Re: Kol Isha - Just the Facts, please!

[Sylvia Schildt <creativa...>]

Lenka, you can't always assume that everyone follows the pattern.

A couple of years ago I attended a pre-Slichos concert at our modern
Orthodox shul, Beth Tfiloh, and Nehama Carlebach with band in a mini skirt
was the featured performer ON THE BIMAH.

After the concert, men and women separated into their sections (lately they
have installed a curtain) and the Slichos service and the male chazn, the
very wonderful Avi Albrecht took over. This is a mixed congregation of
typically minimally observant all the way to black hats and Mizrahis from
Iran and Iraq.

A few small observations and I will go away.

I have been following this discussion very closely and I think in the main
its tone has been more collegial than the last round -- so maybe we are
making some headway after all.

Orthodoxy itself is in transition on many issues and I think the growing
number of college-educated Orthodox women is creating pressure points center
stage and behind the scenes. It is not the place of the non-Orthodox
however, to tell them what to do on their own home turf.

My beef is with the entities who serve non-Orthodox primarily.  Since they
do not feel themselves religiously bound by KI, they should not
pre-emptively kowtow to an Orthodox minority in their hiring practices. and
just let everyone in the audience follow his own conscience on the matter.
This is where we need to put the pressure.

And I keep coming back to the model of my own shtetele Brownsville. There
was not a shul or a wedding place that was not Orthodox. But when the
wedding place across the street would burst into klezmer music Saturday
after the ORTHODOX ceremony, we could often hear a female singer doing
Yiddish and pop tunes and the ubiquitous (at that time) "Because." The
chazntes, long before there were such things as lady cantors singing at
worship services, were part and parcel of the scene. I never saw a protest
mounted against them in front of a shul or concert hall.

Strict Orthodoxy today, its population burgeoning with Baale Tchuva, seems
to be more rigid than its forebears on many issues. I never even heard of KI
or yoshen wheat or other matters until recently. Separate closed off dancing
was something you expected in WILLIAMSBURG, nowhere else. You either
participated in the dancing or you didn't -- but you didn't leave until the
band played "Goodnight, Sweetheart."


Sylvia Schildt
Baltimore, Maryland

PS - The English version of Mayn Shtetel Brunzvil (Remembering Brownsville)
is being readied to go to press. $12USD PLUS 4.50 s/h) Let me know privately
if you are interested.


on 1/23/04 12:56 PM, lenka lichtenberg at lenkal (at) sympatico(dot)ca wrote:

...as well as orthodox Sephardic shuls, absolutely, at least in Canada. Zero
female involvement is a given, from doing an aliyah to singing/chanting
anything whatsoever, in or out of service. i suppose that comes with the
term "orthodox". 
lenka
 
www.lenkalichtenberg.com <http://www.lenkalichtenberg.com>
I'd think you can assume it as a given with almost any Ashkenazic, orthodox
shul in the United States ........
...
 

----- Original Message -----
From: "Alex Jacobowitz" <alexbjacobowitz (at) yahoo(dot)com>
To: "World music from a Jewish slant" <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org>
Sent: Friday, January 23, 2004 8:47 AM
Subject: Re: Kol Isha - Just the Facts, please!


> --- Sam Weiss <SamWeiss (at) bellatlantic(dot)net> wrote:
> > At 01:49 AM 1/23/04, Yoel Epstein wrote:
> > >Perhaps some of you would like to compile a list of
> > specific gigs that
> > >were
> > >refused or cancelled because a female singer
> > participated in the
> > >band.  Then
> > >we might have a starting point for actually doing
> > something about this.
> >
> > Such a list would not even scratch the surface,
> > since the assumption of Kol
> > Isha very often precludes female soloists and bands
> > with a female singer
> > from even being considered at all.
>
> Au contraire, it WOULD scratch the surface -
> at least insofar as this list is concerned.
> As in other political opinions, there would
> most likely be "right", "centrist" and "left"
> versions of KI - and its implementation. If
> any gig were to be refused or cancelled for
> KI reasons, it would be most illustrative to
> see whether the sponsors give that as the
> reason, or whether they hide behind some kind
> of subterfuge. And since on this list
> we´ve only heard from the femails in this case, I
> wouldn´t mind hearing the other side´s view - those
> who are involved in the decision-making process.
>
> Bring it on!
>
> Alex
>
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