RE: Meaning of "Klezmer"

[Adrian Durlester <durleste...>]

In addition to having been a musician all my life, I spent 25 years in
theater as well. If there is one thing I have found in common in both the
music and theater world, it is this distasteful concept of distinguishing
between "art" and "entertainment" as if such a distinction could be drawn in
clear terms, and free of any snobbery. It simply cannot.

I argued with my peers in the theater for years that the real blame for
slipping audience attendance is that the theater elite have failed to
recognize that, whatever they may think of it personally, there were reasons
why the general public were flocking to things like Las Vegas style shows,
female mud-wrestling, "Married With Children" et al. We do a great
disservice to ourselves when we attempt to classify entertainment as
"non-artistic." Some of the same well known designers designing for Bway and
the Met Opera were also designing for TV and movies. Is that work any less
"artistic"?

Is Debbie Friedman's work any less artistic than Lewis Lewandowski's? Is
Walt Disney's cartooning entertainment and therefore not art?

And since when is what a dinner theater troupe does not art? I've seen
productions at dinner theaters better than ones I've seen on Bway or the
West End!

Why this pervasive need to be elitist?

Adrian
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Adrian A. Durlester  -  durleste (at) home(dot)com
http://members.home.net/durleste/
Student, Vanderbilt University Divinity School
http://divinity.lib.vanderbilt.edu/vds/vds-home.htm
Music Director, Congregation Micah, Nashville, TN http://www.micahnash.org/
Home phone (615) 646-9788 Nextel cel-phone (615) 207-2661
You can page me from http://www.nextel.com
List-Owner for hanashir (at) shamash(dot)org; Co-Owner for L-Torah (at) 
shamash(dot)org
http://uahc.org/hanashir
Editor, Bim Bam (for Torah Aura Productions) http://www.torahaura.com/
Alternate Email: aad (at) iname(dot)com  adriand (at) aol(dot)com

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org
[mailto:owner-jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org]On Behalf Of Velaires (at) 
aol(dot)com
Sent: Monday, January 03, 2000 1:50 PM
To: World music from a Jewish slant
Subject: Re: Meaning of "Klezmer"


I think labelling somebody's efforts as "entertainment" is the same thing as
saying its primary concerns are not serious.

Given the amount of work that goes into a KCB presentation, I think putting
its intent on a lower ideological shelf ("entertainment") than somebody
else's group is tantamount to snobbery, unless Hankus or whomever says
outright, "This is strictly to be consumed as entertainment, not as an art
statement".  Until such time as that, though, it is to be treated as
somebody's art presentation.  This isn't a dinner theater group.  Be
respectful.

sh

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