Jewish Music Research

Case Study Hamburg

Dienstag 01.03.2022 15:00 - 18:30
Youtube

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International conference at the University of Music Hamburg 1. – 3. March 2022

From the Music of the Portuguese synagogue in the 19th
to the Rolf Lieberman Era in the 20th century
The presence of Jewish Culture in Europe is going back to the times of the Roman Empire. In 2021 Germany has celebrated 1700 years of Jewish live and culture. The city of Hamburg decided in 2020 to rebuild the large synagogue on Bornplatz, which had been destroyed 1938 during the Reichskristallnacht. On this occasion, the University of Music in Hamburg initiates an international conference on Jewish music in Hamburg past and present.

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3 – 4:30 pm

Jan Phillip Sprick (Vicepresident of the University of Music Hamburg) Greeting words

Edwin Seroussi (Jerusalem) Keynote and opening session
An Unexpected Musical Encounter: Spanish-Portuguese Liturgical Music in German Synagogues

Jewish liturgical music in German-speaking lands underwent dramatic transformations since the late 18th century as the winds of haskala and reform generated waves of musical experimentation in houses of prayer in large urban centres as well as in small villages. The reshaping of the German synagogue soundscape was a major enterprise of this unprecedented civic, social and religious renewal of Judaism. Abrupt and bold moves of the reform-minded leadership to distance itself from the soundtrack of the synagogues of “old” reminds us of similar radical shifts in religious music history, not the least of which is the Lutheran Reformation. The Hamburg Temple, the pioneer centre of Reform Judaism established in 1818, experimented in a unique fashion. Neighbouring the quarters of the local Spanish-Portuguese congregation, a very small and yet prominent enclave of descendants of converted Jews from the Iberian Peninsula who returned to Judaism, the leaders of the Hamburg Temple decided to hire a cantor of Portuguese Jewish pedigree. This decision unchained one of the most peculiar and under-researched chapters in the history of German Jewish modernity.

Edwin Seroussi is Director of the Jewish Music Research Centre at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a Visiting Scholar in Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College. He is the 2018 Israel Prize laureate in the field of Musicology. He founded and edits Yuval Music Series and is editor of the CD series Anthology of Music Traditions in Israel of the Jewish Music Research Centre.

5 – 6:30 pm

Hervé Roten (Paris) Lecture and discussion
The introduction of Western musical notation and the organ in the French Spanish-Portuguese communities in the 19th: changes and continuities

Since the middle of the 16th century, the South-West of France has sheltered Spanish-Portuguese communities. After a presentation of the musical practice of these ancient congregations of "Marranos", this lecture will attempt to study the evolution of their oral traditions after the introduction of the organ and written music in the Western style, at the beginning of the 19th century. How did the Spanish-Portuguese Jews reorganize their musical liturgy? Who were the main actors (composers or arrangers) of that reform? What impact had those changes on the evolution of oral tradition and its transmission modalities? We will also consider the relation between oral and written tradition and the degree of continuity or change of this liturgical music by comparing several versions of the same prayer (oral and written, monodic and polyphonic versions) over a period of over 100 years.
Finally, we will focus on the role of the organ in the development of the new French synagogue worship and the controversy surrounding the introduction of this instrument.

Hervé Roten PHD in musicology of the University Paris Sorbonne is Director of the European Institute of Jewish Music since its creation in 2006. As a musicologist, he was very early interested in saving and digitalizing archives. He taught this subject for several years at the universities of Reims and Marne-La-Vallée. Hervé Roten is the author of numerous articles, books and discs on Jewish music and is also a producer of radio programs.


program overview

Tuesday march 1st
3 – 4:30 pm Edwin Seroussi (Jerusalem) Keynote and opening session
An Unexpected Musical Encounter: Spanish-Portuguese Liturgical Music in German Synagogues
5 – 6:30 pm Hervé Roten (Paris) Lecture and discussion
The introduction of Western musical notation and the organ in the French Spanish-Portuguese communities in the 19th: changes and continuities

Wednesday march 2nd
3 – 4:30 pm Jascha Nemtsov (Weimar) Lecture and discussion
The Cantor of the Reform Temple in Hamburg Leon Kornitzer and his journal (Der jüdische Kantor)
5 – 6:30 pm Jascha Nemtsov, Hervé Roten, Edwin Seroussi, Reinhard Flender (Moderation) Panel discussion
Cultural Identity and Assimilation - Jewish music in Germany and France in the 19th cent.

Thursday march 3rd
3:00 – 4:30 Reinhard Flender Lecture and discussion
Rolf Liebermann - cultural innovation for Hamburg from NDR to the Staatsoper
5:00 – 6:30 pm Yuval Shaked (Haifa) Lecture and discussion
The opera 'Der Turm' ‒ Composer Josef Tal’s collaboration with librettist Hans Keller as conceived and reflected in their correspondence

Eintritt frei

Click here for the live stream.