Aaron Howard's review

[Robert Cohen <rlcm17...>]

Dear Mr. Furnald:  Joel Bresler has shared w/ a Jewish Music list serve his 
letter to your publication (along with, apparently, my footnote) and Aaron 
Howard's reply.

FWIW:  Mr. Howard introduces even more errors in his reply!

Joel Bresler's assertion re "a body of scholarship" is certainly correct 
(even if other scholars have come to different, or somewhat different, 
conclusions).  Eric Werner sets forth this thesis not in A [note indefinite 
article--Does Mr. Howard research *anything* before he writes?] VOICE STILL 
HEARD, but in his THE SACRED BRIDGE.  Idelsohn most certainly makes this 
claim.  See, just for a tiny example, his classic JEWISH MUSIC IN ITS 
HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT, p. 61: "...the tradition and history of the Catholic 
Church are justified in claiming that at least a considerable part of its 
traditional song was adopted from the synagogue."

I would also direct Mr. Howard, and other interested students, to Amnon 
Shiloah's recent, and generally excellent, JEWISH MUSICAL TRADITIONS, pp. 
27-33 for a summary of Idelsohn's and others' claims in this area.

So Mr. Howard's claim that, until Marcello, "borrowing from Jewish music by 
Christian music was extremely rare" may well be (extremely?) wrong.  And 
btw, Marcello, though born in the 17th century, was an adult only in the 
18th century.

And although my own interest and specialty as a Jewish music historian and 
educator is, in fact, communal/folk liturgical song, there is certainly a 
substantial tradition of cantorial (and even some Hassidic) solo 
chant/"performance" in Jewish liturgical music.

I don't happen to be a particular fancier of the album Mr. Howard reviewed, 
but it deserved a more informed response and evaluation.

Thank you for your willingness to involve yourself in this exchange of 
information and views--and for your good intentions in carrying the initial 
review.

--Robert Cohen




______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

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