Re: Klezmer

[Berlin Moshe <berlim...>]

Sapoznik (at) aol(dot)com wrote:

> They're both right. The Hebrew words "klei zemer" mean "musical instruments"
> while the Yiddishization of those words into "klezmer" means a musician.
> Though it was Beregovski who first used the term "klezmer music" in his 1938
> essay "Yiddishe Instrumentalishe Folksmuzik" it was Giora Feidman who
> popularized the term "klezmer music" with his 1970s recordings on the Hed
> Arzi label.
>
> Henry Sapoznik
> Author
> "Klezmer! Jewish Music From
> Old World to Our World"
>  

    In any case "klezmer" is a Jewish "invention" therefore, traditionally and
logically, is must be connected to Jewish tradition and culture. You cannot
separate it from the long history of the Jewish people. Klezmer music is the
musical interpretation and reaction to Jewish life.

Klezmer Music is the way a Jew plays music after the destruction of the Temple
in Jerusalem. The destruction of the Temple (the second one) is the beginning of

the long Diaspora of the Jewish people. They where spread among other nations,
they suffered many pogroms and massacres. But, never in History, Jews forgot
Jerusalem. They even swear to Jerusalem not to forget her. They always prayed to

return back to their homeland.
The musical expression to this philosophy is called Klezmer Music. The Jews took

tune and melodies from any nation they where among, and played them in a Jewish
mood and style. You can hear the sorrow and the pain in this music, even in the
Freilakhs (=joyous tunes).
The term Klezmers is devoted to the east European Jewish musicians, but Jews
from other Diaspora (east, far east, middle east etc.) has their own "Klezmer"
too. The main instruments of the Klezmers where the fiddle and the clarinet.

I think this is the whole story on one foot.

Moshe Berlin
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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