# Jewish Classical musicians



## Clouds Weep Snowflakes (Feb 24, 2019)

I grew up in a Jewish family myself, so I found a good reason why I'd open such a thread; Jewish composers, Jewish conductors, Jewish performers? I'll give a note about Jewish Classical musicians under the Romanovs; was there a scene in the area of settlement, or this only apply to converted Jews? The Russian Tsars were known for their lack of sympathy for Jews, did it pass to music as well? What music did the typical eastern European Jew like?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

It seems that in Russia, at least, you could complain about "a mass of dirty Yids" at the train station yet still be the best of friends to your far more cosmopolitan Jewish colleagues. See *this page* on Tchaikovsky (and note especially the comments of Mrs. Von Meck). Even Wagner, in Germany, had close Jewish friends!


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Jewish Classical Violinists: Wikipedia.....

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Jewish_classical_violinists

Jewish Classical Pianists: Wikipedia......

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Jewish_classical_pianists

etc.


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## Schoenberg (Oct 15, 2018)

Jewish classical musicians have dominated violin and piano playing during the 20th century.
Heifetz, Oistrakh, Menuhin, Perlman, Zukerman, Kreisler, Ysaye and many more great violinists were all jews. Likewise with pianists. They dominated music during this period to the point where I would say that there were few great non-Jewish violinists and pianists.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

Clouds Weep Snowflakes said:


> What music did the typical eastern European Jew like?


Klezmer Wiki is good on the influence of Klezmer on Classical music.

A quick google will bring up a range of sites covering Klezmer. This is the music of the Ashkenazi community.

Sephardic music is quite different.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

I guess Barenboim's West-Eastern Divan orchestra is worth a mention - noted for having both Jewish and Palestinian musicians.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Mendelssohn was Jewish. he converted to christianity but made no secret of his jewishness. He also wrote some dazzling music which has brought joy to many people in spite of Wagner's crude and senseless criticisms.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Obviously Gershwin is another example of a superbly gifted Jewish musician (pity he was cut off in his prime) as was the late Andre Previn, who appears to have been able to turn his hand to any type of music at will.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

DavidA said:


> Mendelssohn was Jewish. he converted to christianity but made no secret of his jewishness. He also wrote some dazzling music which has brought joy to many people in spite of Wagner's crude and senseless criticisms.


You could have stopped your sentence after the word people, but you just had to have a dig at Wagner again, didn't you? Absolutely unnecessary but typical.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

DavidA said:


> Obviously Gershwin is another example of a superbly gifted Jewish musician (pity he was cut off in his prime) as was the late Andre Previn, who appears to have been able to turn his hand to any type of music at will.


What, no mention of Wagner? You do surprise me.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

This mashugana


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Mandryka said:


> This mashugana
> 
> View attachment 122225


Him, his music or both?


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

my first association for a Jewish composer is Bloch, whom I really like (listen for example to his violin concerto) or Moishe Vainberg (a Polish-Russian Jew) who composed likewise a lot of great music


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## ericdxx (Jul 7, 2013)

Kauffman is a jewish name isn't? I think he's overrated personally, but he is probably the most popular tenor in the world today.
edit: sorry Kaufmann


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## Littlephrase (Nov 28, 2018)

Mahler was a German-speaking Jew from Bohemia (then part of the bloated Austro-Hungarian empire). There are moments of klezmer in his music, most notably in the band-like funeral march of the First Symphony:


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## Clouds Weep Snowflakes (Feb 24, 2019)

DavidA said:


> Mendelssohn was Jewish. he converted to christianity but made no secret of his jewishness. He also wrote some dazzling music which has brought joy to many people in spite of Wagner's crude and senseless criticisms.


An awesome composer indeed!


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Barbebleu said:


> You could have stopped your sentence after the word people, but you just had to have a dig at Wagner again, didn't you? Absolutely unnecessary but typical.


Did Wagner stop his absolutely unnecessary but typical digs at people? I take it you don't believe his criticism of Mendelssohn was crude and senseless? Tom Service would disagree:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/may/05/felix-mendelssohn-richard-wagner-classical-music

I found this article enlightening - you might do so too! Service says Mendelssohn 'has become the biggest blind spot in classical music'.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Barbebleu said:


> What, no mention of Wagner? You do surprise me.


Gershwin and Previn lived after Wagner didn't they. But proved him wrong anyway! I find your digs 'absolutely unnecessary but typical' btw.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Clouds Weep Snowflakes said:


> An awesome composer indeed!


Yes you only have to listen to 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' to hear the genius over all those years. Incredible. A celebration of life itself.
And what of the miraculous Octet? Not bad for a 16 year old. Just listen to Heifetz et al working their way through it. Fantastic!


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Of course America produced some great Jewish musician / composers in the twentieth century. One can think of Bernstein, Korngold and Copeland and on the lighter side Irving Berlin, Bernard Hermann and Richard Rogers.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

Bloch, Bernstein, Gershwin (already mentioned) and Wellesz are the first composers I can think of.

edit: Just looking on google writing "jewish composers":

Schoenberg
Mahler
Schulhoff
Glass
Milhaud
Weill
Irving Berlin
Reich
Dukas
Zemlinsky

and many others


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Jewish classical musicians? Kinda like Hispanic baseball players. There's a lot of them. Composers such as Ligeti wanted to study science at University but was prohibited due to discrimination, so he became a composer by default.


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## Clouds Weep Snowflakes (Feb 24, 2019)

DavidA said:


> Of course America produced some great Jewish musician / composers in the twentieth century. One can think of Bernstein, Korngold and Copeland and on the lighter side Irving Berlin, Bernard Hermann and Richard Rogers.


I listened to his 3rd and 4th symphonies several times, just plain great! Hopefully I'll get to know all of them!


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Steve Reich. Was Aaron Copland Jewish?


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

millionrainbows said:


> Steve Reich. Was Aaron Copland Jewish?


With a name like Aaron Copeland? Maybe! :lol:


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## Brahmsian Colors (Sep 16, 2016)

A few well known conductors of Jewish background (mother or father or both Jewish):

Bruno Walter
Otto Klemperer
George Szell
Fritz Reiner
Eugene Ormandy
Antal Dorati
Serge Koussevitzky
Leonard Bernstein
Georg Solti
Istvan Kertesz
Pierre Monteux
Andre Previn
Lorin Maazel
Michael Tilson Thomas
Kurt Sanderling
William Steinberg
Kiril Kondrashin
Mariss Jansons


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## Brahmsian Colors (Sep 16, 2016)

millionrainbows said:


> Steve Reich. Was Aaron Copland Jewish?


Yes, as were Samuel Barber, William Schuman, David Diamond and Jerry Goldsmith, known for his movie soundtracks.


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## Dima (Oct 3, 2016)

One of the the greatest composer of all time was a jew: Anton Rubinstein. You can just begin listening from these two fragments from his opera Nero:


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## Dima (Oct 3, 2016)

One of the last works of great Anton - his opera Moses:





You can also download 5 selected fragments from Anton Rubinstein's opera "Moses" from link: https://cloud.mail.ru/public/GGY4/EmT2bGPmV.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

millionrainbows said:


> Steve Reich. Was Aaron Copland Jewish?


Yes, of course Aaron Copland was Jewish, as was Leonard Bernstein. As were Prokofiev and Shostakovich. And Schoenberg. And Hindemith. But -- NOT Stravinsky or Bartok.
For the golden age of great Broadway musicals, just about all of those composers were Jewish. George Gershwin. Irving Berlin. Jerome Kern. Richard Rodgers. Frank Loesser. Frederick Lowe. Jerry Bock. Leonard Bernstein. But -- NOT Cole Porter. I read a funny story reportedly told by Porter. He was having trouble writing a hit Broadway musical, until he realized he had to make his music more Jewish. The result was Kiss Me, Kate.
There is a common thread. People who suffer discrimination and are shut out of the highest echelons of business look to secondary professions where they are on a more equal footing. Music and the arts and entertainment in general, as well as finance, medicine, law, science, journalism and academia, were traditionally areas that attracted Jews in America and Europe. Ironically, as the 20th century wore on, most of those fields increased in importance and prestige, except for classical music, the one losing bet made by the Jews.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

^^^^News to me anyway that Prokofiev, Hindemith, and Shostakovich were Jewish. Documentation?


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## Clouds Weep Snowflakes (Feb 24, 2019)

Strange Magic said:


> ^^^^News to me anyway that Prokofiev, Hindemith, and *Shostakovich *were Jewish. Documentation?


He used quite a few Jewish themes but wasn't Jewish himself.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Bruch didn't get programmed much under Nazi rule because there was a suspicion he was Jewish. He wasn't, but he did write the famous _Kol Nidrei_.

The young Adolf Hitler once called his Violin Concerto No. 1 "the finest flower of German romanticism." How times change.


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## Hiawatha (Mar 13, 2013)

Dutch composers: Leo Smit was a genius imho if something of an acquired taste musically (and not to confused with the more famous one of the same name) and the CD also feautures Lilien and Wertheim.

https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Times-Dutch-Jewish-Composers/dp/B000003UZ2


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Clouds Weep Snowflakes said:


> He used quite a few Jewish themes but wasn't Jewish himself.


Neither were the other two. Hindemith's wife was partly Jewish.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

During the Soviet era, from the mid-1930s on, writing music inspired by folk or popular music of the various national ethnic minorities was a good defense against charges of formalism. Shostakovich may have needed this defense more than most! But see Prokofiev, _Overture on Jewish Themes_...


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Brahmsian Colors said:


> Yes, as were Samuel Barber, William Schuman, David Diamond and Jerry Goldsmith, known for his movie soundtracks.


Samuel Barber? What source? His father was Episcopalian.


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## AeolianStrains (Apr 4, 2018)

Composing on Jewish themes makes one Jewish like composing Turkish marches makes one Turkish.


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## haydnguy (Oct 13, 2008)

Great thread!!


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## Brahmsian Colors (Sep 16, 2016)

Roger Knox said:


> Samuel Barber? What source? His father was Episcopalian.


You are correct, as I just discovered. Several years back I had seen Barber's name mentioned in a discussion of Jewish American composers which included Copland, Gershwin, Diamond and Schuman. I simply accepted what I saw and let it go at that. My apology for the misinformation.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Strange Magic said:


> ^^^^News to me anyway that Prokofiev, Hindemith, and Shostakovich were Jewish. Documentation?


Let me see your papers.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

starthrower said:


> Let me see your papers.


The papers weren't worth the paper they were written on.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Strange Magic said:


> ^^^^News to me anyway that Prokofiev, Hindemith, and Shostakovich were Jewish. Documentation?


None of these were Jewish


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Prokofiev and Jewish Music:
http://www.sprkfv.net/journal/three26/jewishmusic1.html
There was an influence but he was not Jewish by birth.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

DavidA said:


> None of these were Jewish


No, they weren't. See my post #35. One may assume that Prokofiev's mistress/second wife Mira Mendelssohn was Jewish.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

DavidA said:


> Did Wagner stop his absolutely unnecessary but typical digs at people? I take it you don't believe his criticism of Mendelssohn was crude and senseless? Tom Service would disagree:
> 
> https://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/may/05/felix-mendelssohn-richard-wagner-classical-music
> 
> I found this article enlightening - you might do so too! Service says Mendelssohn 'has become the biggest blind spot in classical music'.


I didn't say that DavidA, I merely remarked that in the context of the thread there was no need for you to mention Wagner in your post. You're putting words in my mouth when you infer that I agree with Wagner's comments on Mendelssohn. Please desist.

BTW, Not that it's of any importance but I don't.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

ericdxx said:


> Kauffman is a jewish name isn't? I think he's overrated personally, but he is probably the most popular tenor in the world today.
> edit: sorry Kaufmann


Pretty sure Jonas is not Jewish.

My grandfather was called Israel but not Jewish. Names are no indicator of religious persuasion.


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

Jacques Offenbach was Jewish (even though he later converted to Catholicism when he emigrated to France).
Arthur Lourié, among the key players of the Russian avant-garde movement of the 1920s, was also Jewish.
Giacomo Meyerbeer, who expanded and improved theatrical presentation and a major influence on Wagner.
Also,


Benjamin Frankel
Karl Goldmark
Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco
Anton Rubinstein (his brother Nikolai was likewise important)


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## chill782002 (Jan 12, 2017)

The great Samuil Feinberg (1890 - 1962), a Russian pianist and composer. His piano sonatas are equally as good as Scriabin's (in my opinion) and in a similar vein, although far less well-known.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Larkenfield said:


> Prokofiev and Jewish Music:
> http://www.sprkfv.net/journal/three26/jewishmusic1.html
> There was an influence but he was not Jewish by birth.


Correct. Prokofiev famously wrote, "I must be the only Jewish composer", but that was an ironic comment, he and Shostakovich did use Hebraic themes but were not Jewish. Hindemith had a Jewish wife, and that was part of the reason he was forced into exile, but even there, the real problem was that Goebbels hated his "atonal" music. I must have misread all this somewhere, sorry. But Schoenberg was Jewish, as were other modern composers like Bloch. I stand by my list of Jewish golden age Broadway musical composers, to which I could have added Kurt Weill. And the interesting thing there is that they come from a wide range of backgrounds and don't necessarily have a whole lot in common, even from a musical standpoint.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Barbebleu said:


> I didn't say that DavidA, I merely remarked that in the context of the thread there was no need for you to mention Wagner in your post. You're putting words in my mouth when you infer that I agree with Wagner's comments on Mendelssohn. Please desist.
> 
> BTW, Not that it's of any importance but I don't.


I had Service's article in mind when I made the comments. Maybe I should have included it initially but I thought the points Service raises are a well known fact of history among musicians. Maybe you didn't? I must confess surprise as to why you did have to respond as you did - including once when I didn't even mention anything! You accuse me of putting words into your mouth yet you put words into mine which aren't even there. Please desist.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Jewish musicians have always been very prevalent in instrumental music....I'll leave it to others to name the great Jewish violinists and pianists.....for my instrument, Bassoon, 
there have been many great Jewish artists:

Arthur Weisberg
Loren Glickman 
Benjamin Kohon
Simon Kovar
Sol Schoenbach
Harold Goltzer
Norman Herzberg

to name just a few....


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Heck148 said:


> Jewish musicians have always been very prevalent in instrumental music....I'll leave it to others to name the great Jewish violinists and pianists.....for my instrument, Bassoon,
> there have been many great Jewish artists:
> 
> Arthur Weisberg
> ...


Yes, of course, and flutists too, Julius Baker, Samuel Baron and Murray Panitz, for example.


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