Social Functions of Synagogue Song
Social Functions of Synagogue Song

Author: Jonathan L. Friedmann

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 199

ISBN-13: 0739168312

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Social Functions of Synagogue Song: A Durkheimian Approach by Jonathan L. Friedmann paints a detailed picture of the important role sacred music plays in Jewish religious communities. This study explores one possible way to approach the subject of music's intimate connection with public worship: applying sociologist mile Durkeim's understanding of ceremonial ritual to synagogue music. Durkheim observed that religious ceremonies serve disciplinary, cohesive, revitalizing, and euphoric functions within religious communities. Drawing upon musical examples from different composers, regions, periods, rites, and services, Friedmann demonstrates how Jewish sacred music performs these functions.

Synagogue Song in America
Synagogue Song in America

Author: Joseph A. Levine

Publisher:

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780765761392

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Jewish Religious Music in Nineteenth-Century America
Jewish Religious Music in Nineteenth-Century America

Author: Judah M. Cohen

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2019-02-14

Total Pages: 328

ISBN-13: 0253040248

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This study of synagogue music in the United States in the second half of the nineteenth century “sets a high standard for historical musicology” (Musica Judaica). In Jewish Religious Music in Nineteenth-Century America: Restoring the Synagogue Soundtrack, Judah M. Cohen demonstrates that Jews constructed a robust religious musical conversation in the United States during the mid- to late-nineteenth century. While previous studies of American Jewish music history have looked to Europe as a source of innovation during this time, Cohen’s careful analysis of primary archival sources tells a different story. Far from seeing a fallow musical landscape, Cohen finds that Central European Jews in the United States spearheaded a major revision of the sounds and traditions of synagogue music during this period of rapid liturgical change. Focusing on the influences of both individuals and texts, Cohen demonstrates how American Jewish musicians sought to balance artistry and group singing, rather than “progressing” from solo chant to choir and organ. Congregations shifted between musical genres and practices during this period in response to such factors as finances, personnel, and communal cohesiveness. Cohen concludes that the “soundtrack” of nineteenth-century Jewish American music heavily shapes how we look at Jewish American music and life in the first part of the twenty-first century, arguing that how we see, and especially hear, history plays a key role in our understanding of the contemporary world around us. Supplemented with an interactive website that includes the primary source materials, recordings of the music discussed, and a map that highlights the movement of key individuals, Cohen’s research defines more clearly the sound of nineteenth-century American Jewry.

Sacred Song in America
Sacred Song in America

Author: Stephen A. Marini

Publisher: University of Illinois Press

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 418

ISBN-13: 9780252028007

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In Sacred Song in America, Stephen A. Marini explores the full range of American sacred music and demonstrates how an understanding of the meanings and functions of this musical expression can contribute to a greater understanding of religious culture.Marini examines the role of sacred song across the United States, from the musical traditions of Native Americans and the Hispanic peoples of the Southwest, to the Sacred Harp singers of the rural South and the Jewish music revival to the music of the Mormon, Catholic, and Black churches. Including chapters on New Age and Neo-Pagan music, gospel music, and hymnals as well as interviews with iconic composers of religious music, Sacred Song in America pursues a historical, musicological, and theoretical inquiry into the complex roles of ritual music in the public religious culture of contemporary America.

Experiencing Jewish Music in America
Experiencing Jewish Music in America

Author: Tina Frühauf

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2018-06-13

Total Pages: 214

ISBN-13: 1442258403

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Experiencing Jewish Music in America: A Listener's Companion offers an easy-to-read and new perspective on the remarkably diverse landscape that comprises Jewish music in the United States. This much-needed survey on the art of listening to and enjoying this dynamic and diverse musical culture invites listeners curious about the many types of music in its connection to Jewish life. Experiencing Jewish Music in America is intended to encourage further reading about, listening to, and viewing of this portion of America’s musical heritage, and provide listeners with the tools to understand and appreciate this body of work. This volume is designed to appeal to listeners of all stripes, regardless of ability to read music, and of religious or cultural background. Experiencing Jewish Music in America offers insights into an extensive range of musical genres and styles that have been central to the Jewish experience, beginning with the arrival of the first Jewish immigrants in the sixteenth century and the chanting of the Torah, to the sounds of pop today. It lays the groundwork for the listener’s understanding of music in its relation to Jewish studies by exploring the wide range of venues in which this music has appeared, from synagogue to street to stage to screen. Each chapter offers selected case studies where these unique forms of music were—and still can be—heard, seen, and experienced. This book gives readers unique insights into the challenges of classifying Jewish music, while it traces its history and development on American soil and outlines “ways of listening” so readers can draw clear connections to Jewish culture. The volume thus brings together American Jewish history, the story of American and Jewish music, and the roles of the individuals important to both. It offers the reader tools to identify, evaluate, and appreciate the musical genres, and reflect the growing interest of the past decade in the academic study of Jewish music.

Jewish Music
Jewish Music

Author: Abraham Zebi Idelsohn

Publisher: Courier Corporation

Published: 1992-01-01

Total Pages: 580

ISBN-13: 9780486271477

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In this landmark of musical scholarship, the leading 20th-century authority on Jewish music describes and analyzes its elements and characteristics, and chronicles its development from the earliest appearance of Semitic song 2000 years ago to the early 20th century. Liberally illustrating every type of music discussed, the book examines the music as a tonal expression of Judaism, Jewish life and the spiritual aspects of Jewish culture.

Jewish Religious Music in Nineteenth-Century America
Jewish Religious Music in Nineteenth-Century America

Author: Judah M. Cohen

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2019-02-14

Total Pages: 303

ISBN-13: 025304023X

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This study of synagogue music in the United States in the second half of the nineteenth century “sets a high standard for historical musicology” (Musica Judaica). In Jewish Religious Music in Nineteenth-Century America: Restoring the Synagogue Soundtrack, Judah M. Cohen demonstrates that Jews constructed a robust religious musical conversation in the United States during the mid- to late-nineteenth century. While previous studies of American Jewish music history have looked to Europe as a source of innovation during this time, Cohen’s careful analysis of primary archival sources tells a different story. Far from seeing a fallow musical landscape, Cohen finds that Central European Jews in the United States spearheaded a major revision of the sounds and traditions of synagogue music during this period of rapid liturgical change. Focusing on the influences of both individuals and texts, Cohen demonstrates how American Jewish musicians sought to balance artistry and group singing, rather than “progressing” from solo chant to choir and organ. Congregations shifted between musical genres and practices during this period in response to such factors as finances, personnel, and communal cohesiveness. Cohen concludes that the “soundtrack” of nineteenth-century Jewish American music heavily shapes how we look at Jewish American music and life in the first part of the twenty-first century, arguing that how we see, and especially hear, history plays a key role in our understanding of the contemporary world around us. Supplemented with an interactive website that includes the primary source materials, recordings of the music discussed, and a map that highlights the movement of key individuals, Cohen’s research defines more clearly the sound of nineteenth-century American Jewry.

A Fine Romance
A Fine Romance

Author: David Lehman

Publisher: Schocken

Published: 2009-10-06

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13: 0805242716

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In A Fine Romance, David Lehman looks at the formation of the American songbook—the timeless numbers that became jazz standards, iconic love songs, and sound tracks to famous movies—and explores the extraordinary fact that this songbook was written almost exclusively by Jews. An acclaimed poet, editor, and cultural critic, David Lehman hears America singing—with a Yiddish accent. He guides us through America in the golden age of song, when “Embraceable You,” “White Christmas,” “Easter Parade,” “Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered,” “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” “My Romance,” “Cheek to Cheek,” “Stormy Weather,” and countless others became nothing less than the American sound track. The stories behind these songs, the shows from which many of them came, and the shows from which many of them came, and the composers and lyricists who wrote them give voice to a specifically American saga of love, longing, assimilation, and transformation. Lehman’s analytical skills, wit, and exuberance infuse this book with an energy and a tone like no other: at once sharply observant, personally searching, and attuned to the songs that all of us love. He helps us understand how natural it should be that Wizard of Oz composer Harold Arlen was the son of a cantor who incorporated “Over the Rainbow” into his Sabbath liturgy, and why Cole Porter—the rare non-Jew in this pantheon of musicians who wrote these classic songs shaped America even as America was shaping them. (Part of the Jewish Encounter series)