Abstract:Preparing the first collection of Jewish folk songs for publication (1901), S. M. Ginsburg and P. S. Marek divided the material into groups according to genres. These methods of classifying largely determined the further development of folklore research both in Europe and Russia. New generations of scholars were brought up in accordance with this tradition, and perceived it as the basis for further research. Over the past century, the classification of genres proposed by Ginzburg and Marek has never been the subject of reflection and critical analysis. We could see that the compilers were looking for new, more convenient approaches to systematize the song material, but the scholars who were engaged in research of the Jewish musical tradition after World War II tried to adhere to the canon set at the beginning of the twentieth century. The purpose of this article is, first, to determine what has served as a model for genre classification, and second, to follow subsequent changes in the criteria in the definition of genres and in the approaches to the publication of song collections. An overview of a collection of folk song in Yiddish, published in the period from 1901 to 2007, as well as comparative analysis of their structures, allows the author to find "missing links" and to shed light to the reason for these changes.
{"title":"The Folk Song of the Ashkenazim: The Problem of Genre Definition","authors":"E. Khazdan","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0023","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Preparing the first collection of Jewish folk songs for publication (1901), S. M. Ginsburg and P. S. Marek divided the material into groups according to genres. These methods of classifying largely determined the further development of folklore research both in Europe and Russia. New generations of scholars were brought up in accordance with this tradition, and perceived it as the basis for further research. Over the past century, the classification of genres proposed by Ginzburg and Marek has never been the subject of reflection and critical analysis. We could see that the compilers were looking for new, more convenient approaches to systematize the song material, but the scholars who were engaged in research of the Jewish musical tradition after World War II tried to adhere to the canon set at the beginning of the twentieth century. The purpose of this article is, first, to determine what has served as a model for genre classification, and second, to follow subsequent changes in the criteria in the definition of genres and in the approaches to the publication of song collections. An overview of a collection of folk song in Yiddish, published in the period from 1901 to 2007, as well as comparative analysis of their structures, allows the author to find \"missing links\" and to shed light to the reason for these changes.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"58 - 88"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41735239","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
W. Feldman, Judit Frigyesi, Anat Rubinstein, E. Khazdan, L. Sholokhova, M. Lukin, Jonathan Boyarin
Abstract:I will attempt to integrate my remarks about the musical creativity of the East Ashkenazim in response to recent historical paradigms about the Jewish people worldwide. The key concept is the distinction between the many numerically small and geographically local "embedded" Jewish communities, as opposed to the much larger and geographically widespread Jewish cultures, which can be defined as "transnational." Since the later sixteenth century only two such transnational Jewish cultures existed—the Ashkenazim and the Sephardim. The Ashkenazim of Eastern Europe constituted the largest portion of the Jewish people in modern times, and their musical creativity shows far deeper internal connections and developments than that of any other Jewish ethnos. Through recent linguistic research into the origin of the Yiddish language, plus musicological paradigms addressing genre, musical articulation, intonatsia, and "ethno-hearing," I will suggest how these facts and concepts can help to explain the saliant musical patterns of the East Ashkenazic Jews.
{"title":"Ethnogenesis and the Interrelationship of Musical Repertoires Among the Jews of Eastern Europe","authors":"W. Feldman, Judit Frigyesi, Anat Rubinstein, E. Khazdan, L. Sholokhova, M. Lukin, Jonathan Boyarin","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0020","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:I will attempt to integrate my remarks about the musical creativity of the East Ashkenazim in response to recent historical paradigms about the Jewish people worldwide. The key concept is the distinction between the many numerically small and geographically local \"embedded\" Jewish communities, as opposed to the much larger and geographically widespread Jewish cultures, which can be defined as \"transnational.\" Since the later sixteenth century only two such transnational Jewish cultures existed—the Ashkenazim and the Sephardim. The Ashkenazim of Eastern Europe constituted the largest portion of the Jewish people in modern times, and their musical creativity shows far deeper internal connections and developments than that of any other Jewish ethnos. Through recent linguistic research into the origin of the Yiddish language, plus musicological paradigms addressing genre, musical articulation, intonatsia, and \"ethno-hearing,\" I will suggest how these facts and concepts can help to explain the saliant musical patterns of the East Ashkenazic Jews.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"1 - 104 - 105 - 12 - 13 - 142 - 143 - 166 - 167 - 169 - 37 - 38 - 57 - 58 - 88 - 89"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47353520","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract:The genre of Yiddish wedding songs as such did not exist in the Jewish music tradition and the wedding songs could be only identified by content, but not by function. The wedding songs were mainly performed before the wedding (by women) and less at wedding events (by men). However, although the Yiddish wedding folk songs didn't play a major ritual role in the actual wedding ceremony, their narrative and musical content represent an extremely important material that helped explain a deep, hidden, emotional context of the wedding and events preceding it. This article aims at a comprehensive analysis of this unique type of song in a broader sociological context, and identifies and reviews several categories of such songs in accordance with their place in the sequence of pre-wedding, wedding, and post-wedding events.
{"title":"The Yiddish Wedding Folk Songs of East European Jews: Function, Ethnography, Sociology, Texts, and Music","authors":"L. Sholokhova","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0024","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0024","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:The genre of Yiddish wedding songs as such did not exist in the Jewish music tradition and the wedding songs could be only identified by content, but not by function. The wedding songs were mainly performed before the wedding (by women) and less at wedding events (by men). However, although the Yiddish wedding folk songs didn't play a major ritual role in the actual wedding ceremony, their narrative and musical content represent an extremely important material that helped explain a deep, hidden, emotional context of the wedding and events preceding it. This article aims at a comprehensive analysis of this unique type of song in a broader sociological context, and identifies and reviews several categories of such songs in accordance with their place in the sequence of pre-wedding, wedding, and post-wedding events.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"104 - 89"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48751774","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Writing on Water by Judit Niran Frigyesi (review)","authors":"Jonathan Boyarin","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0027","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0027","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"167 - 169"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47598249","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract:European Jews' exposure to modernity in the nineteenth century led to major changes in the structure of the community's organization and the balancing of the foci of power, in its patterns of behavior and religious practices, as well as in its aesthetic sensibilities. Cantor Pinkhas Minkowsky (1859–1924) held a prominent position in the attempts to redefine the soundscape of the synagogue during these tumultuous times in the annals of Eastern Europe's Jewish community. Minkowsky's overall work and thought are the products of a formative moment in the highly charged and complicated encounter between Jewishness and modernity in Odessa of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth centuries. His work and thought are an expression of his dealing with the discomfort and ambivalence that the encounter with modernity presented. Minkowky's thought concentrated on the roots of the national idea and the search for primordial authenticity, which constitute one of the most patent manifestations of modern nationalism. His musical works shed light on his musical acumen and expertise, but most importantly, they illuminate the dialectics between old and new, "emotion" and "order," and innovation and conservatism. Based on Philip Bohlmanʻs model, Minkowsky's role as "mediator" or "ambassador" in the encounter between tradition and modernity, as well as his role as a "music expert," rather than a "religious expert," are discussed.
{"title":"The Cantor as a National Leader: Thought and Music of Cantor Pinhas Minkowsky","authors":"Anat Rubinstein","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0022","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0022","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:European Jews' exposure to modernity in the nineteenth century led to major changes in the structure of the community's organization and the balancing of the foci of power, in its patterns of behavior and religious practices, as well as in its aesthetic sensibilities. Cantor Pinkhas Minkowsky (1859–1924) held a prominent position in the attempts to redefine the soundscape of the synagogue during these tumultuous times in the annals of Eastern Europe's Jewish community. Minkowsky's overall work and thought are the products of a formative moment in the highly charged and complicated encounter between Jewishness and modernity in Odessa of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth centuries. His work and thought are an expression of his dealing with the discomfort and ambivalence that the encounter with modernity presented. Minkowky's thought concentrated on the roots of the national idea and the search for primordial authenticity, which constitute one of the most patent manifestations of modern nationalism. His musical works shed light on his musical acumen and expertise, but most importantly, they illuminate the dialectics between old and new, \"emotion\" and \"order,\" and innovation and conservatism. Based on Philip Bohlmanʻs model, Minkowsky's role as \"mediator\" or \"ambassador\" in the encounter between tradition and modernity, as well as his role as a \"music expert,\" rather than a \"religious expert,\" are discussed.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"38 - 57"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41959561","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract:The present study seeks to address the main obstacle in the research of the folk song in eastern Yiddish—the lack of documentation of texts, melodies, and contexts from before the end of the nineteenth century, and the almost complete lack of reliable informants. Based on extant documentation as well as research in neighboring traditions, and conducting a dialogue with a monumental unpublished dissertation by the Soviet musicologist Sofia Magid on the folk ballad in Yiddish (1938), the article outlines three different styles in the eastern Ashkenazi balladic repertoire: the old Yiddish ballad, the German "medieval" ballad that had been absorbed into Yiddish-speaking society since the end of the eighteenth century, and the new sentimental urban ballad. The discussion focuses on the style of the songs from the first group and traces their historical development, poetics, music, social functions, performance by men/women, and interrelations with the printed songs in old Yiddish. The focus on the old ballad as a distinct phenomenon of the early modern East Ashkenazi culture is achieved through examining narrative motifs, rhythmic patterns, and melodic contours. This scrutiny reveals how the aesthetic foundations of the international ballad genre—such as impersonal contemplation of emotional responses to pivotal events in daily communal life, and openness to absorbing diverse poetic and musical elements—contributed to the formation of its premodern eastern Ashkenazi oicotype in the small towns, at the crossroads between the western European heritage, the Slavic environment, Jewish narrative and musical traditions, and the Ashkenazi way of life.
{"title":"At the Crossroads: The Early Modern Yiddish Folk Ballad","authors":"M. Lukin","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0025","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0025","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:The present study seeks to address the main obstacle in the research of the folk song in eastern Yiddish—the lack of documentation of texts, melodies, and contexts from before the end of the nineteenth century, and the almost complete lack of reliable informants. Based on extant documentation as well as research in neighboring traditions, and conducting a dialogue with a monumental unpublished dissertation by the Soviet musicologist Sofia Magid on the folk ballad in Yiddish (1938), the article outlines three different styles in the eastern Ashkenazi balladic repertoire: the old Yiddish ballad, the German \"medieval\" ballad that had been absorbed into Yiddish-speaking society since the end of the eighteenth century, and the new sentimental urban ballad. The discussion focuses on the style of the songs from the first group and traces their historical development, poetics, music, social functions, performance by men/women, and interrelations with the printed songs in old Yiddish. The focus on the old ballad as a distinct phenomenon of the early modern East Ashkenazi culture is achieved through examining narrative motifs, rhythmic patterns, and melodic contours. This scrutiny reveals how the aesthetic foundations of the international ballad genre—such as impersonal contemplation of emotional responses to pivotal events in daily communal life, and openness to absorbing diverse poetic and musical elements—contributed to the formation of its premodern eastern Ashkenazi oicotype in the small towns, at the crossroads between the western European heritage, the Slavic environment, Jewish narrative and musical traditions, and the Ashkenazi way of life.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"105 - 142"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48522742","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract:This study is the first of two connected articles. The present article proposes an approach to the aesthetics of the vast but conceptually homogenous culture of the East European Jewish prayer chant. After an introduction presenting the problems of the scholarship on the topic, the article will discuss, in a summary fashion, two fundamental practices of East European Jewish prayer chant and their meaning: davenen (the simplest form of the recitative chant of the prayers) and heterophony (the soundscape of the prayer house). My argument is that East European Jewish prayer chant was idiosyncratic and unique—different from the coterritorial religious chants and folk music. At the end of the article the reader will find a summary of those aspects of this music that support this argument, listing also the main features of davenen and heterophony as these were discussed in detail in the text. The second article ("The Unique Character of Prayer Chant Among the East European Jews: Part II: The Emergence of the New Aesthetics—A Historical Hypothesis") will propose a hypothesis for the time period and the sociocultural reasons for the emergence of this unique practice of prayer chant.
{"title":"The Unique Character of Prayer Chant Among the East European Jews: Part I: System, Practice, and Aesthetics—A Preliminary View","authors":"Judit Frigyesi","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0021","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0021","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:This study is the first of two connected articles. The present article proposes an approach to the aesthetics of the vast but conceptually homogenous culture of the East European Jewish prayer chant. After an introduction presenting the problems of the scholarship on the topic, the article will discuss, in a summary fashion, two fundamental practices of East European Jewish prayer chant and their meaning: davenen (the simplest form of the recitative chant of the prayers) and heterophony (the soundscape of the prayer house). My argument is that East European Jewish prayer chant was idiosyncratic and unique—different from the coterritorial religious chants and folk music. At the end of the article the reader will find a summary of those aspects of this music that support this argument, listing also the main features of davenen and heterophony as these were discussed in detail in the text. The second article (\"The Unique Character of Prayer Chant Among the East European Jews: Part II: The Emergence of the New Aesthetics—A Historical Hypothesis\") will propose a hypothesis for the time period and the sociocultural reasons for the emergence of this unique practice of prayer chant.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"13 - 37"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42709607","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Daniel H. Frank, A. Grafen, William Pimlott, D. Roskies, Jordan A Chad, Shalem Yahalom, Rachel Z. Feldman, B. Rosenstock, S. Epstein, J. Bernstein, M. Caplan, Zev Garber, N. Simms, Jacques Sémelin, Melissa K. Bokovoy, Dovilė Budrytė, R. Gruber, Emil Kerenji, J. Kopstein, Mira Sucharov, Jelena Subotić
Abstract:Through the 1920 Yiddish little magazine Renesans, Leo Koenig aimed to articulate a specifically Jewish art. His objective was to foster the conditions of its creation, to identify the ways in which it was being created, and to interpret its history. Renesans crystallized a set of priorities for the Jewish artistic present, the criteria for success, and a projected future. Koenig has been credited as the first art critic in Yiddish; we propose that Koenig's combined work as editor, author, and theorist should also be understood as a key example of Yiddish art history.Our introduction of the term Yiddish art history is intended to draw attention to the lively theorization of Jewish art in Yiddish and as part of Yiddishist and cultural nationalist projects in the Eastern European Jewish diaspora. Koenig's work in Renesans is not just a suitable object of study for this field; we argue that Koenig was himself developing Yiddish art history, attempting a fusion of discourse and artwork with the aim of creating a Jewish national consciousness.Koenig's biography is explored as a means of understanding the ideas and art movements that would influence Renesans. The contents of the journal are then analyzed to show how Koenig aimed to curate and define his conception of Jewish art. This attempt is contextualized with its local reception in the London Yiddish press, and its limitations are explored in relation to Koenig's theoretical writing itself.
{"title":"In Memoriam: Saul Lerner","authors":"Daniel H. Frank, A. Grafen, William Pimlott, D. Roskies, Jordan A Chad, Shalem Yahalom, Rachel Z. Feldman, B. Rosenstock, S. Epstein, J. Bernstein, M. Caplan, Zev Garber, N. Simms, Jacques Sémelin, Melissa K. Bokovoy, Dovilė Budrytė, R. Gruber, Emil Kerenji, J. Kopstein, Mira Sucharov, Jelena Subotić","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0000","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0000","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Through the 1920 Yiddish little magazine Renesans, Leo Koenig aimed to articulate a specifically Jewish art. His objective was to foster the conditions of its creation, to identify the ways in which it was being created, and to interpret its history. Renesans crystallized a set of priorities for the Jewish artistic present, the criteria for success, and a projected future. Koenig has been credited as the first art critic in Yiddish; we propose that Koenig's combined work as editor, author, and theorist should also be understood as a key example of Yiddish art history.Our introduction of the term Yiddish art history is intended to draw attention to the lively theorization of Jewish art in Yiddish and as part of Yiddishist and cultural nationalist projects in the Eastern European Jewish diaspora. Koenig's work in Renesans is not just a suitable object of study for this field; we argue that Koenig was himself developing Yiddish art history, attempting a fusion of discourse and artwork with the aim of creating a Jewish national consciousness.Koenig's biography is explored as a means of understanding the ideas and art movements that would influence Renesans. The contents of the journal are then analyzed to show how Koenig aimed to curate and define his conception of Jewish art. This attempt is contextualized with its local reception in the London Yiddish press, and its limitations are explored in relation to Koenig's theoretical writing itself.","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"1 - 1 - 106 - 107 - 132 - 133 - 145 - 146 - 148 - 149 - 151 - 152 - 154 - 155 - 156 - 157 - 159 - 16"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-04-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43347502","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Jewish Studies as Counterlife A Report to the Academy by Adam Zachary Newton (review)","authors":"M. Caplan","doi":"10.1353/sho.2022.0009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/sho.2022.0009","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":21809,"journal":{"name":"Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies","volume":"40 1","pages":"152 - 154"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-04-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45589653","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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