Re: What Makes Music Jewish

[moshe denburg <denburg...>]

On Fri, 28 Mar 1997 10:37:37 -0500, ari (at) ivritype(dot)com (Ari Davidow) 
wrote:

>Of course, once you get to the popular, what I would call
>"white bread" performers such as Debbie Friedman or others,
>there isn't much to differentiate the music other than 
>context and words.

I'd like to utilize the above comment to put in my two shekels worth on this
thread. In my view, context is 'almost' everything in defining Jewish Music.
In this regard I agree with Cantor Neil Schwartz's citation of the
discussion at the Cantorial school he attended:

"One way to define Jewish music is to say that it is music which uses some
elements of Trope and/or traditional Nusah (musical prayer-modes)."

 "Another way to define Jewish music is to say that it has as its text or
subject recognizable Jewish themes."

The use of music within the context of Jewish ritual or life passage events
is a salient feature of what makes music Jewish. Thus, a mode or a melody
can become Jewish over time, due to its functioning in a Jewish context.
This is of course not an iron-clad definition, since ritual itself evolves
over time, but it can serve as a definer for any individual, who may look to
his or her own *Jewish* experience and thus define the musical accompaniment
to that experience as being Jewish. 

As an aficionado of Klezmer, Ari, you have alluded to it as that music which
is basically Jewish Simkha Music. This is my point precisely: Klezmer isn't
Jewish because it has the strength to cross over into Jazz and Pop, as
valuable as these migrations are; its strength resides in its root context -
the Jewish Simkha.

I hope these two Shekels are not the harbinger of any undue inflation. ;-)

Moshe Denburg