Re[7]: Der yidisher tam

[richard_wolpoe <richard_wolpoe...>]

Dear I-L
        I see your point.  let me play talmudist with you and give you some 
hypothetical cases:

1)  A baal tefillo in yshiva sang unseaneh Tokef to alouette and hayom 
te'amtsienu to Mendelsohn's weeing march (no NOT Wagner's).  At what point in 
time can they be considred intrinsically jewish?

2)  nearly all the litvishe yeshiva's I know when they came to America recited 
lecho dodi and eyl odon without any melody.  Most of those same yeshivos now 
sing these peoms to either chassidic or popular jewish tunes.  have they 
violated your definition of traidition by abondoning a nearly atonal recitation?

3)  Chazan ployni in Warsaw adapts a beautiful Polonaise to the davening.  Now 
this piece migrates to America.  Is it wrong to substitute a piece by a 'modern"
composer, eg Shlomo Carlebach?

Also, I did not mean that we in America should adapt a new nusach and abaondn 
those from the old world.  What I meant was, that since we in Americans come 
from diverse places in the old World, including German, sepharadic, etc, we 
should feel free to draw on any and all of them to build our own compiste 
nusach.  if you re-read my emails, you'll note that I never recommnded 
abondoning our reportoire, rather I think it should be expnaded to include a lot
more variety.

Where we do disagree is in the value of the Western traiditons, both Duthc and 
German.  I think they're highly relevant to a Westernized culture such as we are
in America. You seem to advocate sticking with Eastern European modes, 
particularly of the Moldvaian/Roumanian genre.  I say that these modes are not 
necessarily any more jewish than lewandowski, rossi, etc.  I do not mean to 
imply that they are valueless, or obsolete.  And as a matter of fact, many 
Eastern European Chazzonim did adapt some Western pieces, and there are a number
of liturgical peices that East and West share in common.

Where we strongly agree is that we both respect our traditionas and our 
histories nad we'd both like to preserve the musical contributions from the old 
world.  My focus is to include ALL of the diverse traidtions from the old world 
and not to feel restricted to a single subset.

I also advocate that new pieces build on the old traditionas at elast to an 
extent that the innvoator should be well-versed with the "old stuff".  Despite 
my belief in Halacho, I am NOT opposed to all liturgical innovation, I am 
opposed to careless and thoughtless innovation.  Whether the prcess of 
innovation is striclty halachic or not, it should ALWAYS be respectful of our 
traditions.

I hope this helps stimulate further thought as well as discussion.  If we're 
going to have a "Minhag America", let's build cadillacs and not jalopies.

Regards,

Rich Wolpoe 
Best Re 

______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re:  Re[5]: Der yidisher tam 
Author:  <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org > at Tcpgate
Date:    3/16/98 1:22 PM


(Sorry, accidentally sent defective text...)

Rich,

On Tue, 10 Mar 1998 17:42:55 -0500, you wrote:
I don't mean to say that local customs adapted from the Eastern European 
milieu are wrong or bad.  I just don't demm them INTRINSICALLY Jewish per 
se.  Therefore, they may indeed have historical value, however, I wouldn't 
hesitate to modify or replace them with something equally valid.

_____
Reply:
I think it's important, in this rather difficult discussion, not to 
lump together ORIGINALLY JEWISH and INTRINSICALLY Jewish. 

Halakha is not a culture. Halakha is a legal code that has been (a) 
interpreted in various ways in different Jewish cultures (e.g. the 
Sephardim eat rice on Pesakh, the Ashkenazim do not), (b) has been 
fleshed out in many regional forms, as with any other people.

It is these various regional forms, which comes under the concept of 
_minhog_ (local custom), which I am saying, is a basic conept for 
understanding Jewish music. Even though our particular concerns are 
different, Rich -- you are interested in adding variety and, as it 
were, constructing a new "American" nusakh, new, but connected with 
tradition, I am interested in mainatining old traditions (which I think 
is far more of a concern with respect to klezmer, because at least here 
in New York there are many extremely traditional communities that keep 
up the vocal traditions of Eastern Europe, but not the instrumental 
ones) -- even though our concerns are different, I think we can agree 
that minhog, as a concept, is by no means indifferent
when you speak of Jewish music.

Therefore, when something is adopted in, it becomes intrinsically 
Jewish. Gefilte fish may have a halakhic explanation -- not to separate 
the bones from the fish on Shabbes, you say -- yet it's only found in 
Eastern European Judaism, not Sephardic or something else. Uou also
have to consider the possibility that many of these halakhic explanations 
were made "after the fact" - to explain _minhogim_ that were already 
age-old practices.

Itzik-Leyb