Re: Germans and Klezmer

[apikoyros <apikoyros...>]

Steven,
You are entitled to your opinion,
but I think that it is too easy for those a bit 
removed from the pain to absolve those 
who inflicted it and say "get over it" 
to those of us a bit closer to it. 

I find your responses to those of us who can't 
tolerate Germans appropriating Jewish music, 
which I, too, see as a prime example of the world's 
"necrophilia" for the Jews after the Holocaust, 
as insensitive/offensive as I find the crosses at
Auschwitz, the misuses of the term "Holocaust," 
the posthumous psychological analysis of Anne 
Frank based only on her diary, or the opera based 
on the murder of Klinghoffer that doesn't fail 
to remind us about Palestinian aspirations.  
 
You show concern for the sensitivities of the
German Klezmer performers. I, too, must
acknowledge that some of them are fine 
human beings and excellent musicians, 
but why do they have a right to be heard 
when they attempt to play Jewish music?

Concern doesn't seem to extend to those 
of us whose time on German soil was not 
spent under such benign conditions as theirs. 
(Mine was as a child in DP camps).

You say things (to us) such as "I think you 
need to re-evaluate your position" and "Shoah
notwithstanding." (Was there any thought given
to those words?)

There is no such thing as "Shoah notwithstanding"!!!! 
If the sins of the German sadist murderers are visited on 
the next one or two generations of their (innocent) descendants 
to the extent of hindering them from insinuating themselves in 
Jewish culture where they do not belong, that is a very small price 
to ask them to pay. While there are survivors and their children
still alive who can bear personal witness to the atrocities of
the Holocaust,  where is the corresponding concern for Jewish 
sensitivities in the invasion of Jewish culture?

What do you think is so fascinating to Germans a generation or so 
removed from the Holocaust about the music of those they used to 
call, disdainfully, "Ostjuden"?

I am aware of the resurrection by some of pre-war German
Jewish music, deemed "degenerate" by the Nazis. I applaud
these efforts. There were other German Jewish talents between 
Kurt Weill and Felix Mendelssohn. The long musical history of the 
German Jews has material worth researching. Germans performing 
German-Jewish music could be a much better "revival" without the use 
of their misappropriated Yiddish. And don't Germans have their own music?

 
Why don't the Germans perform the music of the long-resident, 
but non-citizen Turkish "guest workers" in their midst?
It might produce some empathy where it could now be useful.

Leopold Friedman

On Mon, 28 Feb 2000 01:25:34 -0500 Steven Fischbach <fischri (at) gis(dot)net>
writes:
> It has been about a year since I took my "roots" trip to Berlin.  In
> addition to flipping through the Nazi property seizure and 
> deportation
> records of my relatives at the Berlin Landesarchiv, I had the 
> opportunity
> to spend time with members of a Berlin based Klezmer group (thanks 
> in part
> to our esteemed List Owner).  I included the band on my itinerary as 
> I was
> as equally interested in finding out about this odd phenomenon of 
> German
> klezmer as I was in learning about my family's history in Berlin.
>  
> Although my experience with the band consisted of a series of brief
> contacts during a short period of time, I came to understand that at 
> least
> these performers had a sincere love of the music, and that's why 
> they
> perform it.  They were conscious of the fact that their band could 
> be
> interpreted by some as a cheap attempt at reconciliation and were 
> also
> conscious that many Germans portray Jewish culture  in cliches.  I 
> asked
> about who came to their concerts and why they came, but the band 
> couldn't
> answer that question.     
> 
> Also, on my trip I had an exchange with a Jewish staff member of the 
> Jewish
> Museum Berlin about the Klezmer phenomena in Germany.  He was 
> totally
> revolted by it, and said there would be no Klezmer music in his 
> museum.
> Yes, the subject of Klezmer in Germany is controversial.
> 
> I hardly consider myself an expert on this subject, since my time in
> Germany was so brief and it  the only time I have ever been outside 
> the US.
>  However, in any community there are good folks and bad folks and 
> folks in
> between.  People should be judged by what they do more than who they 
> are.
> I cannot dismiss or reject all Germans who play Klezmer.  I am glad 
> that
> the German, non-Jewish musicians on this list said what they said 
> and I
> thank them for their contribution to this discussion.  As far as I 
> am
> concerned, I welcome their participation in our culture and look 
> forward to
> hearing their music.  I hope that they will try to re-discover (and
> perform) Jewish folk music that existed in Germany before the Shoah,
> whether that music be Klezmer or otherwise (I am still trying to 
> find out
> more of what it actually was).
> 
> To those who cannot bear the thought of listening to any Germans 
> performing
> Klezmer, I think you need to re-evaluate your position.  Those born 
> after
> WWII (and even those who were born during the war) were not 
> responsible for
> the Shoah.  While I think it is okay for ethnic group members to ask
> questions to the "outsider" as to why they perform ethnic music, I 
> do not
> think it is necessary to hold Germans who play Klezmer to any higher
> standard than any other "outsider" who performs ethnic music, Shoah
> notwithstanding.
> 
> So now I am up to four pfennig.
> 
> And, thanks Josh for sharing your essay with this list.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Steven Fischbach
> Providence, Rhode Island  USA
> fischri (at) gis(dot)net
> 
> ---------------------- jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org 
> ---------------------+
>