[HANASHIR:11682] Re: Did Sulzer compose "his" Shema?

[jcohen <jcohen...>]

Great thinking, Jeff.  But it goes back at least one step further:  the 
"Sulzer" Shema appears in the 1893 (I believe) CCAR Hymnal, attributed to 
"Traditional" (notably, in a publication that seems to cite Sulzer pretty 
clearly, considering he died just a couple years earlier).  That's where my 
research stops for now.  There may well have been a redactor, but it was 
earlier than Binder.

Judah.



Quoting Jeff Klepper <jeffklepper (at) yahoo(dot)com>:

> 
> > although the "trad" shema is a viennese waltz, it was
> > still written by sulzer.
> 
> Aha! Not so fast, Erik ;->
> 
> Did Sulzer really write the Shema that bears his name?  Some years ago I
> scoured the Out Of Print Classics versions of his multi-volume Schir Tzion,
> and guess what?  Couldn't find it.  The Shema we sing begins exactly like
> Sulzer's Ki Mitzion.  The ending of the version we sing is similar to the
> ending of his "real" Shema from Schir Tzion (actually there are several
> different one scattered throughout the collection) which leads me to
> hypothesize that someone literally cut and pasted to create the Shema that
> all of us grew up on and which has nearly defined synagogue music for
> millions of Jews around the world over the years.  My guess is that person
> was A. W. Binder, a giant figure in synagogue music himself, (composer of
> hundreds of pieces, most notably our two most famous candle blessings, the
> ones for Shabbat and Chanukah) who happened to be the music editor for the
> CCAR's Union Hymnal, of which multiple editions were published in the 1930s
> through 50s (I don't have those exact dates in front of me.)  Though we may
> never know the truth, I'd wager real money that when Binder was editing the
> Torah service music for the Union Hymnal, he performed some musical surgery
> on Sulzer in order to make the service more singable and memorable.  And,
> like a mensch, he put Sulzer's name on it instead of "Trad."  The key point
> is that the Union Hymnal is the first place you'll see the famous version
> of
> Shema published.  I'm leaving open the possibility that the "transformed"
> version, whoever wrote it,  was in use prior to that time, but as you say
> with regard to Ein Keloheinu, "Where's the written evidence?"
> 
> Binder, by the way, was Rabbi Stephen S. Wise's music director for many
> years, wrote the music for dozens of English Hymns (Come O Sabbath Day and
> All The World Shall Come To Serve Thee) taught several generations of
> rabbis
> and cantors how to chant trope at HUC-JIR, and was my first teacher of
> Jewish music in 1965.
> 
> Shabbat Shalom,
> Jeff Klepper
> 
> 




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