first Jewish synod in Leipzig in 1869, he made the following statement about the organ’ s inclusion in synagogue services: An instrumental accompaniment of the singing during the worship service [should] be introduced everywhere, in order to make it easier for the members of the congregation to take an active part in the same. ...the organ is worthy of recommendation for the required accompaniment, and there are no religious objections to its us on the Sabbath and on holidays. 3 Samuel Naumbourg (1817-1880) was cantor in Paris at the rue Notre Dame-de-Nazareth Jewish community until his death. He is noted for publishing several anthology volumes of traditional liturgical songs, in these anthologies he is also noted for the inclusion of a number of commissioned new songs for soloists and choir from professional composers, among whom we will mention Meyebeer and Fromental Halevy. It was on the advice of Halevy that Naumbourg obtained the position at rue Notre Dame-de-Nazareth.

Louis Lewandowski (1821-94) studied in Berlin where he became a soprano in a synagogue at the are of 12. At the Berlin Academy he was the first Jew to be admitted on the recommendation of Felix Mendelssohn. In 1840 he became the choir master of the Berlin Synagogue. In 1866 he was appointed Choir master of the Nue Synagogue in Berlin for which he composed a complete service. He made arrangements of old Hebrew melodies to be sung in the synagogue for full mixed choir and soloists. He wrote organ works, cantatas, overtures and symphonies. The Organ

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was still not fully integrated into synagogue worship in most synagogues, but Lewandowski advocated it use fully, and eventually it became essential and common place in modern synagogues necessary to accompany choir and congregational singing. Lewandowski wrote part settings using ancient cantorial modal melodies, he made Hebrew melody settings for choir, cantor and organ, which today are considered full of religious sentient and are still sung in synagogues around the world. 4 Twentieth Century Synagogue Worship Lewandowski’s music today is still the backbone of all traditional synagogue music for all major branches of Judaism, be it, Reform, Liberal, Conservative or Orthodox communities; being sung in every part of the Jewish world. The Orthodox today do not allow mixed choirs and in these Orthodox synagogues the music is arranged for male a capella choir and cantor. Lewandowski’s melodies are also used in congregations with out choir where the melodies are chanted by the cantor.

During the 20th century Jewish composers have continued to write music for the modern synagogue worship, composers such as Ernst Bloch, A.W. Binder, Max Janowski, Ben Steinberg, Bonia Shur, and Leonard Bernstein. Music has been written in almost every musical style the twentieth century has gone through for piano, orchestra, organ and choir. During the latter decades of the twentieth century folk music has been introduced in the more progressive synagogues and the use of guitars, and no doubt synagogue music will continue to progress even further as time passes.

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PART 4 Jewish Music: Traditional, Secular and Folk Chapter 8 Israeli Folk Music Introduction Israeli folk music, wrote the composer Yitahak Edel is: "remnants of ancient Hebrew music that have struggled to survive the years of diaspora... (also) the primitive life of our settlers, who broke away from the European civilization, sought a musical expression that would suit their world view." 1 The modern State Israel is a wide cultural mixture and melting pot of ethnic Jewish peoples from all over the world, who have come with widely divergent musical styles, and who today, and since the formation of the modern state of Israel, have sought some unified cohesion in their musics, some successfully - and some not so. Styles as far apart as the folk songs from the Shtels village culture of The Pale-Yiddish culture, Russian-Jewish folk music, Eastern European Klezmer music, Middle Eastern music, Yemenite music together with Greek, Latin American and Ethiopian styles of music today have influenced, in various ways, the modern folk, art music and pop music that has developed in Israel.

European Jewish Secular Music of the Middle Ages The Feudal system of the Middle Ages in Europe was dominated by the hierarchy of the Catholic church which kept the Jews in subjection to a great extent. Everyone bowed ultimately to the authority of the Pope, even kings. Few legal ways for uneducated Jews to earn a living existed in Medieval Europe apart from the lowest of unskilled work such as butchering, leather tanning, dying, felt making or wood cutting. Jews skilled in silversmith, goldsmith work and jewelry usually had to pay bribes and back-handers to Gentile lords and overseers; for those few with language ability international trade, money lending opened the way - but in all these avenues of

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work, bribes were necessary, and often a single mistake could open the way to disaster and lose of status for them and their families.

It was because of this situation that Jews often found their way into music and the performing arts. We come across the concept of the low-class wandering musician in Europe, usually a Jew, who sang, played an instrument and may have been a comic performer, juggler, jester, magician or wrestler. In France the word was juif, in juglars in Spain, jongleurs in France and in England gleeman - all originally indicating the Jewish wandering musician. Today we find reference in surnames to ancestors who had these occupations, for example: Singer (singer), Cantor (Cantor), Geiger/Fiedler (fiddler), Becker (Gr.cymbal player), Pauker (Gr. Drummer) and Pfeiffer, (Gr. Flutist).

One well known source is the oldest Yiddish manuscript known as Shmuel Buch (The Book of Samuel) which contains about 18,000 rhyming stanzas of poetry retelling Bible stories and of kings and heroes of ancient Israel. Another well know collection of Yiddish poetry and songs from the Middle Ages is Bovobuch, 1507, by Elias Levita (Eliahu Bachur), in eleven syllable ottava-rima.

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Melodies in which these songs were sung are now not know or lost. The First

collection of Yiddish songs was by Eisik Wallisch of Worms about 1695-1605, also without melodies. It contains 56 poems, mostly love songs and humorous songs, some similar to German songs of the time with Christian references taken out and with some Hebrew language added.

From the middle of the 17th Century onwards until the early 19th there is a break in the continuity of the Yiddish culture which was upset by pogroms, plague and the the persecutions of the crusades. Most of what is known today of Yiddish folk music and songs comes from the period post 1750. 3 What exists today of Yiddish songs from from the Middle Ages (1250-1750) is very small.

After roughly the middle of the 18th century Yiddish songs became shorter and not as lengthy as earlier forms the Yiddish song genre. Ethnomusicologists also know that from about this time, the Yiddish secular songs that were sung in Yiddish Jewish communities of Europe and The Pale were shorter and in a more manageable song-stanza format; and were songs sung about passion, mothers for their babies, workers songs, tunes for weddings and villages dances. Melodies and words were ofter shaped and re-shaped over time and as the songs were sung differently with

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variations in different areas. One of the very first to copy down these songs was the composer Modest Mussorgsky who used several in compositions in the 1860’s - how true they were to the genuine article is unclear. Later in 1864 the Russian musician Stepan Karpenko also copied some down. 4

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Chapter 9 Historical Sources of Israeli Folk Music Israeli Folk music today draws its historical sources from Jewish life and culture over the many centuries of the diaspora. As about 2/3 of Jews during the diaspora lived in the Pale Settlement areas of Eastern Europe and the Ukraine; perhaps then one of the most significant historical inputs and influences to Jewish folk music has come from this Shtetl village culture of the Pale Settlement areas, before and up to the first wave of aliyah in 1882.

Israeli folk (and art song) music has been, and still is, one of the most important aspects of building the nationhood’s identity and culture. Seeking a distinctive style for these songs has been of importance to Jewish composers after the long centuries of the diaspora. The Jews of the Shtetl village culture spoke Yiddish, as this is not a language that is common in Gentile culture I shall say something first about this language, and then look briefly at the Shtetl village culture from where most of the songs that first had a forming influenced on the creation of both an Israeli folk music and art music derives its self from.

TheYiddish Language Although the history of the Yiddish language its self goes back as far as the 9th century, when it was the High German Language of the Ashkenazi Jews of Western Europe, it did not spread to the eastern half of Europe until several centuries later. Yiddish was a language scorned by the more literate educated Jews of Europe who spoke German and often Hebrew also; Yiddish was seen as a language for the poor, and for women who did not go to school and who could not learn Hebrew or German. Frequent expulsion and movements of Jews in Europe kept Jewish communities isolated, particularly in the Pale Settlement areas, this fostered the forming of their own language of Yiddish; a language that kept them separate from society, and grew first significantly in the Jewish communities of the Rhine Valley of Germany. (Yiddish being a language Jews used among themselves, a mixture of German, Hebrew, Polish and Russian with even some older forms of French and Italian). Persecution and the anti-Semitic laws kept the

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Jewish population isolated from the general populations to a large degree. The Crusades of Europe which started in 1095 also kept Jewish communities even further isolated and under continual harassment and persecution and threat of death. 1 At the beginning of World War Two there were about 11-13 million Yiddish speakers today about two million world wide. 2 The Shtetls and their Yiddish Folk Music The Shtetl was a small village dominated by a Jewish population that was mostly Orthodox Religious Jews. Shtetl villages were found right throughout The Pale. The Pale was a stretch of land that swept like an arch through Poland southward and eastward down to the Ukraine. First formally established by Imperial Russian in 1791, but in existence much earlier, The Pale was the the only legal place where Jews were allowed to live, and at that time it is reported up to 40% to 60% of the worlds Jews live there at its largest point. (In todays geography The Pale would cover parts of Poland, Lithuania, White Russia, Moldova, Ukraine and Western Russia). The Shtetl system started about 1200 CE and began to break up after the anti-Semitic pogrom attacks by the Russians in the 1890’s when many Russian Jews and Ukrainian Jews started to be driven from The Pale; the last remnants of the Shtetl villages finally disappeared after the Nazi invasions of Easter Europe during the second world war.

Here in the Shtetls we find the indigenous life of the Jews of Eastern Europe. The musical Fiddler on the Roof describes the life in a Shtetl, from this musical can be seen how many Jews were starting to flee the Shtetls after the late 19th century Russian programs, fleeing to the USA and Palestine mostly. The first wave of Russian-Jewish aliyah to Palestine came at this time.

(Aliyah: Heb. meaning ‘to rise’: coming from the later Psalms ‘Song of Ascents’ sung by pilgrims going up to Jerusalem, through the hills around Jerusalem, at the time of the feasts - in modern usage: immigrants to Israel making a ‘pilgrimage’ or aliyah to return to the land of Israel).

From the religious point of view the two most important attributes of a Shtetl community revolved around the study of the Torah (the Old Testament) and responsibility to the community - which meant caring for the poor. Learning was considered the highest form of ‘work,’ while giving to the poor, from a Jewish religious point of view, was considered for high importance.

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Most Jews were in some form of low-grade trade work, like shoe making, farming or small businesses. The Shtetl was a source of rich Yiddish musical culture, in folk poetry, songs and folk dances. Later in the early 20th century much Yiddish folk music was collected from the Shtetls and helped form the basis of one approach to finding a Jewish ‘classical’ music. 3 In the Ukraine ethnomusicologist Moshe Beregovski (1892-1961) of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences is the best known of those who did important research and recording of authentic Yiddish folk songs of the Shtetl village culture. 4

Some Significant Aspects the the Shtetls Folk Song Heritage

Moshe Beregovski wrote in the introduction to his collection of Jewish Folk Music (1934) that to distract the Jewish woking masses from participation the revolutionary process and struggle that was gaining momentum against capitalism in Russia and Ukraine in the 1880/90‘s the, “Jewish bourgeoisie introduced the problem of national regeneration (through ethnographism and folklorism), as a counterweight to the social struggle of the proletariat, which had already taken on organized from in the 1890’s in Russia.” 5 This attitude of the Jewish bourgeoisie caused a spurt in the area of music by the collection of folk songs and cultural information from the Shtetl villages of The Pale. We can say Beregovski’s work to day, is seen as one of the main leaders in this field of Jewish Shtetl folk song collection; together with the work of the St Petersburg School, and the formation in St Petersburg of The Society of Jewish Folk Music in 1906, whose musicians also took most of their folk song collections from the Russian Shtetls. Both Beregovski and the St Petersburg School together form the backbone of what was saved from the Shtetl Jewish-Yiddish musical culture.

So we can say there have been two major Jewish community centers where Jewish folk songs have

incubated and thrived, first in the Shtetl village communities of Eastern Europe and

secondly in Palestine itself, and then Israel in more modern times. As Jews of the Shtetl communities of Eastern Europe lived more self-contained lives than most Jews communities a much greater variety of songs has emerged from these Shtetl communities. Also as so many of

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the Jews of Eastern Europe settled in America after the pogroms of the 19th century there has also arisen a flowering of Jewish folk songs in North America.

Jewish folk songs from the Shttel village communities were written in Yiddish and were melodically related to the Jewish religious music of the period. Usually they had a plain harmonic basis and not so many modulations, but had a clear and precise rhythm. Most were in the minor key, and only a few in the major. In most scales the 7th degree was not raised, and in many songs that used the Dorian mode the 6th degree flattened, and the 7th raised; while in the Phrygian mode the 3rd of the scale was often raised. Many of the tunes also have a pentatonic character and have a mournful mood. By mournful mood, it would be more correct to say that they may have a dark subdued effect, while those in the major key a light and clear effect. These effects often mirrored the lives the poor Jews of the Shtetl villages lived.

There is also to been seen in these songs, some influences of the surrounding Gentile cultures the Shtetl was situated in, be it Russian, Polish, Ukrainian, German, Hungarian or Czech. Therefore the songs-types, and words of the songs, have been influenced by differing racial developments, surrounding cultural communities, national history and graphical situations and languages. Most Yiddish folk songs that are sung today come from a period that starts at the beginning of the 19th century. There has also arisen a corpus of so-called spurious or pseudo-folks-songs from Jewish operettas and folk-plays that some ethnomusicologists catalog.

Jewish songs of the Shtetl communities have roughly been catalogued as follows by Aaron Marko Rothmuller in his ‘The Music of the Jews, an Historical Appreciation:’ 6 Children’s songs Marching songs Love songs Wedding Songs Cradle-songs Dance Songs Dance tunes (Wordless) Humorous and satirical songs Religious and mystical songs,

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Nature songs Soldiers songs Workers songs Chalutzim (pioneer - fighter/worker) songs Dance songs and wordless dance tunes were often Chasidic (songs of Orthodox religious zeal) in origin and very rhythmic, frequently beginning in a slow temp and working up to a climax.

Humorous songs often told of living conditions of poverty and trials with macabre humor.

Religious songs form a bridge between secular and religious subjects; Soldiers songs tell of cares, plague and conditions in Tsarist times. The most moving of all songs were the love songs and the cradle-song with beautiful melodies, being lyrical in mood. Workers and Chasidim songs were work songs and socialist songs, borrowed from other people and translated into Yiddish and later into Hebrew in the land of Israel.

A note about Chalutzim (Chasidim) songs: These are songs of a devout Jewish sect which came into existence in Easter Europe / Poland in the middle of the 18th century. These songs give rise to a spirit of ecstasy and often have no words. God Himself is held to speak through the melody, according to the Jewish poet Peretz. The purer the melody, the less, or, no words it needs; however it still needs a voice. King David used the phrase in the Psalms, “all my bones speak,’” true melody, the Chasidim hold, can come from the heart: “in the marrow of his bones must a man sing; there must the melody reside, that highest praise of God, may He be praised….it is a part of that melody with which God created the world…and of the soul that He has set in it. “ 7

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Chapter 10 The St Petersburg School and the Society for Jewish Folk Music Prior to the inception of the work of the so-called St Petersburg School, which started with the formation of the Society for Jewish Folk Music in 1906, the Russian government had generously financed two Jewish ethnologists, Saul M. Ginsdberg (1866-1940) and Pesach S. Marek (1862-20) to form a collection of Jewish folk songs; this was was published in 1901 in St Petersburg under the title: Yiddish Folk Songs in Russia. This work fostered a new systematic and scholarly research on a practical level. In this regard Ginsberg and Marek, who were not musicians, obtained the services of a graduate to the St Petersburg Conservatory, Joel Engel who became their musical advisor, and gave an important lecture and concert of Jewish folk music in Moscow.

In 1906 Ephraim Sklair, also a graduate of St Petersburg Conservatory, founded the Society for Jewish Folk Music in St Petersburg; around him were a number of talented musicians also graduates of the St Petersburg Conservatory, for example: Lazar Saminsky, Joel Engel and Soloman Rosowsky; they had all come under the influence of Rimsky-Korsakov and the revival of Russian Folk music lead by the composer and teacher Balakirev, of what became known as the group of FIVE. Rimsky-Korsakov encouraged these young musicians, and off they went to the Jewish villages, the Shtetls, where they meticulously recorded and transcribed thousands of Yiddish folksongs. Composers such as Glazunov and Cui (half-Jewish) encouraged them. Sklair and his friends, made arrangements of the Jewish and Yiddish melodies they found, often with the harmonies of the late Russian Romantic school, and many concerts given celebrating finally the arrival of a Jewish Art Music. Many of the melodies were of a melancholy and moaning type of sound. 1

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Folk Songs of the Oriental Jews We shall say now a word about the songs of the Oriental Jews of Palestine and the surrounding Arab countries of the Middle East, in our brief survey of Jewish Folk music. Their songs must be considered more genuine and more Semitic that those of the Western and East European Jews, as Western influences have to some degree had an influence on the Yiddish folk culture. Oriental songs usually use a quarter tone scale known as a maqam or naghana. A maqam is somewhere between a melody and a scale. It is a series of tones, a short melody or musical motive, and these songs are usually sung in unison without any accompaniment. Rhythm is free and often with rich melodic ornamentation and improvisation. The most characteristic oriental folk songs of Palestine are the corpus from the Yemenite Jews who left Palestine about 100 BCE to 100 CE. In 1948 many Yemenite Jews were repatriated to Israel and their songs recorded on disc and tape.

These songs have been a source of inspiration for serious composers seeking an authentic Jewish voice and music in the modern Israel. 2

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Chapter 11 Klezmer The history of Klezmer music goes back to the Middle Ages to Prague and Lublin in the 16th and 17th centuries. Music among Jewish communities was rare up until this time as Rabbis prohibited the performance of music because they still mourned the destruction of the 2nd Temple in CE 70. However as time passed these rules were relaxed and bands of Klezmorim emerged and became prolific especially in the Pale Settlement villages.

Early Klezmer bands consisted of violinist, double bass, a flute, a drummer and various other percussion instruments, sometimes a mandolin was employed also. There were often roaming bands and were hired for weddings and other festivities where they played mostly dance music.

As time passed Romany gypsies from Hungary and Rumania came into contact with Klezmer bands and there was cross fertilization of music styles and songs. In the 19th century Klezmer bands were found in the army and here the clarinet was added and other percussion instruments and an occasional hammer dulcimer. 1 In the 1870’s a Yiddish theatre was founded in Romania that popularized Klezmer music with the Jews of Europe. However later Klezmer lost is favor with European Jews when they started to immigrate to the USA and Palestine, in the latter half of the 19th and early 20th century. During the middle part of the 20th century Klezmer was also most unknown, as new emigrates to the States wanted American culture and American music. Nevertheless in the 1970’s Klazmer music saw a re-birth mainly with the formation of a Klezmer band called The Klezorim that toured Europe and the USA. Today Klezmer bands are much in vogue for Jewish festivities, Bar Mitzvahs and weddings both in Israel and the USA. Each year there is a festival in the town of Safed, Israel for the best the Klezmer bands. 2

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Chapter 12 Sephardic-Ladino Sephardic music first came to light in medieval Spain. Following the expulsion of Sephardic

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Jews form Spain in the 1492, as the Jews of the Iberian peninsular dispersed, and with this dispersion Sephardic songs picked up influences form North Africa, Morocco, Argentina, Turkey, Greece and other places that Spanish Jews settled and were found in.

There are three general types of Sephardic songs: ceremonial songs, often of a religious nature, entertainment songs and love songs; Sephardic songs were primarily sung. Much of the early music has been lost over the centuries and the influences of other nations, adaptations and assimilations in melody and rhythms have molded the traditional Sephardic song; in this connection we may also mention specifically countries of the former Ottoman Empire, Greek, Turkey, Palestine and Jerusalem, the Balkans and Egypt.

Sephardic songs today are often found with the use of the Arabic quasi-melodic-scale maqam mode. Traditionally these songs were accompanied by what ever melody and percussion instruments are found locally for example: lutes, mandolins, hammered dulcimer, zither, violin, hand drums and tambourines. Today often a wider variety of instruments are used including doubles basses, guitars and accordions and an advanced array of percussion instruments.

Modern composers of Sephardic-Ladino, (Ladino is the ancient language of Spain), songs and instrumental pieces include Yitzhak Yedid who combines a classical music roots in the form of chamber groups with Sephardic and Arabic music, for example his piece,“Oud Bass piano Trio.�

Other notable modern Sephardic composers are Betty Olivero and Tsippi Fleisher. Some Sephardic composers also use quarter tones in their music. 2

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Chapter 13 Mizrahi and Dancing Mizrahi Mizrahi is a term that applies to communities of Jews who descended from the muslim countries of the Middle East such as Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Uzbekistan, Kurdish areas, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Georgia and Jews from the Yemen. Mizrahi Jews were, before the founding of the modern State of Israel known as Sephardic Jews, however as the nation progressed the term Mizrahi it today applied to these Jews.

Mizrahi music is part of the modern Middle Eastern popular music scene. Mizahi music combining the flavors of Arabic and Mediterranean sounds; mostly of Middle East origin and sounds form North Africa. There is much use of violin and string sounds and percussion often also higher pitches are used. Zohar Argov today is considered one of the leading Mizrahi songs artists. 1 Jewish Folk Dancing Dancing is important in Jewish culture both as worship to God and in general celebrations for weddings and holidays. We read in the Bible how David danced before the Lord in celebration and worship as the Ark of God was brought into Jerusalem:

So the women sang as they danced, and said: “Saul has slain his thousands, And David his ten thousands.

(1 Samuel 18:7) Then David danced before the LORD with all his might; and David was wearing a linen ephod.

(2 Samuel 6:14) Historically among the Ashkenazi Jew of Europe much dancing was done and that in the various melodies and styles of the Klezmer music. Among religious communities men and women

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danced separately. Much use of intricate foot work and use of hands is found in Jewish dancing and less so of surrounding Gentile nations. Each Jewish community in the diaspora had their own dance forms. 2

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PART 5 Jewish Art Music and Jewish Music in the Land 1 Chapter 14 Introduction “There is a palpable sense of anxiety in the words of the cantors within for their own profession journal in 1848, expressing themselves publicly about the absence of a concept of Jewish music.” 2 Is there a Jewish ‘classical’ music? In 1848 the cantors of Europe lamented in their journal that there was not, and in many ways in a classical sense, this was true at that time. Various attempts have been made over the years to rectify this situation and we shall look now at some of these in Part 3. Jewish ‘classical’ music could be said to start with the inception in the early 20th century, from 1906 onward, when Ephraim Skliar founded The Society for Jewish Folk Music in St Petersburg, Russia, which for most purposes is generally considered the founding of modern Jewish ‘classical’ music; however within the Palestine Mandate period its self and the modern State of Israel attempts were also made a form a National Jewish classical music, as we shall see.

In this chapter we will give a brief overview of the music in the land of Palestine from the time of the first wave of Aiyah (returnees) in 1882, and then later after 1948 as it was, and is, today the State of Israel.

Music During the 5 waves of Aliyah (1882-1939) This period of Jewish history refers to the first 5 waves of aliyah, 2 that is Jewish reparation to the land of Palestine, (Aliyot being the Hebrew plural form), that occurred roughly between 1882 and 1939.

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Palestine before the First Aliyah wave The Jewish presence in the land of Palestine before the first waves of aliyah (i.e. pre c.1882) weas mainly Sephardic Jews, also known in modern usage as Mizrahim Jews. 3 Jews in the land of Palestine before the first waves of aliyah had not been influenced in any way by the liberal movements of the Ashkenazi Jews (i.e. European and Russian Jews), and the Jewish reform movement in Germany known as Haskalah.

The music of the Palestinian Sephardic Jew’s synagogue was traditional and formal, the only instrument allowed was the Shofar, (a rams horn). Their music did not have the elaborate ornamentation of the Ashkenazi Jews of Europe. Sephardic Jews music followed the local muslim singing techniques. Instruments used by Sephardic Jews were played mostly on festival days and at weddings. Their folk must was like that of the local Arab populations. European art music, to any extent that it did existed, was found only in the private homes of the Turkish or British rulers.

The Waves of Aliyah Immigration to the Land of Palestine: First Aliyah Wave 1882-1903 The greater part of the first wave of aliyah to the land of Palestine at this time was composed of Ashkenazic Jews from Russia, driven out by the pogroms. They brought with them the only music they knew, the folk music of their synagogs and their daily lives. They had been however been influenced to some degree by the German-European liberal Haskalah movements; and now they were free from their somewhat sheltered Shtetl lifestyles, they were mostly also eager to know more of the European Christian world. They found that in order not to antagonize the traditional Sephardic Jews they chose to settled mostly on the farms and away from Jerusalem.

Their main occupation was rebuilding the land, draining the land and planting crops, which left little time for cultural pursuits. However of significance there was on the settlement Rishon L’Tzion an orchestra established of 20-25 players, mostly wind instruments from 1905-12 and revived again in 1924. There was also a considerable number of Yemenite Jews in this first wave of aliyah, who kept their tradition musical identity.

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Second Aliyah Wave 1904-1914 The second wave of Aliyah brought with it the establishment of the Kibbutz system of communal living and farming. Due to the continued pressures of building up the land and farming the only significant musical activities in the Kibbutz system were choral groups, at which any trained or non-trained musician could participate; there was little desire among these groups also for religious music.

During this time Jews from Poland, Iraq, Syria, South Africa France and Germany brought with them their own folk music, however there was an increasing desire to find an ethnic Jewish folk music of Palestine - but this took time - and during the first half of the 20th century some musicians started to work with this idea, songs were written about their lives in the emerging and rebuilding of the land; but is was not until the time when the State of Israel came into being that a more purposeful Jewish folk music started to appear. Jew who settled in Jerusalem were often of a more religious persuasion than those who settled in Tel Aviv, who started to cultivate interests in European music. In 1904 the Violin of Zion Society was established in Jaffa, and in 1908 in Jerusalem, for the purpose of inviting professional artists to visit Israel and give concerts. There were times when religious Jews made the establishing of art music in Palestine a problem - but eventually this was over come by the exuberance of art music lovers among the settlers.

In 1910 the first conservatory of music was establish in Jaffa by Shulamit Ruppin and later a department in Jerusalem; a member of her faculty later opened a piano studio and the teaching of music theory. So started the teaching of musical instruments; then musicians and composers started to think not only of purely European music, but started to explore the local colors in a new Jewish music.

In 1915 Idelsohn, the Jewish ethnomusicologists,

took a melody of the religious Jews of

Sadgora in Bukovina and put a Hebrew text to it and so was born the famous Havah Nagilah.

Idelsohn did much research into the music of the Jews and produced what is still today the cornerstone of Jewish musical studies: two volumes of Jewish Music in its Historical

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Development (1929), Jewish Liturgy and its Development (1932), and the ten volume Thesaurus of Jewish-Oriental Melodies (1914-33).

Third and Fourth Waves of Aliyah 1919-1939 The Third wave of aliyah (1919-23) brought mostly Russian and Polish Jews to Palestine. There were many professional musicians in this wave and most to the younger ones who were not so set in their ways and were open to seek new paths from the influences of the surrounding local music culture; while the older generation kept to the European models. From this developed two lines of musical development the one that sought to follow the European traditions aiming for the highest European standards while the other sought a new folk music and art music developed through interaction with the local musical culture.

The Germans who came earlier in the second wave interacted the the Polish-Russians, and from this came the developing of the first musical institutions: in 1919 Idelsohn founded the Jerusalem School of Music, the Bentwich sisters from Britain founded the Jerusalem Music Society (1921-36), from which came the Jerusalem String Quartet. Concerts were often in peoples homes attended by the aristocracy of the ruling classes. In 1921 Mark Golinkin came to Palestine and inspired the beginnings of the Hebrew Musical Association for the establishing of Opera in Palestine.

The Fourth wave of aliyah (1924-29) consisted of Jews from the European cities and so the musical scene of Palestine became more and more professional, and Tel Aviv was becoming the musical center of Palestine. In 1923 an orchestra of 45 gave a concert in Tel Aviv with an all Beethoven concert; and in 1924 The Union of Art Workers was formed to cover musicians rights, as most musicians at this time were also playing in cafes and picture houses. In 1925 the Hebrew Chamber Society was established for the performing of chamber concerts in Tel Aviv. While there were an increasing number of jobs for musicians, some however were forced back to Europe to look for work or went to the United States. At this time also more visiting artists visited Palestine for example Jan Kubelik, Arthur Rubinstine, Jascha Heifetz and Ossip Gabrilowitz.

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In 1923 Golinkin’s Hebrew Musical Association produced its first opera in Palestine La Traviata.

This performance was in Hebrew and in Tel Aviv, and was followed by performances in Haifa and Jerusalem. Early attempts to write local opera were Mikhail Gnessin’s Abraham’s Youth and Jacob Weinberg’s Hechalutz. There were difficulties in producing large operas and Golinkin’s company closed in 1927. Interest was growing in the oratorios from the mid 1920‘s. One significant performance was given of the Haydn’s The Creation. However there were criticisms given of the performances of both opera and oratorios during this period by the emerging musical criticism that started during the 1920’s two of the earliest musical critics being the German David Rosolio and Menash Rabinowitz both of whom had long careers in Palestine.

In 1923 Joel Engel arrived in Palestine and established a department of his Berlin publishing house Verlag. Engel had been instrumental with St Petersburg group and the formation of the Russian Jewish Folk Song Society. With this in mind he perused a path to find the local new folk music of the returnees, songs from the Kibbutz about ploughing, harvesting, shepherding and interactions with local Arabs and Bedouins - in general the settlers daily lives. These songs he took and harmonized and had sung together at concerts with the old songs from the Russian Jewish Folk Song Society. Through his effort some of these songs became national folk songs, still sung today, and many were also performed back in Europe. When performed in Europe they became an arm to reach out to the younger Jewish youth of Europe to inspire them with the idea of making aliyah and a new life in Palestine. In 1929 the Jewish Agency was formed and these songs were used by them in reaching the youth with a passion for the Land, its pioneering culture and language.

The Fifth Wave of Aliyah (1929-1939) During the 1930s with the rise of Hitler in Germany Jewish immigration to Palestine increased significantly in 1932 only 150 German Jews came to Palestine; 1932 there were 5,750 refugees who fled to Palestine from Europe including not only Germans but Polish and Russians also. As the 1930’s progressed more and more Jews came from Western and Middle Europe and many of these were musicians of the highest international standard, professionalism increased, pushing

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standards higher and higher in Palestine, so also did the whole music industry its self start to raise up to new levels. By the end of the 1930’s Palestine was sending out into the world musicians of the highest international caliber. 4

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Chapter 15 Music in the State of Israel.

After 1948 and the formation of the new State of Israel, a wide cultural mixture of ethnic groups came from all over the world to make their homes in the new land; and with this came a vast array of musical styles. In 1948 the Ministry of Culture was formed and State funding was made available at both state and local level, and also from the private sector, for establishing of orchestras and music in schools and at college level, and also for the funding of international artists to visit Israel. Eastern and Western musical styles tended not to mix at first, though later musicians from the eastern half of the middle-east started to add some western harmonic, melodic and rhythmics to their more popular music. The creation of a unified musical culture was difficult at the start particularly as the formal concert was not a concept known to eastern musicians and took time to be accepted.

One unifying factor was the start in 1961 of the Israel Festival that has exposed Israeli artists to the international public while at the same time introducing outstanding international artists to the Israeli public, concerts were held annually in a number if different cities in Israel. Musicians from as far apart as China, India, Europe and the USA each year performed with Israeli musicians. There is in fact a profound and significant interest in music of all types with the Israeli public (and this goes back to the earliest time of the Bible), and this interest has led to sponsorships from a variety of sources.

In the field of music education most of the early music teachers had a European background and for this reason two of the main introductions to music education were the use of the recorder, an instrument simple to play and quickly learnt to a elementary level, and the use of eurythmics, that is the combination of music and movement. Singing was a powerful force to bring cohesion among school children of different ethnic backgrounds and encouraged the used of Hebrew, which most were struggling to learn in the new land. Composers were, and still are encouraged to write songs about the pioneering life of the citizens of Israel and also art songs. Often in the early days of the state make-shift arrangements were necessary as teachers of music struggled to

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form choirs and find instruments for schools. Today there are a multitude of music teachers in Israel which has a highly developed music-going public to concerts of all types and styles.

First Generation of Composers - the Forming of an Israeli Style Composers who were early arrivals to Palestine during the 1930’s, for example Odon Partos and Alexander Boskovitch used Eastern European models of a Jewish music with augmented seconds and syncopated rhythms; this music sounded much in the vogue of Klezmer music.

The other paths chosen by composers such as Paul Ben-Haim (perhaps the most representative of the early Jewish composers), also Boskovitch, Max Brod (1864-1978) and Erich Walter Sternberg (1891-1974) and a small army of other composers, who all sought a style that appeared pseudo-Oriental using the mannerisms of Arab music, having asymmetrical rhythms together with much use of percussion and scales with augmented seconds, melismatic passages and often wide use of free rhythm. Harmony was either modal or of no fixes discernible key. They sought to create a Middle East Sound that became known at the “Mediterranean” or “Eastern Mediterranean.” Other composers working in this style were Menachem Avidon (1908-1905) and Yitzchak Edel (1869-1973).

Today both these paths look synthetic and artificial. However most of this was good music wellcrafted by composers trained in European conservatories who arrived in Israel with their styles already developed and were therefore finding the need to adapt their styles to the new environment. Nevertheless their songs and symphonic pieces laid the first foundation to the forming of a Jewish art music from the land itself. 1

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Chapter 16 The Second Generation of Israeli Art Composers Most of the next generation of composers had fled the Holocaust and brought with them a more diverse range of styles from concert hall to campfire songs. Some of the most representative are: Stefen Wolpe (1902-72), Benjamin Omer (1902-76) and Abraham Daus (1902-74) and Joseph Tal (1910- 2008. Tal became the director of the Jerusalem Conservatory and is considered one of he founding fathers of modern Israeli Music. Composers in this group started to use some of the new techniques of their European collages; for example Bernd Bergel (1909-69) used tonallycentered music but non-harmonic music in a contrapuntal texture like that of Paul Hindemith.

Joseph Tal experimented to some degree with Schoenberg's twelve note technique also abstract manipulation of tones in electronic music. Boskovitch, toward the end of his life, integrated serial constructions and mathematical structures into his so-called, ‘Mediterranean’ style.

Israeli Composers 1967-80 In 1967 Israel won the 6-Day War and a song as written that epitomized the spirit of Israel at that time by Naomi Shemer, ‘Jerusalem of Gold.’ Composers who were reaching their maturity at this time, include for example include Jacob Gilboa (1920-2007), Levi Wachgel (b 1920) and Yehoshua Laker (b. 1924).

During the 1970’s ad 80’ many young Israeli composers chose to study out of the country often in European conservatories. Here they came contact with the Darmstadt school and the internationalism of Paris, London and New York. Techniques used by such composers as Luigi Nono, Luciano Berio Olivier Messiaen, Stockhausen and Boulez proved that non of these composer’s music could be said to have a national identity relating these composers to their native countries. Israeli composers wondered then why their music should not do likewise, and with this in mind many trended away from seeking a genuine Israeli music to seeking an international or world sound, with little desire to align themselves with Israeli music culture. So Israeli composers steered away from the use of ‘artificial’ Oriental modes and Arab melodies.

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Joseph Tal was a leading figure of this Israeli Internationalism movement. Composers Sadai (b.

1935) and Schidlowski (b. 1931) for example, experimented with abstract sound systems of notational pictographs, jagged melodies, richly dissonant harmonies, aleatoric techniques and chance systems, all of which allowed the performers great freedoms.

Another path was struck out by composers, who while deeming themselves Israeli composers and seeking a national style, turned away from local middle eastern folk materials and the socalled Mediterranean style and sought a Jewishness in their music, which in the words of composer Ben-Tzion Orgad was a style rooted in “the people...a heterogeneous society who real common denominator is the language so strongly connected to the Bible and to the book of prayers...” 1 Be-Tzion’s music had the deep influence of cantillation and prayer; and the music is often dense with overlapping layers of sound, ethereal with rootless melodies.

Israel Music 1980 onward...

The 1980’s and 1990’s saw most of the aliyah came form eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The percentage of true Jews among this aliyah wave was was significantly less, as many brought non Jewish spouses, children and relatives. Musicologists noticed a remarkable absence of genuine Jewish folk music, Yiddish folklore and sacred song among them; this being evidence of the cultural deprivation the communist society had wrought on the ethnic people groups of these lands. Other significant aliyah has come form the Falasha-Ethiopian Jews, who came with a much different and remote music background; attempts are being made to document this music especially by scholar Kay Kaufman Shelemay.

In general concerning the Israeli scene today, Irene Heskes remarks of pop music and art music that it “is more worldly and less given to ingenuous folk expression.” out messages she says of “creative universality.”

3

2

Israeli composers send

In other words a large amount of art music

and even pop music, that is played in Israel today could come from any country in the world.

Concert hall music programs in Israel are just the same as music the wide world, with programs that could be played the world over in any art music concert program. Hence the universal creativity spoken of by Heskes earlier, that inspires and influences Israeli composers today in the

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late 20th and early 21st century. The only sustained influences on Israeli music could be said to come from the Jewish festivals, the common cycle of human life and the Bible - that gives Israeli society a strong sense of cohesion and from this is the sustaining power of music in the lives of Israelis.

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Chapter 17 The Emancipation of Jews into European Musical Life We shall not step back a bit and look at Jewish Emancipation in European musical life. Jews started to come into the musical life of Europe after their assimilation during the 19th century.

There was nevertheless some hostility to Jews in Europe in spite of the liberal emancipation movement, that regarded Jews as intruders to European musical life.

The question of Jews in music was brought to focus by the musical periodical started by Robert Schulman “New Zeitschrift fur Musik.” Wagner, a leading anti-Semite, first wrote an article under the name of Karl Freigedank entitled ‘Jewry in Music’ in 1850; and later he enlarged this article under his own name in 1869. Wagner complained that his works receive a hostile reception in Germany and Paris due to the action of Jews - this was unfounded as Wagner never took the trouble to research the question thoroughly, and we can only acknowledge this as outright hostility - a surprising fact when we consider that quite possibly Wagner may have been half Jewish himself, if the true nature of his father was known. Wagner also attacked religious music of the synagogue saying it was undisciplined. He declared that Jews had a decremental affect on the life of music; Jews music making was, “indifferent and trivial, since all their bent for art was only song of a luxury, and unnecessary,” 1 Wagner wrote.

He further declared that Meyerbeer’s success was only because Meyerbeer could amuse audiences from boardroom, and that Mendelssohn lacked true creative powers because he was a Jew, but his success was as a result only because of his talent. There were others in the 19th century critics who also attacked Jews in music as it was a burning question to many artists at this time. However it should be pointed out that most Jews anyway did not accept the music of Mendelssohn, Meyerbeer and their kind as being Jewish music anyway, as most of these composers, although having Jewish roots had submerged themselves into the prevailing Gentile cultures.

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Jewish Composers since 1800 At this point we should mention a number of the more well known European and American composers who were Jewish, most of whom did not write overtly Jewish music, however of this number we may mention Bloch, Bernstein and Schoenberg who did make some attempt to write Jewish music in the 20th century. It is not an intention to give detailed biographies of these composers, but to pin point where and if any Jewish connections lay within their lives or in music. We shall also mention non Jewish composers who sought to write Jewish music and Jewish composers who wrote the lighter music of the Broadway musicals.

Elias Halevy (1799-1862) Halevy was a French composer who wrote operas including one called The Jewess, in 1835. He was born in Paris, the son of a Cantor and a teacher of Hebrew who was secretary of the Jewish community. He had a half French Jewish mother. His opera The Jewess was the cornerstone of the French Grand opera repertory for over 100 years - the opera was a apparently a really grand, grand opera with all the trimmings. Mahler said of the opera: "I am absolutely overwhelmed by this wonderful, majestic work. I regard it as one of the greatest operas ever created." Wagner also admired the work and it is reported that Wagner never showed his anti-semitic attitudes to Halevy that he showed to Mendelssohn and Meyerbeer. 2

Mendelssohn Mendelssohn was Jewish but raised as a Christian and Baptized a Christian Lutheran.

Mendelssohn’s grandfather was a very well known Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn.

How much Mendelssohn adhered to his Jewish faith is today still questionable by experts.

However he did write at least one major work we could call a statement of this Jewish faith the Oratorio Elijah - but he also wrote another oratorio St Paul which is clearly a strong Christian statement to his Lutheran faith. The truth is that Mendelssohn was probably both comfortable as a Jew and a Christian. 3

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Meyerbeer Meyerbeer’s parents were very wealthy and lived in Berlin and near to the Prussian Court. Upon the death of his grandfather Meyerbeer made a promise to his mother he would always live a Jew and throughout his life he never tired to hide his Jewishness, neither did he ever convert to the Christian religion, (like Mahler or Mendelssohn). He wrote several pieces for the Synagogue services and contributed to Zemirot Yisroel - an official French government commissioning of a definitive Jewish music for the Synagogue services. Meyerbeer helped Wagner get his first big break by encouraging the production of Rienzi and gave Wagner financial support. Later Wagner viciously and publicly attacked Meyerbeer in his ‘Jewry in Music’ essay - a diatribe against Jews in music and their “commercial approach to opera.” 4 Offenbach Jacques Offenbach was born in Cologne the son of a Jewish cantor and spent his student and adult life in Paris a successful composer of light operettas. Little can be found to any further association regarding his Jewishness, either in his music or personal life.

Schoenberg (1874-1951) Much can be said about Schoenberg and his adherence to his Jewishness. It has been said that, “No other composer of the twentieth century bears a closer relationship to Gustav Mahler.

Schoenberg was his creative son.” 5 (Like Schoenberg Mahler was also a Jew). Schoenberg was born in Vienna to a middle class Jewish family. His first success was Verklaerte Nacht in 1899 which was later conducted by Mahler in 1912. The two composers were good friend and when Mahler was conductor of the Vienna State Opera, Schoenberg was a frequent visitor to Mahler's house. Schoenberg moved from Vienna to Berlin where he taught at the Prussian Academy of Art. After the rise of Hitler he was dismissed shortly after which he visited Paris. In Paris he found he was unable to return to Germany. In Paris he visited a Synagogue and formally returned to his Jewish faith, after which he left for America where he finally settle in Los Angelus and had

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a busy life teaching in the University of Southern California, composing, teaching privately and painting.

Of Schoenberg’s Jewish music: Irene Heskes writes, “Schoenberg appears to have been a Jewish artist groping his way towards creative fulfillment.”

6

We may looks briefly at his Jewish

compositions and observe: Die Jacobsleiter (Jacob’s Ladder), Heskes further writes that Schoenberg is like Jacob who wrestled with the angel at Penuel (Genesis 32:31), here Schoenberg is trying to find his way through inspiration musically, intellectually, emotionally....”

7

Schoenberg’s main other Jewish works include: Kol Nidrey (1938), Prologue to the Book of

Genesis (1945), and a Surviver from Warsaw (1947) and some settings of the Psalms at the end of his life.

Mahler (1860-1911) “Gustaf Mahler typified this haunting shadow of a Jewish heritage.” 8 Although born in a village Bohemia, Mahler’s Jewish family moved early on to the town of Iglau Moravia, where his father kept an Inn. Mahler attended synagogue, as a youth and was well educated while young, for at that time the Hapsburg Empire was becoming more lenient to Jews.

After studying at the Vienna conservatory he followed the career of both conductor and composer. In 1895 he joined the Catholic church at the time of his application to be the conductor of the Court Opera, (Vienna State Opera) - a job he got and held for ten years. As he left the Cathedral in Vienna after being baptized a Christian he met a friend and remarked, “I have put on a new coat.”

Mahler is known for his 10 symphonies and various song cycles. His music is not overtly Jewish.

Mahler’s music has become very prominent in the second half of the 20th century as it has been championed by three leading conductors who pioneered its revival who also themselves were all Jews: Koussevitzky, Bruno Walter and Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein, also a Jew, has remarked in an interview that he, Bernstein, ...”can hear the Jewishness in Mahler’s music.”

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Mahler said of himself, as quotes by his wife Alma Mahler in her writings: “I am thrice a homeless man, a native of Bohemia among Austrians, an Austrian among Germans and a Jew among the peoples of the world.” 9 Bloch (1880-1959) Ernest Block was born to a Jewish family in Geneva, Switzerland, but spent most of his life teaching and composing in the USA. Bloch was quite successful in fusing Jewish elements into his music of a traditional character. Although many of his compositions are not Jewish in character there are many that are, among which we may mention: early works include settings of the Palms, an Israel Symphony (1912-19), Hebrew Rhapsody (1915-16), Schelomo A Hebraic Rhapsody; Ba’al Shem Suite, “From Jewish Life, Three Sketches: Prayer, Supplication and Jewish Song,” (1924). Abodah, a prayer was written for Yehudi Menuhin, (1929). In 1930-33 he wrote a successful Sacred Service for Synagogue worship entitled: Avodath ha-Kodesh for baritone, mixed choir, organ and orchestra which has been successful recored and sung in European synagogues and in the USA. Other Jewish oriented works of his in later years include Voice from the Wilderness (1936) and Suite Hebraique (1951).

Milhaud (1892-1974) Darius Milhaud was born in the South of France of a long line of Sephardic Jews who originally came from Italy. Darius Milhaud a leader in the French modern school.

Milhaud, Schoenberg and Bloch all taught for a time at the University of Souther California they were familiar with each other and each others music. Milhaud and Bloch first met in 1913 when Milhaud visited Bloch in Geneva and played Bloch’s Jewish Poems for voice and piano, also for a brief time Milhaud studied with Schoenberg; later Milhaud conducted the first performance of Schoenberg’s Pierre Lunaire and again several times again later. In 1940 Milhaud fled Hitler’s Europe and went to the USA. Milhaud said later he lost up to 20 relatives in the Holocaust. In 1947 he wrote a Sacred Service for synagogue use that was widely acclaimed using motives from his native Provence in Southern France. In 1952 Milhaud visited

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Israel and in the same year wrote his opera David and a cantata entitled A Miracle of Faith, and in 1961 he wrote a another cantata Bar Mitzvah setting words from his own Bar Mitzvah. 10

Bernstein (1918-1990) Bernstein was born to a Jewish middle class family in Massachusetts, USA became a very credible pianist at an early age and studied music at Harvard University, and composition and conducting at the Curtis Institute. He was a multi talented musician in many ways and held both a career as a conductor and a composer, and at the same time had considerable success as a Broadway musical composer. Irene Heskes writes, “The facts of Bernstein’s Jewish birth and active affiliation appear to have provided a significant background for most of his interests and endeavors. He had indeed became an important catalyst in Jewish musical affairs. 11 His rise to prominence came when another Jew, Bruno Walter, was sick one November afternoon in 1943 and Bernstein conducted an afternoon concert for Walter at the New York Philharmonic.

A Significant ‘Jewish’ events in Bernstein’s musical life came in 1946 at Carnage Hall where he conducted Block’s Three Jewish Poems. A little earlier Bernstein had written and performed a service for the Sabbath evening prayer, Hashkivenu, for Park Avenue Synagog in New York. In the concentration camp at Dachau he performed a concert on a broken upright piano to a group that included 17 former inmates of Dachau.

Bernstein was a prominent supporter of the new state of Israel and visited it for the first time in 1947, when he made a tour and was very successful received among the younger musicians, he returned to Israel many times over the years. He helped start the music department at Brandeis University near Boston in 1949 where today 55% of the students are Jews. His Jeremiah symphony dates from 1941 and his Chichester Psalms from 1965. He wrote six major musicals and contributed to others. At one point he was regarded as a new Gershwin (also a Jew), and alined musically to another Jew Kurt Weill of the Three Penny Opera fame. To his regret he never managed to write a hit in the manner of George Gershwin. He was interested in Jewish matters all his life, and had a profound appreciation of Gustaf Mahler’s music and his recordings

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were very significant in the re-emergence of this, also Jewish composer’s works, who like Bernstein, Mahler had also once been the conductor of the New York Philharmonic 1909-1911.

Sergi Slominsky (b. 1932 - ) My purpose in writing about Russian composer, pianist and musicologist Sergi Slominsky is firstly to take him as a representative Jewish musician of today working in Russia where there are still a host of Russian Jewish musicians working as teachers of music in various degrees of attainment. He also was my composition teacher at the St Petersburg conservatory in the years 2000 and 2001, where I did a post graduate certificate in music composition under his tutorage.

Slominsky is a professor of composition at the St Petersburg Conservatoire in St Petersburg Russia, and was first a student there entering the conservatoire in 1950. Slonimsky has composed a mass of music, 32 symphonies 5 major operas, 2 ballets and has worked in all genres of chamber, vocal choral and theatre and cinema music. Not only has he written so much, he has had it all performed - not an easy task for most composers - though easier in Russia than the West! He also wrote in a very short period of days, I understood from a friend, 24 preludes and fugues for piano in all major and minor keys. He has composer in all forms of notations and major styles of music.

Jewish sympathies? I can find very little, and this is typical of many Jewish musicians in Russia who ignoring their Jewish roots or suppressing them out of fear of persecution or a backlash of failed promotions. Shostakovich (a Russian) was much more overtly sympathetic to Jewish causes than I suspect often many Jewish musicians in Russia are. Shostakovich boldly set the poems of Yevgeny Yevtushenko that were written in memory of the Babi Yar massacre in Kiev by the Nazi’s, in his symphony no 13 in 1962. (In Kiev in 1941, 33,700 Jews were massacred in a 48 hour period and a total of 100,000 - 150,000 in total were massacred by the Nazi’s in Kiev).

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A Personal Anecdote that speaks volumes!

While a student of Professor Slominsky in St Petersburg (2000-2001), I had a Jewish student friend, named Karol, who was from Israel who was also a composition student of Slominsky’s.

Karol’s parents having immigrated to Israel from St Petersburg at least 15 year earlier. Karol Volansky by name, who is now Dr Karol Volansky and a member of the teaching staff in the Rubin Academy in Jerusalem. Karol went to school in Israel, knows Russian, Hebrew and English and did his first degree at the Rubin Academy, Jerusalem.

Back in 2001, I think it was, Professor Slominsky had a birthday concert of his music in the Capella Concert Hall in St Petersburg which I and Karol attended. After the concert there was a reception for Slominsky and his composer colleges from the St Petersburg Conservatory. Karol, being fluent in Russian attended the reception. Karol told me afterwards of an incident, which for him a Jew coming from Israel was very strange. Professor Slominsky proposed a toast during the reception, “to Russian Music!” ...at which all his Jewish colleges from the Conservator drank too! This incident typifies the Jewish musician in Russia, hiding their Jewishness, mostly out of fear I believe. Perhaps when we understand a little of how many thousands of Jews disappeared in the Russian GULAG we can understand - nevertheless for my Jewish friend Karol, coming from Israel, and being of a different generation - it all appeared very strange!

And more and more...

The list of Jewish musicians goes on and on - here are a few more modern ones, but no space to talk about them: Aaron Cropland, Daniel Barenboim, Arthur Fiedler, Asher Fisch, Otto Klemperer, James Levine Hermann Levi, Lorin Maazel, Eugene Ormandy, Fritz Reiner, Sir Geroge Solti, George Szell, Steve Reich, Morton Feldman., Fritz Kreisler, Nicholas Slonimsky....and the list goes on and on....

Non Jewish composers who wrote Jewish Music Briefly we may mention that both Maurice Ravel wrote a setting of the Jewish Kaddisch, and Max Bruch wrote a setting for cello and orchestra of the Kol Ndrei the Jewish prayer of

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repentance for the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur). Bruch also wrote a cycle of Hebrew songs for choir and orchestra entitled Henraeische. Sergei Prokofiev wrote an Overture on Hebrew Themes and also arranged Jewish folk songs for clarinet, piano and string quartet.

Jewish Composers of Broadway Musicals and Hollywood Finally we shall mention briefly some of the more prominent Jewish composers of musical theatre without saying not too much about them as space is short: Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, George Gershwin, Richard Rogers, Elmer Bernstein, Bob Dylan, Stephen Sondheim...

Jews are every where in Music. Why is this?

This is easy to answer if we turn to the Bible which gives us the answer. When Leah the wife of Jacob gave birth to Jacob’s fourth son Leah said: "This time I will praise the Lord." So she named him Judah... (Genesis 29:35). Judah means ‘praise’ - and we praise God not only with our voices but with instruments. God says, For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” (Romans 11:29). Meaning once God gives a gift He does not withdraw it - so the descendants of Judah manifest to a greater degree than most the gift of praise, and when this in put in a secular setting it produces secular musicians - which largely most Jewish professional musician are in the world today who are not religious in any way.

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PART 6 Jewish Music of the Holocaust Chapter 18 Holocaust Composers and Musicians Introduction: Brief Overview of Music Under the Nazis German music, composers and musicians were the foremost in the world and a great symbol of German pride. The Nazis, after they came to power sought to make capital out of this to their advantage.

During the 1920’s and 1930’s many new avant-guard practices were on the musical scene, together with swing, jazz, and the rise of African-American musicians; not to mention that a large proportion of leading musicians were Jews, especially in Germany. Experimental music, the avant-guard music scene, and the influence of Jews in German music came under fire from the Nazi party, (and German conservative nationalists), who saw these influences as foreign, decadent, and superficial counters to German pride, German music and German interests. Music the Nazi’s also saw, as a German prerogative of her greatness, and needed to be made ‘pure,’ from foreign and Jewish influence. Not only this, the Nazi party needed also to use music and the arts to influence and seduce the masses. These things coupled with Germany’s humiliation in the 1st World War defeat, her woful economic and social situation in the 1920’s and early1930’s led to the Nazi party to seeking to rid the world music of ‘decadent’ influences. 1 After Hitler was appointed Chancellor in 1933; the Nazi parties' ‘Combat League for German Culture’ started to cause disruption in the concerts of Jewish musicians, declaring Jewish music un-German; violence was threatened against Jewish musicians and artists. In April 1933 the Law of Re-Establishment of the Civil Service was introduced and all Jewish artists and musicians employed by the State were dismissed, conductors, instrumental players in orchestras and music

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teachers and those in administration. Arnold Schoenberg and Franze Schreker were dismissed from the Prussian Academy of Art. The German people made little protest at the dismissal of Jewish musicians, though a half-heated exception was the conductor Furtwanger who wrote an open letter of Goebbels decrying the parting of good Jewish players from orchestras who no doubt would be replaced by players of lesser merit. Furtwanger also made pleas on behalf of Hans Gal who was dismissed from the Directorship of the Mainz Academy in 1933.

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Many

Jews fled Nazi German going either to the UK, USA or Palestine.

Unemployed Jewish artists and musician petitioned the Nazi government and in mid 1933 the Jewish Cultural League was set up - for Jewish only performances. Ariyan status, was now the only status for official employment as a musician; and adherence to the Nazi ethic, if not the party itself, so musicians of less ability started to fill the ranks of orchestras, and teaching establishments where Jewish musicians, often of a higher caliber, previously played and taught.

With the banning of works by Jewish composers the musical landscape of Germany was radically changed in the 1930’s. By 1935 both half-Jews and those married to Jews, and blacks, were victimized, later Jewish musicians in the publishing and media world lost their jobs; by this time thousands of Jews of all descriptions had lost jobs in Germany, had been persecuted and put in prison. 3 Music was an important agent the Nazi’s used to reach the hearts of the people and willing composes now produced marches and light music to entertain the crowds at Nazi party rallies and meetings. Hitler’s SS and youth had their music bands, and song books were printed for the soldiers to sing, while out of while on the front fighting to lift their spirits. Many concentration camps had their own orchestras and concerts and musical cultural events; and music was even used while prisoners were being tortured in some cases.

What was ‘Degenerate music’ Music?

Even the Nazi’s found this difficult to define and its definition fluctuated during the Third Rich.

In 1938 an exhibition of Degenerate Music was held but this proved to back fire on its self as many came to hear the foreign popular music. For the Germans to rid themselves of degenerate

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music it meant dealing with facts like what to do with Schumann and Schubert's setting of Jewish Heinrich Hein’s poetry or how to deal with the popularity of Mozart’s settings of a Jewish librettists words or Handle’s setting of Old Testament Texts in the Messiah, or how to deal with the popularity of Mendelssohn’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ 4 Mostly for which the Nazi’s had no convincing answer.

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Chapter 19 Jewish Musical Life During the Holocaust This is a very big subject and in this thesis I only proposed to outline some of the major areas.

Much research has been done in recent years into Holocaust music and more is, and needs to done. Holocaust music refers mainly to music composed during the Second World War, written, played and sung in ghettos, concentration camps and in partisan groups.1 The main, and today most well known ghettos, where Holocaust music was composed, played and sung include: Theresienstadt, Kovno, Krkow, Lodz, Warsar, Riga and Vilna. Holocaust music also thrived to some degree in concentration camps such as: Dauchau, Blergen-Belsen, Dora-Mittlebau, Ravensbruck, Sachsehausan, Auschwitz, Belzec, Birkenau, Majdanek and Treblinka and a number of others also. Songs were also composed and sung among partisan groups in various European countries during the war years. 2. Yet another area of study is that of Jewish composers in exile, like for example, Schoenberg who fled to the USA. I will just write about one, the most famous of the concentration camps where such music composed, played and sung: Terezin in the Check town of Theresienstadt.

Music in the Ghettos : Theresienstadt (Terezin)

The mention today of Czechoslovakia and a camp named, ‘Theresienstadt’ (Terezin) - officially a Ghetto - immediately makes us think of the music of the Holocaust for which it has become the most famous, (or infamous!). Of all the Holocaust camps Terezin had the most developed musical life. Terezin was a camp mostly for older people, intellectuals and artists, among whom were a high proportion of musicians. It was mostly for propaganda purposes that Terezin became a so-called SS ‘show-camp;’ and musicians were allowed to have instruments and form orchestras and hold regular concerts, which in fact were of high artistic metic due to the quality of musicians in the camp, professionals and non - professionals alike.

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Theresienstadt before the war, though a small town, had very high proportion of musicians and musical activities; there were choirs, theaters, orchestras both classical and modern, cabaret groups; and the composer Viktor Ulmann (who later died in Auschwitz) opened a Studio for Modern Music. The works of Brahms, Beethoven, Mozart, Janacek, Suk and the more popular operas were performed in the town. Most of these musicians from the town itself ended up in the Terezin ghetto and were deported and died in the Holocaust.

A Children’s Opera Produced in Terezin: The composer Hans Krasa composed a Children's opera entitled Brundibar,

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in which child

prisoners played and sung in 1943. The story centers around a fairytale and a parentless boy and girl who seek to sing to make some money on the street. The opera was originally written in 1938 and rehearsed, but never fully performed; by 1943 these same children were prisoners with their parents in Terezin and a first performance was accomplished. Krasa was able to complete the score partly by memory and some notes he had; the ‘orchestra’ consisted of a piano, flute, clarinet, guitar, accordion four violins, a cello and double bass. Back drops were painted and it was shown over 55 times in Terezin.

A Red Cross Visit to Terezin On one well known occasion in June 1944 the Red Cross visited the camp - but according to the well known testimony of pianist Alice Sommer Hertz 4, (who spent 2 years in the camps with here little son), the Red Cross got little feel of the real Terezin, which was hidden from the Red Cross by the SS officers.

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The Red Cross visitors also saw a performance of the Children’s

opera, Brundibar. In late 1944 an SS propaganda documentary film was made of the camp entitled: “A Documentary Film of the Settlement Area,” giving an entirely false impression of a life in the camp; where most inmates were hard put to survive each day, food being so scarce, were punished often, and where ultimately most were deported to the death camps. In September and October 1944 transports took to Auschwitz 18,400 inmates to their death including the musicians, Pavel Haas, Hans Krasa, Gieon Klein, Ilse Weber, Vikton Ullmann and Leo Strauss (son of Oskar Strauss).

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Oratorio Terezin: Ruth Fazal, a British violinist and composer, who lives in Canada, read the book “I never saw another Butterfly,” a collection of art work and poems by children of the Terezin camp. After several years of this book sitting on her book shelf she took it down and felt what she calls, ‘a divine commission,’ to write a oratorio around the poetry and art of these young children in the Terezin camp. The oratorio also used Hebrew from the Old Testament and explores the concept and question: ”Were was God in this tragedy?” Fazal’s answer was that, “God is nearer than you know.” Suffering is part of human existence - “we can either chose to walk through those dark times either with Him or without Him,” (meaning God). She further found that deep down many of the survivors felt, “God was looking after things.” 5.

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Chapter 20 A Question of Balance? 1 There is some little controversy around Holocaust Music, that would be good to address briefly in this thesis, which is of some importance in case we get our interest in Holocaust music out of balance, which some possibly have? I am referring to the importance of being balanced in a right minded way to the suffering that these musicians, and indeed all Jews of the Holocaust, and the music world’s interest in the holocaust music today. The Holocaust destroyed early attempts to build a Jewish school of modern ‘classical’ music driving many composers into exile, which is sad no doubt.

Finding of lost and forgotten music always brings some excitement and interest. (Take for example the finding, and the first performance by Mendellsshon, of Bach’s St Matthew Passion, or Schumann, who is said to have found Schubert’s Great C Major symphony when he visited Schubert’s brother, some years after Schubert’s dead. Schubert’s brother is said to have had the symphony lying around in his Attic, or take the finding some years ago of a youthful symphony

by Edward Grieg).

However using Holocaust music as a genuine focus for the suffering of the Holocaust and specially for Jewish musicians may be possibly, in its self, a good thing. The question we ask, with the rising interest in this music, is are we sometimes asking people to surrender their true artistic judgment to a humanitarian or political ideal? Though much Holocaust music may be great music, not all Holocaust music may be of a high standard - interesting as it may be from a historical perspective that it casts light on the suffering of Jewish composers in that defined historical period. As James Loeffler asks in his July 2013 article in Tablet Magazine entitled: Why the New ‘Holocaust Music’ Is an Insult to Music—and to Victims of the Shoah. He asks are we “turning Jewish composers into shadow images defined only by their status as Hitler’s victims?” I sincerely hope not - but the question remains!

James Loeffler also asks is “...the never-ending search for ways to remember the Holocaust, the newest media contrivance to appear is “Holocaust Music.” 2 To quote James Loeffler further:

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“Now, by labeling certain works of art as “Holocaust music,” we risk creating a genre that turns the details of history and the complex meanings of music into one saccharine lesson in universalist tolerance. It may sound like heresy to criticize a pious act of Holocaust remembrance. But the true heresy is to turn Jewish composers into shadow images defined only by their status as Hitler’s victims,” 3.

Further again James Loeffler draws our attention to two recent Holocaust Music projects which he regards as very questionable: Firstly what is known at the Defiant Requiem.

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This is a traveling review, that has travelled

internationally and also been performed in New York’s Lincoln Centre, that replays Verdi's Requiem more or less as it was performed in the 16 performances it had in Terezin, by inmates between 1942-45. Although it was only performed with a piano in Terezin this review uses an orchestra, train whistles, narration and film images and other ‘stage tricks,’ and in some performances singers are dressed in striped prison clothing, (which was not worn by the prisoners in the Terezin performances). A good number of Terezin prisoners we understand at the time of the Terezin performances complained about the staging of Catholic Christian work representing Jewish music - particularly when performed and applauded by members of the SS elite at concerts, at which on one occasion even Adolf Eichmann was present.

Secondly Loeffler draws attention to the Italian conductor Lotoro’s project to record all the music composed in Holocaust camps - whether musical gems or items possibly of less musical worth - (to put it bluntly!); at least 24 CD’s have been produce so far. This project by the company know as KZ-MUSIK, 5 is supported by money from the European Union. Loeffler asks the question: do “they imagine the music to contain a pre-set, generic Holocaust message that can be activated through performance and listening.?” 6 Is is right that holocaust music is to become so established, a self-contained genre itself, that has little regard for the true musical worth of many works, and putting this aside for the sake of elevating music that was produced under the most horrific music suffering, by a vast majority of whom died in the Holocaust, for a kind of political-correctness in the remembrance of the Shoah. Are we making this music into some kind of idol, which its composers would never have intended or wanted it to be?” 7

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To quote Loeffler one final time, do, “they imagine the music to contain a pre-set, generic Holocaust message that can be activated through performance and listening?� 8 Without making any personal judgment, I find this food for thought.

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Chapter 21 Musicians in Exile from the Nazis 1 As the 1930’s progressed and the influence of the anti-semitic laws passed in Germany started to deprive Jewish musicians of the rite to work, more and more musicians were forced to think of exile in another county. The United Kingdom, United States and Palestine were the most popular places to flee. At first many were unsure how things would progress after Hitler came to power in 1933 - but by the end of this year most Jewish musicians had lost their jobs, and as composers royalties started to dry up, and the thought of leaving Germany became a pressing issue, as things were only getting worse. Many who did not flee ended their lives unfortunately in the gas chambers of the Holocaust. To stay and submit might mean having to wrote music to bolster the prestige and pride of the Nazi's for their political rallies and defile their consciences.

Musicians who left Nazi Germany: Of the notable composers and musicians who fled we may mention: Schoenberg, Hindemith, Berthold Goldschmidt, Ernst Krenek, Eric Korngold, Han Gal, Paul Ben-Hain, Walter Braunfels and Mieczslaw Weinberg, Bruno Walter, Ernest Toch - but a host of others of lesser public distinction also fled Nazism. Bartok, though not a Jew also fled the Nazi’s. (Stravinsky also arrived in the Uniter States in 1939 - more for economic reason than fleeing the Nazis - though this must have been an issue also). I shall for the lack of space write on just three: Bruno Walter (1872-1962) Bruno Walter was born to a middle class Jewish family in Berlin and became a conductor, and early in his career worked in the Hamburg Opera where he met Gustaf Mahler, who became friends with, and became later in life strongly identified as a conductor of with Mahler’s music.

Walter had a number of appointments as conductor of European orchestras, and from 1929-1933 he was conductor of the Leipzig Gerwandhaus Orchestra. Hitler on speaking about Jewish

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musicians in Germany personally criticized Walter by name, and in 1933 the Police in Leipzig threatened to close a concert a Leipzig Gerwandhaus concert if Bruno Walter conducted, and Walter had to leave the theatre. Walter was scheduled to conduct the Berlin Philharmonic a little later, but Joseph Goebbels threatened “unpleasant demonstrations” at the concert if Walter conducted. Walter stepped down from conducting the concert and Richard Strauss conducted.

Walter later declared: "The composer "A Hero's Life" actually declared himself ready to conduct in place of a forcibly removed colleague."

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Walter then took his family to Vienna for several

years where became the Artistic Director of the Vienna State Opera (a position Mahler had formally held, and where Walter had been assistant to Mahler in 1901, when it was called the Court Opera). During his time in Vienna Walter also made appearances conducting the Vienna Philharmonic and at the Salzburg Festival.

Walter had also visited and conducted the New York Philharmonic in 1932 and 1936. When Hitler went into Austria in 1938, Walter was in France at the time, France offered him Walter citizenship, which he took, and later he went to the US in 1939 settling in California. During his time in America he conducted many of the well known US orchestras and became the conductor of the New York Philharmonic in 1947, he also made many conducing trips back to Europe and was a regular visiter to Edinburgh Festival in the years after the war.

As a side note, after the death of his Jewish friend Mahler, Mahler’s widow asked Walter to conduct the first performances of Mahler’ song cycle Das Lied von der Erde and the 9th Symphony; which Mahler himself had been unable to conduct.

Paul Ben-Hain (1897-1984): Ben-Hain left Germany in 1933 for Palestine and settled in Tel Aviv where taught at the Shulamit Conservatoire of Music in Jaffa. In Germany in the 1920’s he had studied composition with Friedrich Klose and had been assistant conductor to Bruno Walter. As a Jew who returned to Palestine, that later became the national homeland of the Jews, Israel, he, I believe, should be admired, as from this vantage point he contributed to the real building up of a Jewish national music in the homeland of Israel. As well as teaching in Israel he also composed: compositions

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include works for solo, chamber works, orchestra and choir. He became an Israeli citizen in 1948.

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It could be said that he produced, “a national school of Eastern Mediterranean

sounds...with a mix of Jewish ghetto, sacred music and a touch of impressionism and Bauhaus Functionalism.” 4

Han Gal: (d. 1987) Gal was born to to Jewish family near Vienna and after his studentship, and early success as a composer, he first taught at the New Vienna Conservatory and later was the Director of the Minz Conservatory. After Hitler came to power and Jews were repressed, he was dismissed from the Minz Directorship and forced to leave Germany. He came the Britain and taught at the University of Edinburgh for many years. When war with Germany broke out he was interned as an enemy alien for a short time, but as he posed no real threat to Britain was released. His early music is much influenced by his early studies of Brahms and the Austro-Germany tradition later works were more polyphonic and developed in an individual style. Michael Haas writes in Forbidden Music: Jewish Composers Banned by the Nazis, concerning Gal’s style: Gal...was conventional without being derivative and he could never be accused of banality or empty sentimentality - he was no nostalgic. Gal...took the view modern music should grow organically out of the nineteenth century while retaining classical integrity...” 5 Gal wrote operas, chamber works and orchestral works. He died in Edinburgh in 1987 at the age of 97. 6

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Chapter 22 Musicians who stayed in Nazi Germany 1 There were also musicians of good standing with the public who chose to stay, and in many ways they compromised their music careers, and standing with the public, that left a lasting bad taste in the mouth of the musical public long after they were re-instated after the war. Of these we may mention just: Herbert von Karajan: Karajan, was early his career became a member of the Nazi party to further his career - he was forgiven (perhaps that is the right word?) in 1947 and allowed to conduct again after short ban. 2 Richard Strauss: Not all these were sympathetic with the Nazi’s, and Strauss, although he became president of the Reich Music Chamber did it for purely musical reasons and was largely but secretly in sympathy with the Jews, having a Jewish librettist, a Jewish daughter in law and he also refused to dismiss Jewish musicians from orchestras, finally he was fired by Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda from his post at the Reich Music Chamber in 1935. Goebbels called Strauss’ music anti-German.

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William Furtwangler: Although not Jew, Furtwangler was critical of the Nazi’s during their reign of terror towards Jews in Germany, but the Nazi’s, afraid he would leave Germany, persuaded him to stay as he was the leading Germany conductor of the time - this he did - but in the end it caused much controversy as to where his true sympathies lay, (and perhaps in this respect it might have gone better for him if he had left Germany) - even to day, it is not clear were his sympathies truly stood. 4

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Others who chose to stay in Germany included the composer Hans Pfitzner and the conductor Clements Krauss.

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PART 7 Messianic Music Chapter 23 The Messianic Movement and Music The term ‘Messianic’ has the meaning; ‘of the Messiah,’ and is the term by which Jewish believers in Jesus Christ are referred to today.

In this section I propose to say first a little about the Messianic Movement, as in the Britain this is not so prevalent as in the United States; and also, as I have been a member of two Messianic Congregations in the United States in the last three years: Brit Hadasha (New Covenant) Congregation in Buffalo, New York State, and O Ha Olam, (The Light of the World) Congregation in Kansas City. It should be noted that both these congregations, and all Messianic congregations are composed of both Jews and Gentile believers in Jesus, which is common to the Messianic movement.

In Brief: Jewish Movements in Christian History: The history of the modern Messianic movement goes back as far the 19th and 20th centuries when a number of attempts were made by Jewish believers to have a form of Christian worship that incorporated aspects of specifically Jewish culture and tradition. One of the the first, if not the first of these, was the Church’s Ministry Among the Jewish People (CMJ), which traces it founding to 1809, and in 1849 CMJ established the first protestant church in Jerusalem, Christ Church at the Jaffa Gate; CMJ was also the first with a global vision for reaching Jews.

Among other early pioneers in ministry to Jewish believers in Jesus was Joseph Rabinowitz, who in the Ukraine initiated, ‘The Israelites of the New Covenant’ in 1884, seeking to maintain a culturally Jewish lifestyle in Christian practice, and who wrote an order of worship for the Sabbath morning containing elements of both Christian and Jewish transitions. In the United

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States in 1885 the first Jewish Christian congregation was formed; and in 1894 Leopold Cohen, a Jewish Baptist minister, founded the Brownsville Mission to the Jews in Brooklyn, NY, which is still in existence today under the name ‘Chosen People Ministries.‘ Growth in missions to the Jews continued during the first half of the 20th century with various groups sending missionaries to Palestine and establishing medical, evangelical and humanitarian works. The southern Baptists of the US adopted the term ‘Messianic’ indicating Jews who had converted to the Protestant Branch of Christianity during the 1940’s.

The Modern Messianic Movement The modern Messianic Movement that started in the 1960’s and 1970’s comes largely out of the Jesus Movement in the United States, where a large percentage of its early Jewish leaders came to Christ. This newer Jewish Messianic movement rejected the older form of thinking of the Hebrew Christian movements and desired to embrace a newer charismatic evangelism. Martin Chernoff who was president of the Hebrew Christian Alliance of America (1971-75), moved to change the name to the Messianic Christian Alliance of America (MCAA); this signified much more than a change of name, a change of identity and thinking where by Messianic Jews worship became a type of mainstream for Jewish expression of Jesus as their Messiah. Today this Messianic movement sees itself largely as a direct inheritor of the earliest form of Christian expression, from the 1st to 3rd centuries CE, when Jewish and Gentiles worshiped together. This first ‘messianic’ church that lasted from the time of the apostles until its breakup around 300 CE, when Rome embraced a Christian ‘conversion.’ 1 Israeli Messianic Congregations At this time of writing (2014) there about 130 Messianic congregations in Israel, where as in 1960 there where hardly any, if in fact a single one. Today some of the most well known ones might include King of Kings in Jerusalem, Kehilat Ha Carmel and Tents of Mercy in Haifa, Penuel Congregation and Mornign Star in Tiberias.

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Messianic Worship Music Messianic worship music differs somewhat from contemporary and traditional protestant evangelical worship music in a number of ways. The name of Jesus is most often referred to by the Hebrew name ‘Yeshua;’ and much worship music has references to what might be referred to as traditional phrases from religious synagogue worship, spliced in with messianic hope, Israel’s role in history, Israeli songs and dance rhythms of a particularly Israeli character, together with a traditional evangelical faith. Hebrew phrases ofter occur, and in most Messianic congregations words both in Hebrew and English as they appear on the overheads.

There are a significant number of Jewish Messianic music artists who regularly produce worship music available on DC’s and DVD’s and who are often also worship leaders in Israeli Congregations or who are itinerate traveling artists. Messianic music comes with various influences, depending on the locations of the congregation and the divers collection of backgrounds, including Ashkenazim influences (basically those who came from Europe), Shephardim influences (those identified with a Spanish/Portuguese background), and what would be called middle-east sounds from the Mizrahim Jews.

We will now explore a small number of the most well known of these Messianic artists:

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Chapter 24 Messianic Jewish Musicians (i) Maurice Sklar (violinist) 1 Maurice Sklar was born of Russian-Jewish parents in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is perhaps the most prestigious Messianic Music artist today creating music of the highest professional standard in his recordings. He is a violinist of the world class order having trained for an international soloist career from an early age finishing his musical education at Juilliard School of Music, New York, and the Curtis Institute of Music.

In 1990 he was chosen by Musical America as Young artist of the Year, and for 13 years he was artist in residence and professor of violin at the Oral Roberts University in Tulsa and associate concertmaster of the Tulsa Philharmonic. Maurice Sklar has appeared with many orchestras around the world. He earned a doctorate degree in 1997 from Word of Truth Seminary in Hunstville, Alabama, for his ministry work in the revival of the Holy Spirit, and for returning classical music to the Church.

While pursuing an international soloist career he has also however chosen to work in the Messianic Music scene where to a large degree he fulfills his Jewish identity and belief in his Jewish Messiah, ‘Yeshua.’ He has ministered with some of the major ministries in the Protestant world scene today including: Benny Hinn, Maurice Celullo, Pat Robinson and John Osteen.

Maurice Sklar he is also known as a strong teacher of the Word of God in the prophetic.

Some of his recordings include: We Shall Behold Him, El Shaddai, O Come Emanuel and Sing Hallelujah.

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Chapter 25 Messianic Jewish Musicians (ii) Paul Wilber 1 Paul Wilber today is one of the foremost Messianic Music concert ministries in the world. But it was not always like that. His early ambition was to be an opera tenor and Richard Tucker was his idol in this regard. Wilber studied singing at Indiana University and then in Milan, Italy from some of the top Italian singing teachers. He was brought up in a Jewish home and his public singing was first in the Jewish Temple in downtown, Cleveland, Ohio.

A girl friend took Paul to a church one day where he met a young man Jerry Williams whose testimony and friendship changed his life for ever - on a later meeting with Jerry, Paul Wilber came to know his Jewish Messiah, as Jesus, and became a believer in Jesus. Following marriage, Paul and his wife moved to a small Messianic Congregation in Washington DC. Paul spent a number of years doing odd jobs, to pay the bills, while pursuing a music career with a worship group during which time he recorded several albums for the Maranatha Music label.

In 1994 the Lord spoke to Paul, as he recalls: “...ask of me and I will give you the nations.” After an intense period of fasting, prayer and soul searching Paul and his wife gave up local ministry to go to the nations. An opportunity came almost immediately from Musician Don Moen of Integrity music, to do a project in the land of Israel and his was followed by a tour in the Philippians - Paul Wilber’s new ministry had started. Paul’s concert ministry today leads people into the presence and joy of God through worship and teaching of the Word of God, for, as he says, “The Lord inhabits the praises of His people,...” (Ps. 22:3). Today Paul sees his ministry which is now world wide as bridging a gap between the Jewish and Christian communities. The ministry also has a practical ministry side in providing medical aid, market place teaching to the business community. The ministry is cross cultural, and multilingual from South America to the Middle and Far East. 2

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Some of his recording include: Desert Rain, Shalom Jerusalem, Lion of Judah, Jerusalem Arise (DVD) - the last three were recorded live in Jerusalem

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Chapter 26 Messianic Jewish Musicians (iii) Joel Chernoff 1 Joel Chernoff is the son of Martin Chernoff a former president of the Messianic Christian Alliance of America, and as such, from the 1960’s when he was a young man, Joel saw from first hand the birthing of the modern Messianic movement in America.

Joel Chernoff was one of the earliest pioneers of the Messianic music movement and was, and is still, the leader singer and songwriter for the very successful Messianic Group ‘Lamb.’ Many of his recordings have reached the top 10 in the religious recording charts and over 600,000 copies have been sold of the 14 recording he has produced to date. He has worked recently with the Galilee of the Nations

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label and released two new albums: Restoration of Israel and Come

Dance with Me. An older recording entitled The Sacrifice was released also.

Joel Chernoff serves today as the President of the International Messianic Jewish Alliance and chairman of the Messianic Jewish Alliance of America.

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Chapter 27 Messianic Jewish Musicians (iv) Karen Davis Karen Davis together with her husband Pastor David Davis are founders of the Carmel Assembly in Haifa. Karen is the worship leader of the Congregation, which is built on Mount Carmel in Haifa, on land give them by the Church’s Ministry Among the Jews (CMJ) in 1991. Karen Davis was born in Detroit and raise in a reformed Jewish family. She came to New York as a young women searching for the truth in New Age and elsewhere, but eventually met a woman who prayed with her and introduced her to her Jewish Messiah, Jesus. She later married David Davis, a former professor of drama in New York, and who was became ordained from World Challenge, David Wilkerson’s ministry in NY, before their move to Israel in 1989. 1 Today Karen is known as one of the greatest Messianic music artist, songwriter and instrumentalist. Her music is a unique blend of styles. Jewish people have returned from the four corners of the earth, there are European Jews with a classical culture, Latin American Jews, Middle Eastern Jews, and people like her self who grew up with Motown and Rhyme and Blues (her brother in NY is a Jazz musician). Karen has in her music group in Mount Carmel Assembly three Arab musicians. Karen also makes use of Middle Eastern instruments together with western orchestral sounds, a blend of many rhythms and languages together; her heart is to bring glory and uplift the name of Yeshua. Her albums are often recorded in the Holy Land and many by Galilee of the Nations label.

Karan and her husband have lived through several wars in Israel and her album Songs in the Night was birthed largely out of their experiences of being huddled in shelters while rocket attacks came on the city of Haifa. 2 Some of her recent recordings include: Songs in the Night (2011), The Lord Roars From Zion: Song of the Warrior Bride (2009), Sar Shalom: Breakthrough from the Land of Israel (2003), Yeshua (2001).

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Chapter 28 Messianic Jewish Musicians (v) Barry and Batya Segal

Barry and Batuya Segal have a heart for both Israel and the Nations. Batuya is one of the leading Messianic songwriters today, both in Hebrew an English, and together they have a number of very successful well known albums and they have contributed to other combination albums of Messianic Music. There ministry embraces teaching the Word of God on Israel and a humanitarian project known as Joseph’s Store House supplying clothes and domestic necessities to the needy, poor immigrants and children in Israel. There latest recording entitled, Go Through the Gates has a strong ethnic sound. 1 The Segal’s live on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Barry plays a style of guitar called mizrahi which is a combination of Middle Eastern tradition sounds and modern world music.

Two of their latest album are: Shema Yisrael and Go Through the Gates

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Chapter 29 Messianic Jewish Musicians (vi) Merve and Merla Watson 1 Merv and Merla Watson, although Gentiles, have done so much in Messianic music. They have been pioneers in the Messianic music movement form its inception in the 1960’s and 1970’s, in fact they we could almost say, (like Joel Chernoff), they were the beginning of the modern Messianic music movement!

Both are international highly acclaimed professional arts coming from Canada; Merla a violinist, violist, arranger and songwriter, and Merve proficient in many instruments, and a conductor.

Both have worked as music teachers, and also teach seminars on worship and the Word of God, particularly in things concerning Israel. They were the first to use Hebrew in their songs and they have lived in Israel, just outside Jerusalem for many years. Merva has also functioned the Head of the Music Department in the Anglican School in Jerusalem for a time.

In their early days in the later 1960’s and 1970’ they held and led weekly meetings in Toronto Cathedral Catacombs for 2/3000 young people, as many as 2000 were baptized and committed themselves to the Lord, (among them the evangelist Benny Hinn). They have ministered in over 50 countries, and were instrumental in the early formation of the International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem (ICEJ) and directed the early ICEJ Tabernacles Festivals in Jerusalem. Merla has a string quartet, Serenata that functions both in Israel and Canada, when they are there in their second home, back in Canada. They also operate a guest house just outside Jerusalem, (were I have also been a guest). They have also been asked over the years to produce and lead Biblical Feasts in several countries.

Some works written by them: Merla has written over 500 (mostly published) songs available as a pdf download on her website, 2 (she has written over 1,000 in fact - she had many packed away, this she told me when I was a guest in their house in 2013). Her songs include such Messianic

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standards as: Jehovah Jireh, Awake-O Israel, Then Shall the Virgin Rejoice, He That Keepeth Israel, Blessed Is He Who Comes, etc. Other Albums include: Musaica (a joint program with their musically gifted children: Elana and Ariel.

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Chapter 30 Conclusion and Final Summation: ‘What is true Jewish music?’

In conclusion to this brief survey of Jewish music, we have taken a bird’s eye view of the history and development of Jewish music from the period David’s Tabernacle (Tent) in Jerusalem roughly 1000BCE, passing though the establishment of the synagogue system during the Babylonian Captivity (c 586 - 516 BCE) and the later development of synagogue music in the 19th and 20th centuries; Jewish music of Europe in the Middle Ages and the 18th to early 20th centuries; the early development of folk music in the Pale Settlement areas of Eastern Europe; music during the early waves of aliyah in Palestine, from the first aliyah wave in 1882 to 1939; mentioning also middle Eastern music; the continuing development and search for an authentic Jewish music, post 1947, after the modern State of Israel was born; looking also at Holocaust music and the music of the modern Messianic movement. A whole gambit of Jewish music infused with influences from many Gentile sources: be it the Russian School of Rimsky Korsakov and the Western classical tradition, Mediterranean influences, Middle Eastern Arab influences, North African, Latin American, Yemenite, Ethiopian or Western experiential music.

What does all this tell us? For me to understand that the God of Israel gave to this special nation a special gift of music is easy to understand, when the Bible, a Jewish book, reveals to us that the God of Heaven created mankind to worship Him, so it follows that the gift of music flows very strongly in this Jewish people group. (The Word ‘Jew’ has the Hebrew meaning of ‘praise,’ as mentioned earlier in this thesis). That a surprising amount of the world’s secular musicians are not only Jews, but Jews with a very high standard of world class excellence in there performing abilities is no surprise in this regard. It is a pity that this nation has endured such horrendous persecution over the centuries from the Gentile world, and such a miracle that today this nation has been recreated from the dust of human history is a leader in many areas of life, sciences, agriculture, high technical involution and the arts etc. The nation that gave the

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world the moral law of the 10 Commandments and introduced us to (what I deem personally, as does the Christian world) the One True God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Sad to say that here is also an anomaly. How easy it is to recognise a Jewish folk song by his systematic springy rhythm and beat in either 2 or 4 in the bar - yes very easy! But where is Jewish classical music? It is claimed, on the one hand, that Jewish classical music was birthed out of the St Petersburg School, from the collectors of the Shtetl folk songs of the early 20th century and how this influenced Jewish secular classical composers. On the other hand it is suggested that Israeli music was birthed in Palestine during the early 20th century by many of the returning Jewish musicians, from Western and Eastern Europe, who created that Arab influenced ‘Mediterranean’ sound, for example Paul Ben-Haim. True they did create a Middle Eastern sound.

But to day (post 2000) Israeli composers produce more of a World Music sound than a specifically Jewish sound, as most having been trained not only in Israel but in Europe and America, where they have been influenced by Schoenberg, the Darmstadt School and experimentalism of various types and styles from the 20th century.

So I ask again, where is the real authentic Jewish music? Yes we can point to this and that but at the end of the day I am still wondering what is Jewish music? When we hear “Brigg Fare”

by Delius, Vaughan Williams Pastoral Symphony or Thomas Tallis Fantasia for Strings or an Elgar Symphony we know we are listening to English music. So may be when listening to the folk songs of the the Shtetls of the Pale Settlement areas we come nearest to authentic Jewish music? But these Shtetls folk songs were also to some extent by influenced by Western classical music, and when this music arrived in Israel it was deemed to lack a true Middle Eastern sound, (which authentic Israeli should have - so it is said), and for many in Palestine it became hard to believe it had that authentic Jewish sound!

Of course the suffering of the Jewish people, and their dispersal into the nations of the world for the last 2000 years, has been the major reason that Jewish music, per say, has seen such a late birth, and is in such a fragmented state today; so it can be still said today, from at least some perspectives, ‘what is true Jewish music?’ Perhaps true Jewish music is ‘World Music,’ as the

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nation has come out of almost every nation of the world today, since the rebirth of the State of Israel, and so world influences are are dominant character of this music - which then breaks down into many roads, avenues and styles of the art of music. Finally let is be said, we love the Jews and their music, where ever it comes from, and may it live on and grow richer and richer in every way and taking a message of hope, from the ashes of world history, to the whole world!

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APPENDIX Here a some examples of music from different periods of Jewish Musical History...

A 0: Biblical Accents (Teaman) and Melodies (Neginot) for Cantillation of Biblical Texts A 1: General Source Outline of Jewish Music * A 2: Cantillation from Zechariah 2:10 (From the German Middle Ages) * A 3: Synagogue Melody from Germany 11th Century * A 4: Cover from a Tara Publication of Jewish Folk Songs from the St Petersburg Jewish Folk Song Society. * A 5: A Love Song from the Shtetls of the Pale Settlement. (copied from Ruth Rubin, ‘Voices of a People’) A 6: Two Pieces for Cantor and Bass from the Shir Zion Collection of Solomon Sulzer Salomon Sulzer (1804-90): Shiur Zion (Songs of Zion 1840-66) is a collection by Sulzer of arrangements he made for cantor, choir, congregation responses and optional organ accompaniment. The influence of Protestant-like 4 part writing for choir can be seen here is this example - and this was an advance for it time in Synagogue music, of which Sulzer is sometimes know as the “Father of Modern Synagogue Music.” (refer chapter 7) * A 7: Adon Olom by Louis Lewandowski, (refer Chapter 7) * A 8: Holocaust Lulaby: “Quite, Quite!” * A 9: Shepardic short song for Festivals * A 10: Leonard Bernstine: “Hashkivenu:” * "Cause us, O Lord, to lie down in peace," Commissioned by the Park Avenue Synagogue from the twenty - seven-year- old composer A 11: Thumbelina: Piano piece for Children by Russian Jewish composer Sergi Slominsky * A 12: Sound of the Shofar - commonly heard sounds in a Synagog Shofar Service * Items taken from: Google Images.com (Web.)

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A 1: Jewish Music: an Outline

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A 2: From the German Middle Ages - Cantillation from Zechariah 2:10

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A 3: Synagogue Melody from Germany 11th Century

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A 4: Cover from a Tara Publication of Jewish Folk Songs from the St Petersburg Jewish Folk Song Society.

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A 5: Yiddish Love Song for the ‘Shtetls’

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A 6: Salomon SULZER from “Shir Zion”

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A 7: Lewandowski - Adon Olom

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A 8: Shtiler, Shtiler – Quiet, Quiet ( Holocaust Lullaby) Lyrics: Shmerke Kaczerginski Melody: Alexander Volkoviski (Tamir)

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A 8: Holocaust Lulaby: “Quite, Quite!”

The song was published by Shmerke Kaczerginski in his anthology, Lider fun di Getos un Lagern (1948).

The song’s lyrics were written in the Vilna ghetto by Kaczerginski – an educator, author, poet and partisan. The accompanying melody was written by Alexander Volkovitski (today Tamir) when he was 11 years old, winning a Judenrat competition in April 1943 encouraging cultural endeavors in the ghetto.

The song describes the events at Ponary as a mother singing a lullaby to her son. She tells him of the tragedy of Vilna but expresses her hope that from the darkness light will break forth.

The song is a kind of lullaby to the “graves” that were born after the massacre of Vilna’s Jews at Ponary. In the first verse, the mother asks her son not to cry over the disappearance of his father because their enemies would not understand. In the second verse, with the coming of spring, the son is also sent to his death. The third verse and the end of the song finds the mother promising her son that the sun will shine once more, and freedom will come and bring back his missing father.

Lullabies had long been one of the most popular Yiddish song genres. They formed part of the Yiddish theater tradition since Abraham Godfadn’s popular lullaby “Rozhinkes mit mandlen” (Raisins and Almonds), also based on folk lullaby. Most of the lullabies told of a missing father, with the mother soothing her child to sleep and telling him of better days and a brighter future awaiting him. During the Holocaust, this tradition became fertile ground for a new kind of lullaby based either on popular melodies or new ones, as in this case.

According to a note in Kaczerginski’s book, the song was performed in the Vilna ghetto by the choir, conducted by A. Slep, as well as by the partisans. The song won popularity among Holocaust survivors, and became one of the most performed songs on Holocaust remembrance days.

Song Material copied of Yad Vaham, Jerusalem, Israel, under the “Fair Use” regulations for “non-commercial educational purposes, such as teaching, scholarship and research” Yad Vashem. Heartstrings, Music of he Holocaust. (Web)

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A 9: Shephardic Yigdal for Festivals

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A 10: Leonard Bernstine: “Hashkivenu:�

"Cause us, O Lord, to lie down in peace," Commissioned by the Park Avenue Synagogue from the twenty seven-year- old composer. Opening bars in composers short score.

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Notes PART 1 Chapter 1: Ancient Beginnings of Jewish Music 1 Rothm端ller, Aron Marko. The Music of the Jews; an Historical Appreciation. South Brunswick: T. Yoseloff, 1967. Print.

Chapter 2: Book of Psalms and Music During the Babylonian Exile 1 Rothm端ller,

PART 2 Chapter 3: Tabernacle and Temple Worship 1 Zion Song Ministries. A Short Catechism on the Tabernacle of David. (Web. 2008) 2 Philadelphia Tabernacle of David. What is the Tabernacle of David? (Web. 2014) 3 Rothm端ller.

4 Wikipedia. Second Temple. (Web) 5 Bible Lessons Worldwide Ministry. The Second Temple. (Web.) 6 Idelsohn, Abraham. Jewish Music: Its History and Development. Print.Dover. 1992.

7 Mishnah. The Rabbis first written edition of the Oral Law 8 Idelsohn.

PART 3 Chapter 4: The Beginnings of the Synagogue Worship 1 Wikipedia. Synagogue. (Web.) 2 Bible Lessons Worldwide Ministry. (Web) Chapter 5: The Cantor, Cantillation....

1 Wikipedia. Cantor. (Web) 2 Rubin, Emanuel, and John H. Baron. Music in Jewish History and Culture. Sterling Heights.

MI: Harmonie Park, p. 67-69. 2006. Print.

3 Wikipedia. Religious Jewish Music. (Web. 2013) 4 Shema. The Hebrew Prayer found in Deuteronomy 6:4 5 Tefillin. Small leather box worn my observant Jews in synagogue services contain scrolls with words from the Old Testament.

Chapter 6: The Development of Religious Jewish Music...

1 Wikipedia. Jewish Emancipation. (Web) 2 Wikipedia. History of the Jews in Poland. (Web)

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3 Wikipedia. Haskalah. (Web) 4 Wikipedia. Jewish Religious Movement. (Web) Chapter 7: Development of Music in the Synagogues....

1 Bohlman, Philip Vilas. Jewish Music and Modernity. New York, NY: Oxford UP, 2008. P. 76 Print 2 Reform Judaism. Development of Reform Judaism. (Web. 2014) 3 Sulzer, Salomon. Summarized in Verhadlungen Der Ersten Israelitischen Synode Zu Leipzig.

Cited in F. Berlin 1969 4 Wikipedia. Louis Lewandowski. (Web)

Part 4: Chapter 8: Israeli Folk Music..

1 Bohlman, Philip Vilas. Jewish Music and Modernity. New York, NY: Oxford UP, 2008. N. Page 76. Print.

2 Bohlman.

3 Bohlman.

4 Rubin.

Chapter 9: Historical Sources of Israeli Folk Music 1 Zborowski, Mark, and Elizabeth Herzog. Life Is with People; the Culture of the Shtetl. New York: Schocken, 1962. Print.

2 Wikipedia. Council of Europe Report 1996. Yiddish (Web.) 3 Zborowski.

4 Beregovski, Moshe. Old Jewish Folk Music: The Collections and Writings of Moshe Beregovski. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 1982. Print.

5 Rothmuller ch.13 6 Rothmuller. p. 173/4 7 Rothmiller. p. 175.

Chapter 10: The St Petersburg School...

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1 Rubin. p. 180/181.

2 Beregovski, p. 18.

Chapter 11: Klezmer 1 Slobin, Mark. Fiddler on the Move: Exploring the Klezmer World. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2000.

Print.

2 Safed. A Brief History of Klezmer Bands. (Web. 2009) Chapter 12: Sephardic-Ladino 1 Sephardic Jews: to it put simply, have come from the Israelite tribes of the Middle East or Spain - whereas Ashkenazi Jews come from Germany and are of Israelite-European decent.

2 Wikipedia. Sephardic Jews. (Web) Chapter 13: Mizrahi and Dancing 1 Wikipedia. Mizrahi. (Web) 2 Wikipedia. Ashkenazi Jews. (Web)

PART 5 Chapter 14: Jewish Art Music and Jewish Music in the Land 1 Rubin. p. 309-322.

2 Rubin.

3 Mizrahim Jews. Jews who derive their heritage from the Middle East itself and North Africa.

In contrast Jews from Spain and Portugal are called in modern usage Sephardic Jews; this also in today’s usage can be a synonymous term for Mizrahim Jews.

4 Wikipedia. Aliyah. (Web)

Chapter 15: Music in the State of Israel 1 Rubin.

Chapter 16:The Second Generation of Israeli Art Composers 1 Rubin. p. 341.

2 Heskes, Irene. Passport to Jewish Music: Its History, Traditions, and Culture. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1994. Print. p. 244

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3 Heskes. p. 244 Chapter 17: The Emancipation of Jews into European Musical Life 1 Jewish Board of Education, Jewish Composers. (Web.) 2 Wikipedia. Halevy. (Web.) 3 The Jewish Week. Mendelssohn’s Elijah: Both Sides Now. New York 11/09/10 4 Home Site of David Conway, Department of Hebrew and Jewish Studies, University College, London. Jewry in Music. (Web. Conway 2001/11) 5 Heskes. p. 273.

6 Heskes. p. 274 7 Heskes. p. 274 8 Heskes. p.2697 9 Heskes. p.270 10 Wikipedia. Darius Milhaud. (Web.) 11 Heskes. p.299

PART 6 Chapter 18: Holocaust Composers and Musicians 1 World ORT. Education for Life; Music of the Holocaust. (Web) 2 Haas, Michael. Forbidden Music: Jewish Composers Banned by the Nazis. New Haven, CT: Yale UP. 2013. Print 3 World ORT. (Web) 4 World ORT. (Web) Chapter 19: Jewish Musical Life During the Holocaust 1 Yad Vashem. Heartstrings-music of he Holocaust. (Web 2014) 2 World ORT. (Web 3/2014) 3 Wikepedia. Brundibar. (Web.) 4 Muller, Melissa. Reinhard Piechocki. A Garden of Eden in Hell: The Life of Alice Sommer Hertz. Pan Books Books 5 La Scena Musicale. Oratorio Terezin. (Web.) Chapter 20: A Question of Balance?

1 Tablet Magazine. Why the New ‘Holocaust Music’ Is an Insult to Music—and to Victims of the Shoah. (Web. July 2013) 2 Tablet Magazine.

3 Tablet Magazine.

4 Defiant Requiem (Web. 2013)

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5 Musica Concentrationaria. (Web. 2007) 6 Tablet Magazine.

7 Tablet Magazine.

8 Tablet Magazine.

Chapter 21: Musician in Exile from the Nazis 1 World ORT. Composers in Exile. (Web) 2 Ryding, Erik and Rebecca Pechefsky, Bruno Walter: A World Elsewhere, Yale University Press, 2001. Print. p 19.

3 Wikipedia. Paul Ben-Haim (Web.2013) 4 Haas. p. 249.

5 Hass. p. 158.

6 Wikipedia. Hans Gal. (Web) Chapter 22: Musician who Stayed in Nazi Germany 1 World ORT. (Web) 2 Wikipedia. Herber van Karajan. (Web) 3 Wikipedia. Richard Strauss. (Web) 4 Wikipedia. William Furtwangler. (Web)

PART 7 Chapter 23: The Messianic Movement and Music 1 Wikipedia. Messianic Judaism (Web 2014) Chapter 24: Messianic Jewish Musicians (i) Maurice Sklar 1 Maurice Sklar Ministries. Maurice Sklar (Web. 2010) Chapter 25: Messianic Jewish Musicians (ii) Paul Wilber 1 (CBN Music. International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. Paul Wilber. (Web. 2014) 2 Paul Wilber Ministries. (Web. 2014) Chapter 26: Messianic Jewish Musicians (iii) Joel Chernoff 1 Lamb Messianic Music. Joel Chernoff (Web. 2006) 2 Galilee of the Nations. (Web.) Chapter 27: Messianic Jewish Musicians (iv) Karen Davis 1 Wikepedia. Karen Davis (Web.) 2 New Release.com Karen Davis. (Web)

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Chapter 28: Messianic Jewish Musicians (v) Barry and Batya Segal 1 Gratefully Grafted Ministries. Barry and Batya Segal. (Web.) Chapter 29: Messianic Jewish Musicians (vi) Merve and Merla Watson 1 Merve and Merla.com. Merve and Merla Watson. (Web. 2012) 2 Merve and Merla.com (Web.)

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Works Cited Ashkenazi Jews. Wikipedia. (Web) Beregovski, Moshe. Old Jewish Folk Music: The Collections and Writings of Moshe Beregovski.

Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania, 1982. Print Bible Lessons Worldwide Ministry. The Second Temple. (Web.) Bohlman, Philip Vilas. Jewish Music and Modernity. New York, NY: Oxford UP, 2008.

Brundibar. Wikepedia. (Web.) CBN Music. International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. Paul Wilber. (Web. 2014) Conway, David. Home Site of David Conway, Department of Hebrew and Jewish Studies, University College, London. Jewry in Music. (Web. Conway 2001/11) Davis, Karen. Wikipedia. (Web.) Galilee of the Nations. (Web.) Hans Gal. Wikipedia. (Web.) Halevy. Wikipedia. (Web.) Gratefully Grafted Ministries. Barry and Batya Segal. (Web.) Haskalah (Web.) Wikipedia.

Heskes, Irene. Passport to Jewish Music: Its History, Traditions, and Culture. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1994. Print

History of the Jews in Poland. Wikipedia. (Web) Idelsohn, Aron Z. "Jewish Music in Its Historical Development." Schocken Books New York.

1972 Print.

Jewish Board of Education, Jewish Composers. (Web.)

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Jewish Emancipation. Wikipedia.(Web.) Jewish Week, The. Mendelssohn’s Elijah: Both Sides Now. New York 11/09/10 La Scena Musicale. Oratorio Terezin. (Web.) Lamb Messianic Music. Joel Chernoff (Web. 2006) Lockyer, Herbert. All the Music of the Bible. Peabody, Mass: Hendrickson, 2004. Print.

Lewandowski, Louis. Wikipedia (Web) Merve and Merla.com (Web.) Messianic Judaism. Wikipedia. (Web 2014) Mizrahi. Wikipedia. (Web) Musica Concentrationaria. (Web. 2007) Muller, Melissa. Reinhard Piechocki. A Garden of Eden in Hell: The Life of Alice Sommer Hertz. Pan Books Books Maurice Sklar Ministries. Maurice Sklar. (Web. 2010) Reform Judaism. Development of Reform Judaism. (Web. 2014) Religious Jewish Music. Wikipedia. (Web. 2013) RothmĂźller, Aron Marko. The Music of the Jews; an Historical Appreciation. South Brunswick: T. Yoseloff, 1967. Print.

Rubin, Emanuel, and John H. Baron. Music in Jewish History and Culture. Sterling Heights. MI: Harmonie Park, 2006. Print.

Ryding, Erik and Rebecca Pechefsky, Bruno Walter: A World Elsewhere, Yale University Press, 2001, Print. p. 19 Safed. A Brief History of Klezmer Bands. (Web. 2009)

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Slobin, Mark. Fiddler on the Move: Exploring the Klezmer World. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2000.

Print.

Sulzer, Salomon. Summarized in Verhadlungen Der Ersten Israelitischen Synode Zu Leipzig.

Cited in F. Berlin: 1969. Print.

Synagogue. Wikipedia (Web.) Tabernacle of David. What is the Tabernacle of David? (Web. 2014) Tablet Magazine. Why the New ‘Holocaust Music’ Is an Insult to Music—and to Victims of the Showa. (Web) Wilber, Paul. Ministries. (Web. 2014) World ORT Composers in Exile (Web.) Yad Vashem. Heartstrings-music of the Holocaust. (Web.2014) Zion Song Ministries. A Short Catechism on the Tabernacle of David. (Web. 2008)

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