Re: schmaltz, pandering and Klezmatics

[meydele <meydele...>]

I am certainly with Seth on this one. Sorry, Mike, but there are a lot of 
different reasons for 
composing/making music - as well as for listening to it.  Being entertained is 
only 1 of them.  It 
is more than legitimate for an artist to follow his or her own aesthetic sense, 
to develop an 
interesting, insightful and - maybe, if we're all lucky - original style.  
Clearly, the artist is 
trying to communicate something through the music.  Sometimes it is more 
accessible to some 
audiences than other times.  Schoenberg, Pederecky, Steve Reich and Frederic 
Rzewski aren't 
entertaining, but they are interesting.  Sometimes they are (or were)ahead of 
audiences, but that 
doesn't mean that they should stop composing.  I agree with the posters who 
point out that it's 
important to let your audience know what they are coming to hear.  It would be 
very dull musically 
if all music was aimed at entertaining alone!  What is most marvelous about New 
Yiddish Music is 
that it encompasses the simkhe music, but is able to take audiences beyond 
that, to reach a 
broader understanding of what makes up "klezmer" and Yiddish music.  

Shira Lerner

---------------------- jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org ---------------------+