This is the Forward’s coverage of Jewish music, including klezmer and other traditions.
Music
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The Schmooze Berlin Philharmonic Returns to Roots
In tandem with three New York concerts given by the Berlin Philharmonic in February, New York University’s Deutsches Haus has opened an exhibition of Holocaust survivor David Friedmann’s “Lost Musician Portraits” from the 1920s. These sketches of Berlin Philharmonic members were drawn from life, and captured each of the artists in the act of performing….
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The Schmooze Monday Music: Rap for Rabbis
A lot of my favorite music could be described as religious hip-hop. It probably has to do with my obsession with the Dirty South, even though all of that music is Christian. Take “True Hero Under God” by Z-Ro, which includes lines like “But I am just a man, trying to Satan free / Through…
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The Schmooze Oscar Winning Composer Inspired by Silent Film
Crossposted from Haaretz Three days before he won an Oscar for the soundtrack he composed for the movie “The Artist,” Ludovic Bource sat in his studio in Paris and adapted one of the film’s songs for the accordion — the first instrument he played as a child. Speaking before the Oscar ceremony last Sunday, the…
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The Schmooze ‘Kaddish’ in the Armory
“Strange now to think of you, gone without corsets & eyes, while I walk on / the sunny pavement of Greenwich Village. / downtown Manhattan, clear winter noon, and I’ve been up all night, talking, / talking, reading the Kaddish aloud..” So begins Allen Ginsberg’s “Kaddish,” a sprawling lament for his late mother, Naomi Ginsberg….
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The Schmooze Q&A: Herb Alpert on Becoming Tijuana Brass
Herb Alpert’s list of accomplishments is longer than, well, a trombone. He is the composer, arranger, trumpet player and leader of the famed Tijuana Brass, as well as a record producer (he and partner Jerry Moss founded A&M records), painter, sculptor and philanthropist. Alpert has had five number one hits, 15 gold and 14 platinum…
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The Schmooze Monday Music: Balkan Beat Goes On
Crossposted from Haaretz The penultimate song on “Give,” Balkan Beat Box’s new album, is poignantly titled “Enemy in Economy.” This light and humorous song mocks the varying suspicions that Americans harbor toward non-Americans, and in effect takes a stand against xenophobia. “Enemy in Economy” ends with a sort of musical pan of the length of…
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The Schmooze Israeli Arab Wins Yoko Ono Lennon Award
Crossposted from Haaretz Nabeel Abboud-Ashkar, a 34-year-old violinist and the director of the Polyphony Conservatory in Nazareth, will be awarded the Yoko Ono Lennon Courage Award for the Arts. The prize has been awarded annually since 2009 by Ono to artists from various fields for their efforts to promote peace through the arts. Ashkar founded…
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The Schmooze Monday Music: Gypsy Jazz in Jaffa
Photo by Ronen Goldman Finding my way through the cavern-like passages of Jaffa’s old city to the appropriately named Alleyway Theater (“Teatron Hasimta”) was an apt beginning to an evening of music with Israeli gypsy jazz trio Swing de Gitanes. On an intimate red-lit stage surrounded by bare, black walls Oren Sagi (double-bass), Yacov Hoter…
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