Re: survey of who is doing what jewish music

[Joe Kurland & Peggy Davis <ganeydn...>]

Seattle

I've been on the road and haven't had much time to write.  Seeing that Owen
wrote what I would have liked to say about Wholesale Klezmer Band, let me
add a few words about what I'm doing with Jewish Music when I'm not
performing in the klezmer context.

I found that when I started playing this music for more than myself, that I
wanted to learn Yiddish.  As I studied Yiddish I found that it didn't make
sense to me outside of a religious context.  Now, if I lived in New York
City, it would be pretty easy to be an non-religious Yiddish speaking Jew
in the context of a religious Jewish community, but living in rural Western
Massachusetts, I understood that to be in the context of a Jewish religious
community, I had to join a shul, and there I found I knew more of davening
and ritual than most of the other people in the community.  I also found
that I really missed the old style of davening and baal tfiles that I heard
growing up and when the shul announced that it needed volunteers to daven
farn omed for the High Holidays, I volunteered to take a part.

I've had a quick lesson with the then khazn at my parents' shul which I put
on tape and listened to over and over and practiced from, and began
listening to old recordings of Hershman, Waldman, Sirota, etc.  I took
voice lessons from a traditional Greek singer who sings in a style that
uses many of the same types of ornamentation as khazones, and we analyzed
the ornaments on an old recording by playing it at half speed.  I've been
doing Yom Kippur Shakharis and Ne'ileh for about 7 years, now, and have
recently added Ma'ariv Rosh Hashanah with the help of some coaching from a
friend who is in cantorial school.  I've also been doing Shabbos morning
services once in a while for about the last year.

I've been trying to learn more about the system of nusakh, and trying to
avoid such shandes as the itsy bitsy spider.  Recently Wholesale added to
its repertoire a vaudeville piece which I translated into English from the
1931 Leybele Waldman short film, "A Khazn on Trial" in which I play Leybele
Waldman as the narrator and 3 different khazonim trying out before a search
committee.  The piece is hysterical, but the music is beautiful.

When I was a kid growing up in the Bronx, there was a wonderful Eastern
European style khazn at our shul.  I can't remember any of the special
melodies he used, but I remember how wonderful it felt to sit wrapped in my
tallis and listen to him daven.  Where I live, I can't go to shul and hear
that sort of davening, so if I want to hear it, I have to learn it and do
it myself, and luckily, the folks in my shul are happy to come when I lead
services.  I'm trying to teach them how the congregation is supposed to
daven along--in the mode, but each in his/her own time.

I'd love to know how much that old fashioned, Eastern European ba'al tfile
style is practiced these days.  I've heard people say, oh, people don't
really want to hear that, but I feel it connects to the meaning of the
prayers much more than some of the more modern tunes.

A gutn Shabbos,

Yosl (Joe) Kurland
The Wholesale Klezmer Band
Colrain, Ma 01340
413-624-3204
http://www.crocker.com/~ganeydn