Monthly Archives: November 2006

‘A Living Legacy’ Exhibition at HUC

A LIVING LEGACY:
AMERICAN JEWISH LITURGICAL COMPOSERS OF THE 20th & 21st CENTURIES
A multi-media exhibition celebrating the creativity and contributions of
Samuel Adler, Charles Davidson, Jack Gottlieb, Michael Isaacson,
Gershon Kingsley,
Stephen Richards, Bonia Shur, Simon Sargon, Ben Steinberg, and Yehudi Wyner

and reflecting the enduring inspiration of their mentors

On View: November 12, 2006 – January 31, 2007
Museum Hours: Mondays-Thursdays, 9 am – 5 pm; Fridays, 9 am – 3 pm;
Also Sunday, December 10, 10 am – 2 pm
Information/Tours: 212-824-2205
Admission: Free, Photo ID required

‘Funny, It Doesn’t Sound Jewish’ at National Arts Club

Monday, December 18, 2006 at 8 PM
National Arts Club
15 Gramercy Park South (at 20th St. between Park Avenue & Irving
Place), New York City
Free event.

Funny, It Doesn’t Sound Jewish
Slide Lecture, Musical Performance & Booksigning
In his latest book, Funny, It Doesn’t Sound Jewish, composer and
author, Jack Gottlieb chronicles how Jewish songwriters and composers
transformed American popular music of the mid-twentieth-century. Dr.
Gottlieb will play piano and show vintage images as he illustrates
the connection, citing instances where Yiddish songs and cantorial
music were adapted by Jewish songwriters as they penned tunes for Tin
Pan Alley, Broadway, and Hollywood. The book (which includes a CD)
will be available at NAC member discount. A reception will follow.

Milken Archive Releases 50 CD set

Milken Archive Completes First Phase of Multi-Year Recording Project with Release of 49th and 50th CDs-
and Complete Box Set

The Milken Archive of American Jewish Music, the most comprehensive exploration of music related to Jewish life in America ever undertaken, has reached a major milestone with the release of the 49th and 50th CDs in its pioneering recording series on Naxos American Classics.

These discs illustrate two of the Archive’s primary goals: to reconstruct and preserve for current and future generations major musical manifestations of the American Jewish experience and to reveal the intersection of Jewish composers and Jewish subject matter with some of the major genres in Western classical music.
The Milken Archive has also released a deluxe box set of < http://www.milkenarchive.org/cds/cds.taf?cdid=51all 50 Milken Archive CDs.…
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Artist-in-Residence Opportunity

Sarah Beller is serving as co-coordinator for the Artist-in-Residence program at
the National Havurah Committee’s Summer Institute, a week-long
celebration of Jewish learning and living attended by a diverse group of
Jews from all over North America (Conservative, Reconstructionist,
Reform, Renewal, Orthodox, single, partnered, young, old, LGBT, etc.).

Under a grant from the Poretsky Foundation, the NHC sponsors two Jewish
Artists-in-Residence to teach and be part of the Institute community.
The application forms are available online, and those who wish may
apply.

The Poretsky Artist-in-Residence grant is ideal for those wishing to
explore a participatory project or thematic course idea in a supportive
community that itself includes a number of talented artists. The program is
particularly searching for artist-teachers who can help others become
art-makers for the week, and who will participate actively as both
teachers and learners in the Institute community that forms each summer.…
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Rabbi Joe Black & Maxwell Street Klezmer Band

Rabbi Joe Black with The Maxwell Street Klezmer Band in Two Hanukkah Concerts!
Wednesday, December 20 (sixth night of Hanukkah)
6:00 pm Family Concert
7:30 pm Community Concert
Temple Sholom of Chicago
3480 N. Lake Shore Drive
Doors and concessions open 1/2 hour before each concert
Tickets
$12 advance/$15 at the door
Children age 3 and under free
Family maximum $50 advance/$55 at the door
Come early – stay late! One ticket price for one concert or both!
Be a Maccabee!
For $250, receive a reserved parking space in the Temple Sholom lot the
night of the concert, reserved concert seats for up to 6 people, a Rabbi Joe
Black CD, & a Maxwell Street Klezmer Band CD. Maccabee spaces are limited!
Reserve your tickets today!…
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The Strauss/Warschauer Duo in Berlin

Dienstag, 21. November 2006, 21 Uhr

Ort: Maschinenhaus in der Kulturbauerei, Knaackstr. 97
Eintritt: VVK: 12,- Euro (zzgl. VVG) // AK: 15,- Euro
Karten unter: 030 – 44 31 51 51
Beginn: 21 Uhr

The Strauss/Warschauer Duo

Eben klagt und weint sie noch – und im nächsten Moment hüpft sie fröhlich
davon und rennt, getrieben von purer Lebensfreude, immer schneller, die Violine
von Deborah Strauss, gefolgt von der federleichtfüßigen Gitarre Jeff
Warschauers. Die Musiker aus Brooklyn sind – konzertant und pädagogisch –
Koryphäen in
Sachen Klezmer und Yiddish Music. Sie waren Mitglieder der Klezmer Conservatory
Band und haben mit Itzhak Perlman musiziert. Manche Lieder dieser
wunderbaren, leisen CD singt Jeff Warschauer, der auch begnadeter Mandolinist ist,
alleine – mit hellem traurig-frohen Tenor. Wenn Deborah Strauss singt, dann ist es
filigran, behutsam, hört bei Duettpassagen genau auf ihren Partner hörend.…
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Bo Shir Ivri , Come Thou Hebrew Song– A NEW BOOK

The publication of a new book “Bo Shir Ivri (Come, Thou Hebrew Song) – Songs of the Land of Israel: Musical and Social Aspects” (Haifa University Press, 2005) by Dr. Talila Eliram, will be celebrated in the auditorium of the music dept. at Bar Ilan University, on Wednesday, 22 November, 2006, 7:30pm. Free admission. Please confirm your participation (or leave a message) at either: 08-9432870, or 054-8032870

Metropolitan Klezmer and Isle of Klezbos in East Village

Metropolitan Klezmer and Isle of Klezbos
perform together at Nuyorican Poets Cafe,
an East Village cultural landmark for 30 years!
Tuesday, November 21st
8pm double bill, $8 cover charge
as part of the club’s monthly Women Take the Bandstand series
236 East 3rd Street (between Avenues B & C), NYC
hotline: 212-505-8183

www.nuyorican.org
www.metropolitanklezmer.com
www.myspace.com/metroklez
www.myspace.com/klezbos

Shalom Kids by Roberta Seltzer CD

A new CD for children called “Shalom Kids” is now available through CD Baby by Roberta Seltzer.Roberta Seltzer is a children’s performer whose warm voice delights both youngsters and adults. She entertains extensively at temples, schools, libraries and organizations,
where she builds a warm rapport with her audience. In her CD SHALOM KIDS, she shares some of her favorite Shabbat melodies and familiar playsongs.

Roberta serves as music specialist at various temples, day schools and community centers. Sound clips for the CD are available at CD Baby.
http://cdbaby.com/cd/seltzer

Ruth and Naomi Raise Your Spirits in Israel

www.raiseyourspirits.org
On stage in Alon Shvut, Gush Etzion, Israel is the season’s newest SMASH
HIT musical production – RUTH & NAOMI in the Fields of Bethlehem.

RUTH & NAOMI is the fourth production of the Efrat/Gush Etzion Raise Your Spirits
Summer Stock Festival. It follows Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “JOSEPH & The Amazing
Technicolor Dreamcoat” and two other original musicals, “ESTHER & The Secrets in The
King’s Court” and “NOAH! Ride the Wave!” “ESTHER,” “NOAH!” and “RUTH & NAOMI” were
all written by the team of Arlene Chertoff, Toby Klein Greenwald and Sharon Katz.
The music for “RUTH & NAOMI” was composed by Mitch Clyman.

Raise Your Spirits has already performed for more than 20,000 women and raised more
than 400,000 NIS for charity.

This year’s production is totally sold out until the middle of November, but tickets
are still available for November 20th and November 30th.…
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Hanukah Hopkele – Yiddish klezmer keilidh

Live klezmer music and dance with attitude!
The Hanukah Hopkele – Yiddish klezmer keilidh.
Sunday 17 December 2006
Doors open 7.15pm, first dance 7.45pm

Merlin Shepherd’s Chanukah Dance Band
will provide the musical entertainment (Merlin Shepherd on clarinet, Ilana
Cravitz
on violin, Polina Shepherd on accordion and Julia Doyle on bass) and
your dance caller for the evening will be Sue Foy, all the way from
Budapest. Your last chance to bop the klezmer way in 2006!

Venue: 40 Hallam Street, London W1. Nearest tubes: Great Portland Street;
Oxford Circus.

http://www.ilanacravitz.com/hopkele.html
Tickets £15, £12 concs. Call 020 8985 3724 or email hopkele@hotmail.co.uk to
book.
This special party is being hosted and supported by Central Synagogue, and
forms part of the Jewish Music Institute’s Autumn/Spring programme.…
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Woody Guthrie’s Happy Joyous Hanukkah Tour

The Klezmatics will be in conert for a Woody Guthrie music performance to bring Happy Hanukkah music to Washington state.
When: December 12, 7:30pm
Where: Kirkland Performance Center
350 Kirkland Avenue
Kirkland, WA 98033
Info: Adult $36 Senior $32.50 Youth $15 Group $32
All tickets subject to a $1.00 service fee
(Youth is 25 and younger; Senior is 62 and older)
For information call Kirkland Performance Center at
(425) 893-9900 or visit www.kpcenter.org
Taking advantage of a rare opportunity, Kirkland Performance Center
welcomes The Klezmatics to their 2006-2007 line-up midseason. The
Klezmatics will perform Woody Guthrie’s Happy Joyous Hanukkah Tour at
KPC December 12.
The Klezmatics will be presenting a contagious celebration of Hanukkah,
marrying their soulful and ebullient Jewish roots to Woody Guthrie’s
poignantly mesmerizing and newly discovered lyrics.…
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American Democracy Inspires Jewish Music

Meira Warshauer Look to the Light will be performed on November 12 at Princeton University as part of American Democracy Inspires Jewish Music and Poetry Program

Meira Warshauer’s Look to the Light for SATB and piano, with text by
Rabbi Dan Grossman will be performed by Sharim V’Sharot, central New
Jersey’s select Jewish choir, Elayne Robinson Grossman, Music Director,
as part of their “American Democracy Inspires Jewish Music and Poetry”
program on Sunday, November 12 – 1:00 PM in Frist Hall on the campus of
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey. Look to the Light portrays
Chanukah themes of light and freedom through the lens of American
experience, with references to George Washington and Billings, Montana.

This program is free and open to the public, however reservations are
required.…
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Le festival NIGUNIM

Le festival NIGUNIM (Mélodies) a débuté avec brio. Ceux d’entre vous qui ont assisté au concert de Gerard Edery peuvent en témoigner!

Et voici les deux évènements du week-end prochain:

Samedi 11 novembre à 20h
Salle Ernest Ansermet (Maison de la Radio, 66 Bd Carl Vogt)

TOHU veBOHU musiques klezmer, arabo-andalouse et de la Renaissance
avec: Michel Borzykowski: saxophone, Christine Niggeler: accordéon, Bianca
Mihaies-Favez: violon, Adrien Gaubert: contrebasse, Adel Degaichia: chant,
percussion & cordes, Claude Jordan: flûtes, Cecilia Knudtsen: viole, Laura Mendy:
clavecin, Patricia Esteban: flûtes & percussion, Julie Mazille: flûtes & chant

et:

Dimanche 12 novembre à 17h
Salle Robert Dunand ( 9 rue du Marché, Carouge)

CONTES JUIFS EN MUSIQUE
pour enfants et adultes de 7 à 777 ans! avec 2 invités successifs:

– Rose Bacot (voix et clarinette):
“Zlateh la chèvre” (d’après I.Bashevis Singer)

– la Compagnie “2 temps 3 mouvements”:
“Otto, autobiographie d’un ours en peluche” (d’après Tomi Ungerer)
avec Nathalie Athlan, Sylvie Zahnd, Marc Athlan & Proum-Proum:
Mise en scène et chorégraphies : Rossella Riccaboni

Billets en vente:
à l’entrée
aux guichets ResaPlus (liste sur www.resaplus.ch)
par téléphone: 0900 552 333 (1 fr/minute)

tarifs et autres infos sur www.amj.ch
Le comité de l’AMJ se réjouit de vous y retrouver avec de la belle musique et de
l’amitié!…
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CHOIRS AND CANTORS BRING ON THE LIGHT THIS CHANUKAH

Over 250 adults and children will celebrate Chanukah, the Festival of Lights, in concert, 3 P.M., Sunday, December
10, 2006 as Congregation Rodeph Sholom of Manhattan hosts its unique, multigenerational Festival of Choirs.
Congregation Rodeph Sholom is located at 7 West 83rd Street off of Central Park West in Manhattan. For more information about this concert, please call (212) 362-8800, ext. 1337. A Festival of Choirs is free of charge and open to the entire community.

The seventh annual concert will feature cantors and their volunteer adult and children’s choirs from all
over the New York metropolitan area. This year, the first night of Chanukah is Friday, December 15, 2006.

“There is no better way to usher in the festival of Chanukah than to see people from all ages, literally from age five to 85 singing together,” according to Congregation Rodeph Sholom’s Senior Cantor, Rebecca Garfein.…
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‘Ud & Piyyut 2006 The Legacy of Asher Mizrahi

This year’s Ud U’fiyyut (a co-production of the JMRC and the Confederation House in Jerusalem, in the framework of the International ‘Ud Festival Jerusalem, 2006) bears the title:
Mi-qeddem U-miyyam: The Legacy of Asher Mizrahi

This concert is dedicated to the work of Asher Mizrahi – poet, musician, composer, artist and a teacher of Hebrew and music – who was born in Jerusalem in 1890, lived more than 40 years in Tunisia, and died in Jerusalem in 1967. Mizrahi wrote songs in Ladino, Hebrew Piyyutim of longing to Zion, as well as Arab-Tunisian songs, performed in the 1930′ and 1940′ by the most prominent musicians of his time, both Jews and Arabs.

The ‘Ud Ufiyyut series, initiated by the Jewish Music Research Centre at the Hebrew University, together with the Confederation House in Jerusalem as part of the International ‘Us Festival, Jerusalem, is meant to bring closer the academia and the stage.…
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What to Listen For in Jewish Music

By Charles Heller

Heller covers the basics. He does so in a rather quirky way with very short, self-contained chapters. On the one hand, the book presumes one can read notes and there are many musical illustrations. On the other hand, he has some basic music hints –such as an illustration on how to relate notes on the score to a picture of a piano, or what a major and minor chord sound like –examples which makes the book seem as if it’s intended for those who have a very hard time reading music and no music theory background at all. It does seem difficult to me to explain Jewish modal theory if one doesn’t have the basics of a western scale firmly mastered. Somehow I’m having a hard time understanding this book’s audience as the author envisioned it.…
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Marc Blitzstein: A Bio-Bibliography

By Leonard Lehrman

Even though Marc Blitzstein: A Bio-Bibliography is large, with more than 645 pages, this review will be brief, because it’s very easy to describe this book. This is Leonard Lehrman’s labor of love. For years he has been a fan, promoter, musicologist, arranger, adapter, reconstructor and performer of the works of Marc Blitzstein. Blitzstein is a major figure in American music and his star continues to rise. Lehrman’s devotion of years of work is clear in this major reference work. The book is extremely thorough, comprehensive and filled with extraordinary minute detail. It is a must for any music library in a college or university setting, as well as anyone who is studying or working with the music of Marc Blitzstein.

The scope is enormous. It includes a brief biography of Blitzstein, including a genealogy; chronological list of musical works with bibliographies of studies, commentaries and writings about those works; a chronological list of text to the music; an alphabetical list of works with alternate titles; general articles; and information about performances of the works.…
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Come Celebrate Joel Mandelbaum & Friends at PeaceSmiths

On Sun., Nov. 12, 2006 at 3PM PeaceSmiths, The Elie Siegmeister Society, and The Professor Edgar H. Lehrman Memorial Foundation for Ethics, Religion, Science and the Arts, Inc. proudly present A Concert of Music by Joel Mandelbaum & Friends, launching the celebration of his 75th year, with Helene Williams, soprano; Antoinette Blaikie, oboist; and composers Jay Anthony Gach, Leonard Lehrman, & Joel Mandelbaum, the latter two at the piano, at First United Methodist Church, at 25 Broadway (Route 110 – “the last church on the left,” going south), in Amityville, NY. Info: 631-798-0778. A donation of $8 is suggested.

Two pieces will receive their world premieres at this concert: Elie Siegmeister’s “Outside My Window,” on a text by poet Kim Rich, who will also be present; and Mandelbaum’s setting of his own (June 10, 2005) “Letter to Jewish Week,” composed for the occasion.…
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