Re: survey and Musical/Tin Pan Alley

[Alex J. Lubet <lubet001...>]

Responding to the message of <01BD54D9(dot)6F28C060 (at) 
nysh1-41(dot)flash(dot)net>
from jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org:
> 
> Sometimes in February, I stopped reading almost all of the Jewish-music 
> mail and am just now beginning to catch up with everything.   Just 
> found this post.  
> 
> First let me say Gideon Aronoff, that I very much appreciated your
> comments below.  I have been learning more and more about Lieber and 
> Stoller and have become fascinated by all this whole topic.  
> Furthermore, it's totally fascinating at how Jews in general are always 
> so adept at articulating and defining the local cultural values and 
> essences for both Jews and non-Jews whether that its film, or music or 
> art, business, or politics, etc.; or whether the country is America, 
> Germany, Poland, Italy, France, or Arab countries, etc.
> 
> Second, Alex Lubet, do you know or anyone else know what Phillip Roth's 
> hilarious explanation of White Christmas and Easter Parade?   I would 
> love to hear the explanation.
> 
> Did you hear what Cole Porter said when someone asked him how you write
> a Broadway melody?   He said "Well, first you start with a Yiddish song."
> 
> 
> Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky
>
I'll see if I can't find out which novel it's in.  Roth claims that those songs 
are a means to secularize the major Christian holidays as a means of deflecting 
anti-Semitism.  It's meant, I think, as one of those jokes with an element of 
truth in it.  If you want to read a great book on Broadway lyricists, get 
Phillip Furia's "The Poets of Tin Pan Alley."  It has that Porter anecdote in 
it, but every other lyricist is, not surprisingly, Jewish. 
> 
> 
> ----------
> From:  Alex Lubet[SMTP:lubet001 (at) maroon(dot)tc(dot)umn(dot)edu]
> Sent:  Wednesday, February 11, 1998 12:00 PM
> To:  World music from a Jewish slant.
> Subject:  Re: survey and Musical/Tin Pan Alley
> 
> Responding to the message of <52eb93f6(dot)34e1d23f (at) aol(dot)com>
> from jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org:
> > 
> > Alex Lubet wrote: 
> > 
> > "I like to think of the musical (also the classic Tin Pan Alley song) as a
> > Jewish genre, although I'm not exactly sure what's Jewish about it.
> > (lbviously, there are Yiddish theatre antecedents, but I specualte that
> > there's more)."
> > 
> > Alex and all:
> > 
> > I suspect that the answer will come more from sociology than musicology.  
> > Tin
> > Pan Alley, musical theater, as well as the Brill Building songwriters and
> > producers like Lieber and Stoller, Phil Specter, Carol King etc. all seem 
> > to
> > share two characteristics.  There is an obvious deep love of words that 
> > seems
> > fully appropriate for the "People of the Book."   Also these classic 
> > American
> > songs seem so deeply non-Jewish, eg. White Christmas, that they can best be
> > understood in the context of American assimilationism.  Like the film
> > industry, the music business is full of Jews articulating what it means to 
> > be
> > American, that is to say not Jewish.  All of this is important in
> > understanding the place of Jews in American culture, and in no way detracts
> > from the wonderful music that these Jews created.
> > 
> > Alternatively, there is a small trend for some popular performers to add
> > explicit Jewish content to their music.  Peter Himmelman, John Zorn, and 
> > Phish
> > are examples. 
> > 
> > Gideon Aronoff
> > 
> > 
> >  
> >Thanks.  Phillip Roth has a hilarious explanation of White Christmas and 
> Easter
> Parade, but I can't remember which novel it's in.  It's hilarity owes a great 
> 
> deal to its truth.   
> 
> 
> Alex Lubet, Ph. D.
> Morse Alumni Distinguished Teaching Professor of Music
> Adjunct Professor of American Studies
> University of Minnesota
> 100 Ferguson Hall
> Minneapolis, MN 55455
> 612 624-7840 (o)
> 612 699-1097 (h)
> 612 626-2200  ATTN:  Alex Lubet (FAX)
> 
> 
> .


Alex Lubet, Ph. D.
Morse Alumni Distinguished Teaching Professor of Music
Adjunct Professor of American Studies
University of Minnesota
100 Ferguson Hall 
Minneapolis, MN 55455 
(612) 624-7840
(612) 626-2200 (FAX)