Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of Jewish music, including klezmer and other traditions.
Music
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The Schmooze Amy Winehouse Said Would ‘Go Mad’ With Fame
A new documentary on the life of late British singer Amy Winehouse shows the six-time Grammy-Award winner in her younger days discussing her misgivings about fame, a preview of the trailer showed on Thursday. Winehouse died from alcohol poisoning nearly four years ago at her London home at the age of 27 after struggling with…
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Culture On Alexandre, the Greatest Jewish Composer You’ve Never Heard of
When “Ida” received the Oscar for best foreign film, it put a global spotlight on a Polish story about that nation’s struggle to face Jewish memories from the Nazi era. Earlier this year, the Los Angeles Philharmonic gave a concert that touched on these themes in a different way. The orchestra performed the long-awaited American…
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The Schmooze 8 Israeli Bands to Listen to Right Now
Vaadat Charigim // Photo by: Goni Riskin Israel has never been known for producing breakthrough musical acts, but if the first few months of 2015 are anything to go by, that may soon change. With Israeli groups traveling to Austin, Texas for South by Southwest and gaining recognition at a number of European festivals, the…
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Culture How Synagogue Music Breaks Down Barriers Between Denominations
We may fret about declining enrollments in rabbinical seminaries and the ever-rising tide of intermarriage, yet one aspect of the contemporary Jewish experience should lift our spirits rather than roil them: music. From monthly concerts and annual festivals that cast a spotlight on the creativity that pulses throughout the community to Shabbat services where, week…
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Breaking News Suburban Detroit Synagogue Gets $10M for Music Program
A synagogue in suburban Detroit has received a $10 million endowment to fund its music program. Temple Israel in West Bloomfield, Mich. received the donation from members Sarah and Harold Gottlieb. The endowment will fund the Reform synagogue’s cantorial chair, which will be named in memory of the couple’s son, Stephen, who died in 2006….
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The Schmooze Major UK Grant Will Unearth Forgotten Music
A major international research arts project, “Performing the Jewish Archive,” has been awarded a grant of just over £1.5 million by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) in the U.K., under the theme, “Care for the Future: Thinking Forward Through the Past.” The project, headed by Russian music specialist Stephen Muir, a senior lecturer…
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The Schmooze Cantor by Day, Moroccan Pop Star by Night
Samy Elmaghribi was a hugely popular Moroccan-music star. Salomon Amzallag was a beloved Sephardic cantor in Montreal. That the pop star and the liturgical giant were the same person has inspired a new exhibition that opened in Montreal February 25. “Sacre Profane: Samy Elmaghribi” explores the “seemingly opposite” notions of sacred and secular in Elmaghribi’s…
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The Schmooze The Sway Machinery’s Expanding Cantorial Epic
The Sway Machinery promises that its 3rd LP, “Purity and Danger,” is its “most chiseled enunciation of its foundational concept” yet — and it delivers on this promise. In a return to Afro-pop infused cantorial traditionals and modern blues myth-making, The Sway Machinery comfortably resettles into its epic vision, though this time with even more…
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