| Klezmer | |
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| Native name | קלעזמער |
| Other names | Jewish instrumental folk music, Freylekh music |
| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | Ashkenazic Jewish ceremonies, especially weddings, in Eastern Europe |
| Typical instruments | Standard orchestra instruments,accordion,cimbalom |
  Israeli music |
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| Religious |
| Secular |
| Israel |
| Dance |
| Music for holidays |
Klezmer (Yiddish:קלעזמער orכּלי־זמר) is an instrumental musical tradition of theAshkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe.[1] The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for listening; these would have been played at weddings and other social functions.[2][3] The musical genre incorporated elements of many other musical genres includingOttoman (especiallyGreek andRomanian) music,Baroque music, German andSlavic folk dances, and religious Jewish music.[4][5] As the music arrived in the United States, it lost some of its traditional ritual elements and adopted elements of Americanbig band and popular music.[6][7] Among the European-born klezmers who popularized the genre in the United States in the 1910s and 1920s wereDave Tarras andNaftule Brandwein; they were followed by American-born musicians such as Max Epstein,Sid Beckerman and Ray Musiker.[8]
After the destruction of Jewish life in Eastern Europe duringthe Holocaust, and a general fall in the popularity of klezmer music in the United States, the music began to be popularized again in the late 1970s in the so-called Klezmer Revival.[1] During the 1980s and onwards, musicians experimented with traditional and experimental forms of the genre, releasing fusion albums combining the genre withjazz,punk, and other styles.[9] By the 1980s and 1990s the American revival spread to Europe and inspired a new interest in the genre in places such as Germany, France, Poland and Russia. A parallel tradition has also continued in Israel with such figures as Moussa Berlin.
The termklezmer, as used in theYiddish language, has aHebrew etymology:klei, meaning "tools, utensils or instruments of" andzemer, "melody"; leading tok'lei zemerכְּלֵי זֶמֶר, meaning "musical instruments".[10][1] Over time the usage of "klezmer" in a Yiddish context evolved to describe musicians instead of their instruments, first inBohemia in the second half of the sixteenth century and then inPoland, possibly as a response to the new status of the musicians who were at that time forming professional guilds.[11] Previously the musician may have been referred to as alets (לץ) or other terms.[12][13] After the termklezmer became the preferred term for these professional musicians in Yiddish-speaking Eastern Europe, other types of musicians were more commonly known asmuziker ormuzikant. Twentieth-century Russian scholars sometimes used the term "klezmer";Ivan Lipaev did not use it, butMoisei Beregovsky did when publishing in Yiddish orUkrainian.[11]
It was not until the late 20th century that the word "klezmer" became a commonly known English-language term.[14] During that time, throughmetonymy it came to refer not only to the musician but to the musical genre they played, a meaning which it had not had in Yiddish.[15][16][17] Early 20th century recording industry materials and other writings had referred to it as Hebrew, Jewish, or Yiddish dance music, or sometimes using the Yiddish termFreilech music ("Cheerful music"). The term 'klezmer' to refer to a genre of music was popularized as a marketing term in the late 1970s by Revival bands; Walter Zev Feldman, whose 1979 LP withAndy Statman used the term, claims credit for this shift in usage.[18]
The traditional style of playing klezmer music, including tone, typicalcadences, andornamentation, sets it apart from other genres.[19] Although klezmer music emerged from a larger Eastern European Jewish musical culture that includedJewish cantorial music,HasidicNiguns, and laterYiddish theatre music, it also borrowed from the surrounding folk musics of Central and Eastern Europe and from cosmopolitan European musical forms.[4][20] Therefore it evolved into an overall style which has recognizable elements from all of those other genres.
Few klezmer musicians before the late nineteenth century had conservatory musical training, but they generally learned through apprenticeship and inherited a rich tradition with its own advanced musical techniques.[21] Each musician had their understanding of how the style should be "correctly" performed.[22][19] The usage of these ornaments was not random; the matters of "taste", self-expression,variation and restraint were and remain important elements of how to interpret the music.[19]
Klezmer musicians apply the overall style to available specific techniques on each melodic instrument. They incorporate and elaborate the vocal melodies of Jewish religious practice, including the vocal style of theHazzan,Jewish prayer, and paraliturgical song, extending the range of human voice into the musical expression possible on instruments.[23] Among those stylistic elements that are considered typically "Jewish" in klezmer music are those which are shared with cantorial orHasidic vocal ornaments, including imitations of sighing or laughing.[24] Various Yiddish terms were used for these vocal-like ornaments such asקרעכץ (Krekhts, "groan" or "moan"),קנײטש (kneytsh, "wrinkle" or "fold"), andקװעטש (kvetsh, "pressure" or "stress").[10] Other ornaments such astrills,grace notes,appoggiaturas,glitshn (glissandos),tshoks (a kind ofbent notes of cackle-like sound), flageolets (string harmonics),[25][26]pedal notes,mordents,slides and typical klezmer cadences are also important to the style.[19] In particular, the cadences which draw on religious Jewish music identify a piece more strongly as a klezmer tune, even if its broader structure was borrowed from a non-Jewish source.[27][20] Sometimes the termdreydlekh is used only for trills, while other use it for all klezmer ornaments.[28] Unlike in Classical music,vibrato is used sparingly, and is treated as another type of ornament.[24][19]
The accompaniment style varies depending on instrumentation and context, ranging from playing in octaves without harmonization, to partial chords played by a second violinist, to very elaborate harmonized brass bands arrangements in the twentieth century.[29][30]
The repertoire of klezmer musicians was very diverse and tied to specific social functions and dances, especially of the traditional wedding.[2][20] These melodies might have a non-Jewish origin, or have been composed by a klezmer, but only rarely are they attributed to a specific composer.[31] Generally klezmer music can be divided into two broad categories: music for specific dances, and music for listening (at the table, in processions, ceremonial, etc.).[31]
Given that Ashkenazic Jewish weddings have taken place in many countries and historical contexts, the dances preserved in klezmer music show a variety of ritual and cultural origins:
Historically, klezmer musicians also performed a variety of ritual and listening music which may have been rhythmic or freeform depending on the type. As with dances, these often borrowed from Jewish or non-Jewish folk melodies, religious music, and so on.[37]
Klezmer music is an instrumental tradition, without much of a history of songs or singing. In Eastern Europe, Klezmers did traditionally accompany the vocal stylings of theBadchen (wedding entertainer), although their performances were typically improvised couplets and the calling of ceremonies rather than songs.[40][41] (The importance of the Badchen gradually decreased by the twentieth century, although they still continued in some traditions.[42])
As for the klezmer orchestra, its size and composition varied by time and place. The klezmer bands of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century were small, with roughly three to five musicians playing woodwind orstring instruments.[22] Another common configuration in that era was similar toHungarian bands today, typically a lead violinist, second violin, cello, andcimbalom.[43][44] In the mid-nineteenth century, the clarinet started to appear in those small Klezmer ensembles as well.[45] In Ukraine, by the last decades of the century the orchestras had grown larger, averaging seven to twelve members; incorporatingbrass instruments and up to twenty performers for a prestigious occasion.[46][47] (However, for poor weddings a large klezmer ensemble might only send three or four of its junior members.[46]) In these larger orchestras, on top of the core instrumentation of strings and woodwinds, ensembles often featuredcornets,C clarinets,trombones, acontrabass, a large Turkish drum, and several extra violins.[31] The inclusion of Jews in tsarist army bands during the 19th century may also have led to the introduction of typical military band instruments into klezmer. With such large orchestras, the music was arranged so that the bandleader soloist could still be heard at key moments.[48] InGalicia, andBelarus, the smaller string ensemble with cimbalom remained the norm into the twentieth century.[49][31] American klezmer, as it developed in dancehalls and wedding banquets of the early twentieth century, had a more complete orchestration not unlike those used in popular orchestras of the time. They use a clarinet, saxophone, or trumpet for the melody, and make great use of the trombone for slides and other flourishes.
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The melody in klezmer music was historically generally assigned to the lead violin, although occasionally it went to the flute and eventually clarinet.[31] The other instrumentalists provide harmony, rhythm, and some counterpoint (the latter usually coming from the second violin or viola). The clarinet now often plays the melody. Brass instruments—such as the French valvedcornet and keyed German trumpet—eventually inherited a counter-voice role.[50] Modern klezmer instrumentation is more commonly influenced by the instruments of the 19th-century military bands than the earlier orchestras.
Percussion in early 20th-century klezmer recordings was generally minimal—no more than awood block orsnare drum. In Eastern Europe, percussion was often provided by a drummer who played aframe drum, orpoyk, sometimes calledbaraban. A poyk is similar to abass drum and often has a cymbal or piece of metal mounted on top, which is struck by a beater or a small cymbal strapped to the hand.
Klezmer music is a genre that developed partly in theWestern musical tradition but also in theOttoman Empire, and is primarily an oral tradition which does not have a well-established literature to explain itsmodes and modal progression.[51][52] But, as with other types of Ashkenazic Jewish music, it has a complex system of modes which were used in its compositions.[10][53] Many of its melodies do not fit well in themajor andminor terminology used in Western music, nor is the music systematicallymicrotonal in the way thatMiddle Eastern music is.[51]Nusach terminology, as developed forCantorial music in the nineteenth century, is often used instead, and indeed many klezmer compositions draw heavily on religious music.[39] But it also incorporates elements ofBaroque and Eastern European folk music, making description based only on religious terminology incomplete.[27][29][54] Still, since theKlezmer revival of the 1970s, the terms for Jewish prayer modes are the most common to describe those used in klezmer.[55] The terms used inYiddish for these modes includenusach (נוסח);shteyger (שטײגער), "manner, mode of life", which describes the typical melodic character, important notes and scale; andgust (גוסט), a word meaning "taste" which was commonly used byMoisei Beregovsky.[29][31][52]
Beregovsky, who was writing in theStalinist era and was constrained by having to downplay klezmer's religious aspects, did not use the terminology ofsynagogue modes, except in early work in 1929. Instead, he relied on German-inspired musical terminology of major, minor, and "other" modes, which he described in technical terms.[31][56] In his 1940s works he noted that the majority of the klezmer repertoire seemed to be in a minor key, whethernatural minor or others, that around a quarter of the material was inFreygish, and that around a fifth of the repertoire was in a major key.[31]
Another set of terminology sometimes used to describe klezmer music is that of theMakams used inOttoman and otherMiddle Eastern music.[55][57] This approach dates back to Idelsohn in the early twentieth century, who was very familiar with Middle Eastern music, and has been developed in the past decade by Joshua Horowitz.[58][54][55][51]
Finally, some Klezmer music, and especially that composed in the United States from the mid-twentieth century onwards, may not be composed with these traditional modes, but rather built aroundchords.[27]
Because there is no agreed-upon, complete system for describing modes in Klezmer music, this list is imperfect and may conflate concepts which some scholars view as separate.[53][58] Another problem in listing these terms as simple eight-note (octatonic)scales is that it makes it harder to see how Klezmer melodic structures can work as five-notepentachords, how parts of different modes typically interact, and what the cultural significance of a given mode might be in a traditional Klezmer context.[51][52]
The Bible has several descriptions of orchestras andLevites making music, but after the destruction of theSecond Temple in 70CE, manyrabbis discouraged musical instruments.[61] Therefore, while there may have been Jewish musicians in different times and places since then, the concept of a "Klezmer" musician arose much more recently.[62] The earliest written record of the use of the word was identified byIsaac Rivkind [he] as being in a Jewish council meeting fromKraków in 1595.[63][64] They may have existed even earlier inPrague, as references to them have been found as early as 1511 and 1533.[65] It was in the 1600s that the situation of Jewish musicians inPoland improved, as they gained the right to formGuilds (Khevre), and therefore to set their own fees, hire Christians, and so on.[66] Therefore over time this new form of professional musician developed new forms of music and elaborated this tradition across a wide area of Eastern European Jewish life. The rise ofHasidic Judaism in the late eighteenth century and onwards also contributed to the development of klezmer, due to their emphasis on dancing and wordless melodies as a component of Jewish practice.[17]
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The nineteenth century also saw the rise of a number of klezmer violin virtuosos who combined the techniques of classical violinists such asIvan Khandoshkin and ofBessarabian folk violinists, and who composed dance and display pieces that became widespread even after the composers were gone.[67] Among these figures were Aron-Moyshe Kholodenko "Pedotser", Yosef Drucker "Stempenyu", Alter Goyzman "Alter Chudnover" andJosef Gusikov.[68][69][70][71]
Unlike in the United States, where there was a robust Klezmer recording industry, there was relatively less klezmer recorded in Europe in the early twentieth century. The majority of European recordings of Jewish music consisted of Cantorial andYiddish Theatre music, with only a few dozen known to exist of Klezmer music.[72] These include violin pieces by artists such asOscar Zehngut,Jacob Gegna,H. Steiner, Leon Ahl, and Josef Solinski; flute pieces by S. Kosch, and ensemble recordings byBelf's Romanian Orchestra, the Russian-Jewish Orchestra, Jewish Wedding Orchestra, and Titunshnayder's Orchestra.[72][73]
The loosening of restrictions on Jews in theRussian Empire, and their newfound access to academic and conservatory training, created a class of scholars who began to reexamine and evaluate klezmer using modern techniques.[31]Abraham Zevi Idelsohn was one such figure, who sought to find an ancient Middle Eastern origin for Jewish music in the diaspora.[74] There was also new interest in collecting and studying Jewish music and folklore, including Yiddish songs, folk tales, and instrumental music. An early expedition was byJoel Engel, who collected folk melodies in his birthplace ofBerdyansk in 1900. The first figure to collect large amounts of klezmer music wasSusman Kiselgof, who made several expeditions to thePale of Settlement from 1907 to 1915.[75] He was soon followed by other scholars such asMoisei Beregovsky andSofia Magid, Soviet scholars of Yiddish and klezmer music.[76][31] Most of the materials collected in those expeditions are now held by theVernadsky National Library of Ukraine.[77]
Beregovsky, writing in the late 1930s, lamented how little scholars knew about the range of playing technique and social context of Klezmers from past eras, except for the late nineteenth century which could be investigated through elderly musicians who still remembered it.[2]
Jewish music in the Soviet Union, and the continued use of klezmer music, went through several phases of official support or censorship. The officially supported Soviet Jewish musical culture of 1920s involved works based on or satirizing traditional melodies and themes, whereas those of the 1930s were often "Russian" cultural works translated into a Yiddish context.[78] After 1948, Soviet Jewish culture entered a phase of repression, meaning that Jewish music concerts, whether tied to Hebrew, Yiddish, or instrumental klezmer, were no longer allowed to be performed.[79] Moisei Beregovsky's academic work was shut down in 1949 and he was arrested and deported toSiberia in 1951.[80][81] The repression was eased in the mid-1950s as some Jewish and Yiddish performances were allowed to return to the stage once again.[82] However, the main venue for klezmer has always been traditional community events and weddings, not the concert stage or academic institute; those traditional venues were repressed along with Jewish culture in general, according to anti-religious Soviet policy.[83]
The first klezmers to arrive in the United States followed the first large waves of Eastern European Jewish immigration which began after 1880, establishing themselves mainly in large cities like New York, Philadelphia and Boston.[17] Klezmers—often younger members of klezmer families, or less established musicians—started to arrive from the Russian Empire, theKingdom of Romania andAustria-Hungary.[84] Some of them found work in restaurants, dance halls, union rallies, wine cellars, and other modern venues in places like New York'sLower East Side.[85][86] But the major source of income for klezmer musicians seems to have remained weddings andSimchas, as in Europe.[87] Those early generations of klezmers are much more poorly documented than those working in the 1910s and 1920s; many never recorded or published music, although some are remembered through family or community history, such as the Lemish klezmer family ofIași, Romania, who arrived in Philadelphia in the 1880s and established a klezmer dynasty there.[88][87]
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The vitality of the Jewish music industry in major American cities attracted ever more klezmers from Europe in the 1910s. This coincided with the development of the recording industry, which recorded a number of these klezmer orchestras. By the time of theFirst World War, the industry turned its attention to ethnic dance music and a number of bandleaders were hired by record companies such asEdison Records,Emerson Records,Okeh Records, and theVictor Recording Company to record 78 rpm discs.[89] The first of these wasAbe Elenkrig, a barber and cornet player from a klezmer family in Ukraine whose 1913 recordingFon der Choope (From the Wedding) has been recognized by theLibrary of Congress.[90][91][92]
Among the European-born klezmers recording during that decade were some from the Ukrainian territory of theRussian Empire (Abe Elenkrig,Dave Tarras,Shloimke Beckerman,Joseph Frankel, andIsrael J. Hochman), some fromAustro-HungarianGalicia (Naftule Brandwein,Harry Kandel and Berish Katz), and some fromRomania (Abe Schwartz,Max Leibowitz,Max Yankowitz,Joseph Moskowitz).[93][94][95][96]
The mid-1920s also saw a number of popular novelty "Klezmer" groups which performed on the radio orvaudeville stages. These includedJoseph Cherniavsky's Yiddish-American Jazz Band, whose members would dress as parodies ofCossacks orHasidim.[97] Another such group was the Boibriker Kapelle, which performed on the radio and in concerts trying to recreate a nostalgic, old-fashionedGalician Klezmer sound.[98] With the passing of theImmigration Act of 1924, which greatly restricted Jewish immigration from Europe, and then the onset of theGreat Depression by 1930, the market for Yiddish and klezmer recordings in the United States saw a steep decline, which essentially ended the recording careers of many of the popular bandleaders of the 1910s and 1920s, and made the large klezmer orchestra less viable.[99]
Along with the rise of klezmer "big bands" in the 1910s and 1920s, a handful of Jewish clarinet players who had led those bands became celebrities in their own right, with a legacy that lasted into subsequent decades. The most popular among these wereNaftule Brandwein,Dave Tarras, andShloimke Beckerman.[100][101][102]
In the 1970s there was a renewal of interest in Klezmer music centered primarily in the United States. Notable early figures and groups wereGiora Feidman,The Klezmorim, Walter Zev Feldman,Andy Statman, and theKlezmer Conservatory Band. They drew their repertoire from recordings and surviving musicians of U.S. klezmer.[103] In particular, clarinetists such asDave Tarras and Max Epstein became mentors to this new generation of klezmer musicians.[104] In 1985,Henry Sapoznik and Adrienne Cooper foundedKlezKamp to teach klezmer and other Yiddish music.[105]
The 1980s saw a second wave of revival, as interest grew in more traditionally inspired performances with string instruments, largely with non-Jews of the United States and Germany. Musicians began to track down older European klezmer by listening to recordings, finding transcriptions, and making field recordings of the few klezmorim left in Eastern Europe. Key performers in this style areJoel Rubin,Budowitz, Khevrisa, Di Naye Kapelye, Yale Strom, The Chicago Klezmer Ensemble, TheMaxwell Street Klezmer Band, the violinistsAlicia Svigals, Steven Greenman,[106] Cookie Segelstein andElie Rosenblatt, flutist Adrianne Greenbaum, andtsimbl playerPete Rushefsky. Bands likeBrave Old World,Hot Pstromi andThe Klezmatics also emerged during this period.
In the 1990s, musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area helped further interest in klezmer music by taking it into new territory. Groups such as the New Klezmer Trio inspired a new wave of bands merging klezmer with other forms of music, such asJohn Zorn's Masada and Bar Kokhba, Naftule's Dream, Don Byron's Mickey Katz project and violinistDaniel Hoffman's klezmer/jazz/Middle-Eastern fusion band Davka.[103] The New Orleans Klezmer All-Stars[107] also formed in 1991 with a mixture of New Orleans funk, jazz, and klezmer styles.
Starting in 2008, "The Other Europeans" project, funded by several EU cultural institutions,[108] spent a year doing intensive field research in the region ofMoldavia under the leadership of Alan Bern and scholar Zev Feldman. They wanted to explore klezmer andlăutari roots, and fuse the music of the two "other European" groups. The resulting band now performs internationally.
A separate klezmer tradition had developed in Israel in the 20th century. Clarinetists Moshe Berlin and Avrum Leib Burstein are known exponents of the klezmer style in Israel. To preserve and promote klezmer music in Israel, Burstein founded the Jerusalem Klezmer Association, which has become a center for learning and performance of klezmer music in the country.[109]
Since the late 1980s, an annual klezmer festival is held every summer inSafed, in the north ofIsrael.[110][111][112][113]
While traditional performances may have been on the decline, many Jewish composers who had mainstream success, such asLeonard Bernstein andAaron Copland, continued to be influenced by the klezmeric idioms heard during their youth (asGustav Mahler had been).George Gershwin was familiar with klezmer music, and the opening clarinet glissando of "Rhapsody in Blue" suggests this influence, although the composer did not compose klezmer directly.[114] Some clarinet stylings of swing jazz bandleadersBenny Goodman andArtie Shaw can be interpreted as having been derived from klezmer, as can the "freilach swing" playing of other Jewish artists of the period such as trumpeterZiggy Elman.
At the same time, non-Jewish composers were also turning to klezmer for a prolific source of fascinating thematic material.Dmitri Shostakovich in particular admired klezmer music for embracing both the ecstasy and the despair of human life, and quoted several melodies in hischamber masterpieces, thePiano Quintet in G minor, op. 57 (1940), thePiano Trio No. 2 in E minor, op. 67 (1944), and theString Quartet No. 8 in C minor, op. 110 (1960).
The compositions of Israeli-born composerOfer Ben-Amots incorporate aspects of klezmer music, most notably his 2006 compositionKlezmer Concerto. The piece is for klezmer clarinet (written for Jewish clarinetistDavid Krakauer),[115] string orchestra, harp and percussion.[116]
The figure of the klezmer, as a romantic symbol of nineteenth century Jewish life, appeared in the art of a number of twentieth century Jewish artists such asAnatoly Kaplan,Issachar Ber Ryback,Marc Chagall, andChaim Goldberg. Kaplan, making his art in theSoviet Union, was quite taken by the romantic images of the Klezmer in literature, and in particular inSholem Aleichem'sStempenyu, and depicted them in rich detail.[117]
In Jewish literature, the klezmer was often represented as a romantic and somewhat unsavory figure.[121] However, in nineteenth century works by writers such asMendele Mocher Sforim andSholem Aleichem they were also portrayed as great artists and virtuosos who delighted the masses.[31] Klezmers also appeared in non-Jewish Eastern European literature, such as in the epic poemPan Tadeusz, which depicted a character named Jankiel Cymbalist, or in the short stories ofLeopold von Sacher-Masoch.[12] InGeorge Eliot'sDaniel Deronda (1876), theGerman Jewish music teacher is named Herr Julius Klesmer.[122] The novel was later adapted into a Yiddish musical byAvram Goldfaden titledBen Ami (1908).[123]
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