Re: Doinas & taksim

[Joshua Horowitz <horowitz...>]

> For us doinas-illiterates, can you give specific musical examples (i.e. 
> titles/tracks) from some currently available albums sprinkled into an edit of 
> this...  

Sure Judy, but only if you include me in your club of doina-illiterates
and let me use some Budowitz tracks.... I'll sprinkle them in between
the sections in capital letters. Other stuff comes from my field
recordings and manuscripts and things, so I can't give you a reference
there yet... Take care. J....
 
> >The whole ritual of seating the bride is called the bazetsns (some
> >called it badekns, baveynens or bazingens, too)

KURT BJÖRLING'S TAPE CALLED: JEWISH FOLK MUSIC OF THE UKRAINIAN S.S.R
THERE IS A THEATRICAL BUT VERY GOOD SUNG KALE BAZETSNS THERE. In
actuality, what
> >happens is the bride is seated (bazetst) , veiled (badekt), sung to,
> >(bazungen) and brought to tears (beveynt), so any of these words can and
> >do function separately to describe the entire ceremony. The ceremony
> >itself involves the badkhn and klezmorim, and traditionally the women.
> >The badkhn sings or ?zogt?

A ZOGN VERSION  IS ON THE CD: TREASURE OF JEWISH CULTURE IN UKRAINE,
PUBLISHED BY THE VERNADSKY LIBRARY OF UKRAINE  (the musical ones used
their voices partly to
> >sing, whereas the less musical ones used  Sprechstimme) a
> >semi-improvised text, which the klezmorim punctuate with chords. At the
> >beginning there was often an instrumental ?opshpiln? which served as an
> >introduction, and at the end a nokhshpil, which served to end this
> >portion of the ceremony, with interludes placed at the end of the
> >strophes. Sometimes the same procedure was done for the bridegroom
> >(called Khosn bazingns, in which case there might have been an escort
> >piece like a gasn nign which was played while walking to the groom, or
> >another opshpiln was played. There was no standard, as the mood created
> >was probably something which differed from kapelye to kapelye and
> >belonged to each kapelye?s original style. The character of the kale
> >bazingns was generally ?light?, instructive and in Yiddish, with very
> >little Hebrew, as it was not expected that the bride know loshn Kodesh,
> >whereas the character of the khosn bazingns was generally more serious,
> >with more quotes in Hebrew from the holy books, and could also have been
> >sung or ?gezogt? in a deeper voice, at least that?s how Majer Bogdanski
> >and Toyvye Birnbaum both performed it for us.
> >
> >What you hear on the early recordings as a bazetsns (i.e., Brandwein and
> >co.) is generally a condensed version of what the badkhn would ?sing?

TRACK 3 OF THE CD YIKHES, PLAYED BY BRANDWEIN, CALLED *VIE TSVEY IZ
NAFTULE DER DRITER

ALSO BUDOWITZ MOTHER TONGUE. TRACK 1
> >?zogt?. There is a specific modality and basic modulation scheme he uses
> >which seems to be fairly standard and is closely related to synagogue
> >prayers, though, like the doina, the tempo and rate of modulation differ
> >from performer to performer. Since there is syncretic overlap between
> >the historically predated bazetsns (I don?t know how old it is, but can
> >tell you that I am fairly sure it is the oldest strata of klezmer melody
> >we have and goes back as far as any Mogen Ovos  and Adonoy Molokh
> >prayers) and the later doina, it would appear that the doina gradually
> >replaced the bazetsns and became a genre unto itself. Certain
> >characteristics of the doina did in fact make their way into the
> >bazetsns ceremony, though the VOCAL  portions never changed, they just
> >gradually disappeared as the function of the badkhen became outdated.
> >So, in fact what seems to have happened historically is:
> >
> >The instrumental OPSHPILNS which heralded the Badkhn gradually took on
> >characteristics of the doina. And when the badkhns ?hamule? was no
> >longer a fixed part of the ceremony, the  INSTRUMENTAL IMITATION of the
> >vocal portion could also have begun to sound more and more like a doina,
> >though a klezmer playing a bazetsns melody to the bride would be more
> >likely to sound like a badkhen than a doina, and his audience (up till
> >roughly the 1930?s) in eastern Europe would recognize clearly the
> >difference, as this is not difficult when you?ve heard both (typical
> >bazetnsn move between say D mogen ovos to F adonoy molokh to r and G

RUBIN AND HOROWITZ: BESSARABIAN SYMPHONY, TRACK 15 (THIS BEGINS IN F
ADONOY MOLOKH AND THEN MOVES TO G MOGEN OVOS THEN DOWN TO D MOGEN OVOS.
THE BAZETSNS PATTERN IS ALSO FOUND AS A DANCE NIGUN ON TRACK 9 OF MARTIN
SCHARTZ'S KLEZMER MUSIC 1908-1827 ARHOOLIE RECORDS   
> >mogen ovos, Whereas the standardized doinas move from D mi shebarakh to
> >G mogen ovos to D Mi shebarakh to G adonoy molokh to A freygisg, etc).

RUBIN AND HOROWITZ: BESSARABIAN SYMPHONY, TRACK 5 (JOEL TOOK THIS FROM A
BRANDWEIN RECORDING)
> >The period of this transition whereby the doina was used for opshpilns
> >begins, in my opinion, around 1900 and not much earlier. The bazetsns
> >which uses the doina opshpilns seems to have already begun to disappear
> >from the repertoire of the klezmorim in the Ukraine by the time
> >Beregovski was doing his work.
> >
> >Beregovski writes a short paragraph about the sung part of the kale
> >basetzns being in minor (actually Mogen Ovos) while the extended
> >instrumental interludes between the verses were in freygish. Well, sure
> >enough, all the recorded examples of bazetsns I had showed this
> >characteristic. The texts were remarkably consistent in all the
> >bazetsns, and the interludes were almost always in freygish, though
> >varied in contour. ALMOST always. I had one bazetsns from Beresh Katz
> >with a different modality which indicated an older type - at least
> >that's what I think, because I think the FREYGISH interlude was the
> >overlapping link with the Moldavian doina particularly popular among
> >Jews around the turn of the Century, but not much earlier.
> >
> >Well, then we interviewed Majer Bogdanski in London (born in Piotrkow,
> >Poland), and he sang still another interlude type. I looked at the
> >regions of the other bazetsns, and they all came from the Ukraine
> >(Beregovsky's region was VERY contained- west Ukraine, radius average
> >about 200 Km), so Beregovski?s observation that the bazetsns are sung in
> >Mogen Ovos, while the interludes are played in Freygish, while common,
> >does not represent an exclusive type. Since both the Katz bazetnsn and
> >that from Majer had NO Freygish interludes, we can assume that the
> >Ukrainian type was not omnipresent and there were others.
> >
> >I think the bazetsns represents the oldest layer of klezmer music we
> >know, for these reasons:
> >
> >1) The text and modality of the sung parts are the most static,
> >independent of region (according to my sources)
> >
> >2) The static quality of the text and it's modality (Mogen Ovos- one of
> >the oldest of the Jewish modes) are religious in nature and content, and
> >therefore less subject to change.
> >
> >3) It represents the only organic use of the voice in the wedding
> >ceremony.
> >
> >4) It was the first genre to disappear on American soil, indicating it's
> >incompatibility with modern trends
> >
> >So I think the key to understanding a whole pile of questions lies in
> >comparing the differences in text/modality of the sung parts (minimal
> >variance) AND the interludes (more variance than previously assumed).
> >The bazetsns ceremony has fairly dissappeared now, but the doina has
> >remained as its last vestige, ironically, since it probably wasn't
> >originally connected to the basetzns.
> >
> >The syncretic characteristics of the bazetsns and doina are:
> >
> >1) The typical doina used makes use of a simple and concise formula
> >which can be completed quickly as the badhkn indicates.
> >
> >2) That type of doina was simply very popular and widespread (at the
> >expense of the more interesting ones, perhaps)
> >
> >3) The modality of that doina corresponds sycretically with Mi shebarakh
> >prayers.
> >
> >The whole of our knowledge about whether or not Jews played Taxims is
> >based on a sketchy statment that Beregovsky made when one of his
> >informant stated that they were unfortunately not played anymore, and
> >Jews only play doinas now. What that was supposed to mean in musical
> >terms we'll never know, because we don't have a reference point for the
> >Jewish taxim. We don't know if they were played commonly, occasionally
> >or infrequently. Nor do we know what could have been meant by the term.
> >The nominal taxim is played mainly in southern Romania. The rest of
> >Romania plays doinas, and many different kinds. There are a few
> >different modulation schemes which were used by Jews, but these
> >represent a mere fraction of what was, and still is played all over
> >Romania (why is everybody talking about doinas in the past tense? They
> >are still quintessentially Dacian expressions). Because the Jewish
> >doinas were already standardized by 1920, they became known as the
> >*Jewish Doina* The schemes are limpid in comparison to what else exists
> >and what is possible. People seem to forget that, while the modal
> >modulation used in doinas is very limited, the motives used have very
> >specific functions, and while flexible, are also recognizable at any
> >moment. Therefore there are opening motives, connecting motives,
> >episodal motives, closing motives, and motives which signal a change of
> >modal area. This type of musical thinking is absolutely necessary to
> >complete the ritual portions of the wedding, where musicians had to
> >communicate non-verbally - another reason for adopting it. Gypsies still
> >use motives when playing to indicate anything from, check out the cute
> >girl to the left of the Primas, to watch out, here comes the Balaboste,
> >etc.
> >
> >If the doina were played at table, it's function would be emotional, and
> >I'm convinced that one of the long lost vestiges of the klezmorim was
> >the ability to weave zmiros motives into their improvisations in order
> >to please religious members of the audience (thereby of course getting
> >more tishgeld). In fact I would go so far as to say that many dances
> >which formed came out of these improvisations. The *sher* technique,
> >cutting and pasting motives from various dances to form a chain, uses
> >the technique, so you no longer have a typical AABB or ABCBA dance form,
> >but a chain form, AABBCCDDEEFF etc. Though the shertants is relatively
> >new, the technique used in it's construction is probably quite old.
> >
> >The doina was never a lullaby for sheep (why do I picture all those
> >fluffy creatures snoozing on a green pasture?) One of my field
> >recordings from Radioia Romania is a doina of violin and tsimbl. There
> >is virtually no difference between this and the myriad Doinas you hear
> >played by Jews on those old 78's. I would love to hear comments on this
> >theme, because in truth, I don't feel I know what I'm talking about-
> >just rambling on and on. So stop me, please. Josh Horowitz
> >
> >
> >
> 


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