RE: Der yidisher tam

[Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky <reyzl...>]

Gut gezogt (=well said).   And there are several Jewish "collectives".


Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky

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From:  Solidarity Foundation[SMTP:svzandt (at) igc(dot)apc(dot)org]
Sent:  Tuesday, March 10, 1998 10:49 AM
To:  World music from a Jewish slant.
Subject:  RE:  Der yidisher tam

On Mon, 9 Mar 1998 11:09:28 EST, Marvin 3809 wrote:
I can't buy your argument that "That means people should be thoroughly steeped
in the tradition as a first requirement.  Only then will they be able to judge
what changes might be for the better,  or at least of equal quality, and what
changes might be for the worse.   When you are able to be creative from within
a tradition, that's when  it's a living tradition."

What tradition do you mean?  There is no "Jewish tradition" in music.  I have
a tape of Adon Alom sung by Moroccan Jews to a typical North African Arab
melody.  That is a Jewish tradition, but not the one you probably have in
mind.

______

Reply: Obviously, I mean the relevant tradition. A klezmer should be
thoroughly steeped in the tradition of klezmer music, not the nusakh of the
Moroccan Jews or the polyphony of the Pygmies of the Ituri Forest. What
the Jewish musical tradition is as a whole, or whether there is one, is a
speculative question that has no practical relevance to my point.

Then you write:
Every creative person starts from somewhere, not from a blank page.  But then
he must innovate. 

Reply: No disagreement there.

You write:
 Classical composers like Bach and Mozart departed from
their "tradition" and created something wonderful to this day.

They were innovating within established tylistic traditions. Bach was
steeped in the Baroque tradition, and I think it could be said that he
consciously tried to draw on virtually the entire tradition, from North
German to French to Italian and even English Baroque styles. The same
can be said for Mozart. He was steeped in the Italian opera of his day,
the Mannheim orchestral style, the music of Haydn. He had been trained
in the counterpoint tradition of J.J. Fux.

Jewish music has developed in a similar way, and if it would continue to
develop in this way I would be happy. Because the influences available
today are so much more numerous and heterogeneous, anyone wishing to
innovate within a tradition has to exercise more restraint or whatever
is distinctive about the tradition will disappear or at least get very
watered down. Otherwise -- you MAY get a good result, but it will be in
the nature of an individual creation only, typical of modern Western
art dogma. And if it's something really nice, it wouldn't be continued
by anyone else because THAT -- khas v'kholile -- would be working
within a tradition (albeit a new one) and not sufficiently "original".
_______

Finally you write:
If you want to preserve your tradition, you are free to do so.  But don't tell
me that it is THE Jewsih tradition.  I know better.

Reply: I know better too. But where you write:
"That is my tradition in hearing classical music." I understand you to mean
that's the tradition you belong to, rather than your personal thing,
because a tradition is by definition a collective and received, and
continued and transmitted practice of doing something.
Itzik-Leyb