Re: Jewish songwriters

[Bob Wiener <wiener...>]

Elliot,

A variation on the claim of the German adage you cite is made by some as to
Jewish American songwriters.

Look at Jeffrey Melnick's "A Right to Sing the Blues", for example, at page
43:
"... in Berlin's "Alexander," George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess (itals.), and
so many other significant productions, Jews capitalized on their ability to
convey both closeness to the cultural stuff of "Blackness" and distance from
actual African Americans."

Or come to one of my talks on the music of Blacks and Jews.

Bob

----- Original Message -----
From: "Eliott Kahn" <Elkahn (at) JTSA(dot)EDU>
To: "World music from a Jewish slant" <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org>
Sent: Friday, November 15, 2002 1:47 PM
Subject: Re: Jewish songwriters


> I'm stunned to find out Brian Wilson's mother was Jewish, but I shouldn't
be too surprised. People of Jewish descent have clearly been the best
American songwriters. We invented Tin Pan Alley. We invented the Broadway
musical. We provided a large contribution to early Rock and Roll
(Lieber/Stoller, Schuman/Pomus), and now one can safely say that of the most
important songwriters for pop music of the sixties and seventies, four of
them were of Jewish descent: Carole (Klein) King, Burt Bacharach, Bob Dylan,
and Brian Wilson.
>
> One might make the argument that these folks were not practicing Jews and
made no contribution to "Jewish music" per se, and I would agree with them.
But if one would accept being Jewish as a distinctive culture, which I do,
then we have every reason to be proud of the enormous contributions that
these songwriters and composers have made to American culture.
>
> One only need think back on the old nineteenth century German adage that
Jews are great interpreters but not creators of music and to see it for
bigoted nonsense it really was.
>
> Or one only need go to the opera and hear PORGY AND BESS.
>
> Shabbat Shalom,
>
> Eliott Kahn
>
>
> At 03:32 PM 11/14/02 -0500, you wrote:
>
> >In a message dated 11/14/2 11:49:55 AM, lubet001 (at) umn(dot)edu writes:
> >
> ><< I don't doubt you, but this is the first time I've encountered a
reference
> >to
> >Brian Wilson being Jewish.  Do you know him or have a published source.
> >Neither
> >Great Jews in Music nor Jews Who Rock list the Wilson brothers.
> > >>
> >
> >Their mother  is Jewish ..one of the Brothers, I believe it MIGHT be Carl
> >Wilson's kids go to one of the Jewish Schools here in LA...hey, I'm still
> >getting "are you certain" about Jackie Wilson!
> >..and NO,  Jakcie Wislon was NOT on the the Beach Boys!
> >
> >Simon
> >
>
>
>


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