Re: Guzikow

[Alex Jacobowitz <alexbjacobowitz...>]

B"H Munich

> But did he achieve it through renditions of Klezmer
> melodies? Apparently
> not. 
One of your definitions, either "klezmer" or
"klezmer melodies" must give way.
When the Mendelssohn wedding march appears
in your "Ultimate Klezmer" book, is it or
is it not a klezmer melody? Yes, of course
it is, street-rodded. Why? Because it
was played by klezmer musicians at Jewish
functions. That puts the stamp of kashrus on it.
Prince Oginski´s march "becomes" a klezmer piece,
as the Marseillaise "becomes" Napolean´s March
to the Chabad Chasidim. Josh, please get used
to the idea some things fit into more than
one category. "Percussion" as a category
didn´t include keyboards in Guzikow´s time,
and so even the idea of a percussionist playing
such a specialized instrument is a relatively
recent invention.
  
> > The first xylophone came into being in 1866, long
> > before your Seelische percussionist.
> 
> If you are talking about the first time the
> instrument's etymology changed
> from "Wood and Straw Instrument" to the modern term,
> "Xylophone" that is a
> fascinating bit of information. 
No, it´s not etymological. Two different instruments,
one category.

Or whether its
> layout changed from vertical
> to horizontal. 
THAT´s funny! Its layout changed? As if someone
suddenly played "Sorcerer´s Apprentice" in the
background? No, a flesh-and-blood person changed
the layout, removed the rolls of straw (egad!),
broadened the range to five octaves, and called
it a new name. It´s not the same instrument.
But related.

Did it enter another orchestra in
> Paris before the Gewandhaus
> orchestra? 
As in "penetration"? The xylophone (well, to
be fair, its forerunner) was used for
many years in different orchestras as a novelty
item, for the occasional glissando, for comic
relief, back in the early 18th century.
You´ve surely heard of "claquebois", hoelzern
Gelaechter, etc. Please look it up.

The instrument used by Seele was still
> the Guzikovian
> construction (vertically situated wood slabs laid
> out flat on a bed of 5
> straw bundles, similar but not identical to a
> Glockenspiel laid on a table).
Strange. My issue of Seele (issued 1933!)
mentions both versions,  but favors
the modern construction, lists the Guzikow
version as a footnote.

> With all three present at Guzikov's first concert
> there, it seems more than
> mere coincidence that the instrument would
> eventually become part of their
> orchestra. 
Balderdash. Pure. Why don´t you make the
jump to Warp Speed, and postulate that
Mendelssohn composed for Guzikow?
If Mssrs. Idelssohn, Beregovski and Stutchewsky,
(peace upon their haloed musicological heads) missed
something in your opinion, you better bring
more factual information than such a wild guess.
My mailbox is open to your proof 24/7.

What I don't know is whether it was the
> first orchestra to
> include the Guzikov instrument.
go to the next step, Sherlockwitz, 
:-) which would be the easiest:
find even one compositional score calling for
Guzikow´s instrument. THAT would be the 
document, doncha think?

 But even more
> interesting to me is, why did
> Idelssohn, Beregovski and Stutchevsky leave out the
> classical music
> connection of Guzikov to the Gewandhaus Orchestra?
WHERE´s your proof there is one? The coincidence
of Guzikow playing in Leipzig at least fifty years
earlier? Guzikow´s spirit hovering over the
Gewandhaus? The first scoring for xylophone qua
xylophone (for orchestra) is 1874 in Paris.
Saint-Saens. Please look it up. Maybe Guzikow´s spirit
was hovering over Place de l'Opera too?
 
I
> suppose because they
> may not have known at the time of their writing that
> his instrument was
> later integrated into the orchestra,
is that a joke? Mahler scored xylophone for orchestra
in 1906, if not earlier. Do you think this
was some kind of secret, invisible instrument
in 1920? In 1937? In 1959?
:-)

 but also
> because all three of these
> writers use the Mendelssohn quote to validate
> Guzikov as a famous klezmer
> musician without pausing to reconcile the paradox
> that Guzikov's fame rested
> upon his non-klezmer renditions, 
that´s the kernel of the problem, Josh, it´s all 
in your esteemed mind. Read my pishkes -
Guzikow´s program was klezmerized. That is, it
became Jewish by his treatment of the material.
Kindly think of it as 19th century crossover.

and his weird
> instrument (which never
> really took hold in klezmer ensembles),
but it was never meant to. Guzikow played
his Wood-and-Straw as an emergency measure
because of his tuberculosis. Guzikow´s student
DID play concerts on it, up until 1849. And a mere
twenty-nine years after Guzikow´s passing,
Wood-and-Straw was overtaken
by the modern xylophone - in range, in volume,
in literature, in production, in tuning, etc.

 a
> contradiction which is sadly
> perpetuated in the Ottens/Rubin version, but with an
> entirely new
> motivation. 
Could be. But I think you have to ask Ottens/Rubin
about their motivation.
 
> All of these writers present a selectively
> interpreted, ideologically
> colored contextualization of Guzikov arising out of
> their need to place him
> in the Klezmer continuum, 
or better, at the apex of it.

a noble impulse for the
> time of the earlier
> writers, given the low image of klezmer music in
> their circles, but
> historically undiscerning nonetheless and one which
> Ottens/Rubin should know
> better.
Aha. It´s your opinion, then, that all musicologists
should focus strictly on klezmer musicians from
that standpoint and nothing else? Therefore Giora
Feidman, who doesn´t fit neatly into klezmer
categories, isn´t a real klezmer? At the very least,
not when he plays non-klezmer music? So you rush
to value him when he plays "Ani oleh l´Yerushalayim",
and tune out when he plays "Por una cabeza" tango?
Is that how it works?

> >> It seems suspicious to me that the only surviving
> >> notated source of a
> >> musician who built his reputation on society
> salon
> >> music would be a choral
> >> liturgical setting.
> > Choral liturgical setting? Josh! Relax!
> > It?s a NIGUN!
> 
> Shir Ha Maalot is Guzikov's setting of psalm 126.
Guzikow, please note the correct spelling.

> Its first printing in 1927
> in Musikalischer Pinkas by the Vilner Hazzan A. M.
> Bernstein (1866-1932) has
> the melody set with Hebrew text in 2-4 voices,
> complete with dynamic
> markings and articulations. 
You may be incorrect there. Pete mentions a string
quartet version listed in 1850.

Stutchevsky later
> published it in Ha Klezmorim
> in 1959 with a single melody line and text. If
> Guzikov was such an
> illiterate as all his chroniclers claimed, who
> notated the piece 90 years
> after his death?
Who knows? Anyone! How do you think ALL those
nigunim were handed down over the past two hundred
years? MP3 files? No, they were learned, repeated,
and taught to the next generation. K?

Shalom from Bavaria,

Alex Jacobowitz

 

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