Newspaper Page Text
Klezmer music is enjoying
revival: concert set June 8
Special to The Southern Israelite
The farther we get away from
our eastern European roots, the
more we tend to characterize east
ern European Jews in exclusively
religious terms. We think of Jewish
music as synagogue and cantorial
in nature (hazzanut). However,
when focusing on this one aspect of
Jewish musical life, we overlook
the richness and diversity of our
shared musical heritage. Most
assuredly there were other popular
and expressive genres of Jewish
music, secular music which today
might be characterized by the terms
“popular” and “classical.”
At the turn of the century, one of
the most popular and entertaining
forms of music was called klezmer.
(“Klezmer” is derived from the
Hebrew, klav 'zemer, meaning
musical instrument.) The term
klezmer was originally applied to
the musician who wandered from
town to town, shtetl to shtetl mak
ing music.
These klezmer musicians became
artists, embroidering onto the rich
tapestry of Jewish music the threads
of Eastern, European, Rumanian.
Ukrainian, Hungarian, Turkish,
and Greek musics.
When klezmer came to the Uni
ted States with the great waves of
immigration in the late nineteenth
century, its musicians also incor
porated strains of a growing, young
American musical phenomenon:
jazz. (For more about one such
musician see the recent article, “The
music man: Fiddler meets the
clezmer” in The Southern Israelite,
Friday, April 18, pages 26-27.)
Klezmer music, as a popular
idiom, and like most popular music
today, was intended to uplift the
spirits and offer up a release from
the drudgeries of day-to-day ex
istence.
This music, which is enjoying a
remarkable revival in many parts
of the country, w ill be celebrated in
a cafe concert at Congregation
Shearith Israel, Sunday evening
June 8. For information about his
concert, which is open to the pub
lic, see the ad on page 7, or call the
synagogue at 873-1743.
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Adapted from the works ol Rabbi Menacheni M
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deprivation of liberty is considered
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Though very rarely implemented
under Torah-law. corporal pun
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criminal who received physical
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shortly able to return to his place in
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until the system of penal servitude
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