Judge Dennis Davis
Cantorial Music
Judge Dennis Davis - Cantorial Music
- Good. Well, thank you so much. So I’m going to hand over to you now. Thanks, Dennis. Thank everybody for joining us.
- Okay. Well good afternoon or good evening to everybody and I hope everybody’s having, given the COVID Omicron variant, the best possible holiday under the circumstances. Tonight, I’m going to talk a little bit about Cantorial music. This follows a lecture that I gave just before the , the High Holy Days when I took the audience through a tour of some of the prayers that we say, particularly over Yom Kippur, and through some of the great cantors and tried to explain what it was that they were doing and what the prayers were about. I was quite amazed when I gave this lecture, the extent to which I got probably more emails and responses from people than on any other lecture that I’ve given. And I pondered as to why that was. And I think the reason, given what I read from the contents of emails and WhatsApps and so and so forth, for which thank you so much to everyone who did do that at the time, was that my lecture seemed to evoke a sort of nostalgia, if you wish, a recapitulation of the past. A sense of going to shul with one’s parents and listening to chazan cantor who perhaps made an impression on you or the service did. Something about recalling a past that to some extent no longer is, and perhaps reflecting on just, you know, our own formative years because it was very interesting to me just how many people spoke about various chazanim cantors that they’d heard Shuls that they’d been, who had married them, who had they had heard, why that was such a special occasion.
And for that reason, more than any other that I thought perhaps towards the end of the year just to do something entirely different. I would have another session of this, of the chazanim and try to explain to people some of the work that they did and why. Perhaps certainly start by just a story that Ellie Vize, a love to tell in the name of the Bahlsen. And it’s the story of the Bahlsen just before the High Holy Days going into a place, a special place in the woods where he’d light a fire and sing a particular prayer with particular words. And the generations passed on and people centrally knew where the place was and they knew the melody when they lit the fire, but they’d forgotten the words and the generations passed on and people forgot the place and they’d already forgotten the words, but they remembered the melody. And Vize says, “That’s our generation, a generation that has forgotten the place, been deracinated and to a large degree, has lost so much of the implications of the tradition.” And he ends the adaptation of the Bahlsen’s Tori by saying, “If we can get back to humming the tune, as we still know, perhaps we will recapture our knowledge of the words and the memory of the place.”
And I tell this story because it seems to me certainly when I was preparing what to play for you tonight, some of the cantorial pieces I’m playing certainly reflected that to me of just the tradition which we try to recapture in whatever particular way we can and how much we’ve forgotten and what challenges lie ahead, which is basically the thrust of the Vize story. Now, I can’t possibly through this lecture, give you a full history of cantorial music, that would be just too much for one lecture, although I think there’s so much material that one could certainly do another lecture with ease and I’m sure you’d enjoy it. But let me just tell you a little bit about the history of Cantorial museum. If you go to the , it tells us about the that was not a chazan . That was not the chazan as we know, this person was charged with performance of a variety of duties and tasks. Does not include his required reading or interning of liturgy. He could do so on request, but that’s as far as it went. And then as time went on, when we got into the geonic period, in fact, and as the liturgy expanded, and certainly even during the Middle Ages, when you had these PU Tim, these particular parts of prayer, which were sort of poems if you wish, many of which we still say over Rosh HaShanah Yom Kippur, the bulk of ilar, the person who was leading the service became a much more central part of the service itself. And mediaeval chazan, if I could use that word now. Mediaeval cantors were often the only ones in the congregation possessed prayer book manuscripts with the complete liturgy, including but not limited to recently added . These poems that were scored.
And even if there were multiple copies that included at least the call liturgy, there were not enough to accommodate the entire Kahila congregation. And this therefore meant before the practise of printing of prayer books that the cantor, the person who led the service, was central to that particular period, to that particular process of running the service. Now that sort of began to develop right throughout so that by the Middle Ages and when you started getting 17th, 18th century, particularly in the Ashkenazi world, the chazan to evolved from an orally transmitted craft to something which was highly cultivated with some carefully constructed forms of music. And it is true that certainly whilst for about 200 years from the time of the Barack to the dawn of modern eras synagogue music in Western and central Europe, basically the classical and Rococo episodes in Western musical history were completely bypassed. But then all of a sudden, as we got into the 19th century, then you started getting what in many ways were avant God chazanim who attempted to emulate and incorporate Barack forms and styles in newly fashioned musical, a musically notated liturgical compositions. And I’ll talk about that a little bit in a moment. And of course we know a lot about this, particularly from people who’ve discovered the work of Solomon Zulsa who published a volume called first published in VMM 1838. So the 19th century, and I’m going through this obviously very quickly, began to see considerable develop. And during the 19th century, therefore once saw these virtue as the chazanim maturing around a whole range of different autistic avenues with a rich individual tradition of how to conduct a service and how to sing the prayers.
And there’s no doubt about it, that by the late 19th century right through to the First World War, many consider that, and I’ll come back to this point to be the golden age of cantorial music in Europe. And it is true that there were many, many Chazanim all whom were regarded as absolutely extraordinary. But the only one of the early part of the 20th century that of course lived beyond that who we know about from all of these because we’ve got recordings of him, was the very famous Gershen Sirota because he actually was one of the first of these cantors to record the others who just have written descriptions. But the truth was that there were major amounts of great chazanim late 19th century, early 20th century. And that continued and many of them mercifully then landed up before the war for the Second World War in managing to get to the United States of America. And there’s no doubt about it that it was during that particular period, 20th century period, and I’ll come to a couple of the great names in a moment, that what we call the golden age of Cantorial music took place. And if you look at five of the greatest chazanim of the name of the 20th century, I’ve mentioned Gershen Sirota, 1874 to 1943. He was the one who remained and therefore perished in the Warsaw Ghetto.
The others came to America Rosenblatt on which I’m going to speak a little bit in a moment. Morai Hirschman, who was one of the chazanim who served temple Beth El in Burra Park, Brooklyn, 1874 to 1953. Those of you who know your chazanim will know that he was probably most famous for a rendition of Tahira Rabbi Yishmael, a really dramatic piece of chazanim. And of course somebody else I’m going to come to Moshe Koussevitzky 1899 to 1966. There were many others, many others who arrived in the United States and they therefore represented through that entire early period of the 20th century, right through I suspect to about 1970, what is considered to be the golden age of Cantorial music. You’ll, I apologised to you all to you for doing this so quickly because what I want to try to do is to squeeze into the time available six different recordings and explain them to you as best I can. And I’m going to start, if I may, with probably the person who was regarded as the greatest of all of them was Yossele Rosenblatt. And let me tell you a little bit about him, because it’s quite remarkable history really. He was born on May 2nd, 1882 in the Ukraine, came as many he had from a long line of these chazanim who as I say, started really to having traction late 18th century into the 19th century. He was certainly regarded a Vundicint and travelled throughout the Austria-Hungarian Empire, performing at countless synagogues as a young man.
Eventually he gets to the United States in 1912. He’s engaged immediately by killer or Zeek in New York. But because he’s such an extraordinary chazanim and because he recorded various photograph for photographs companies, he suddenly, his fame spread right throughout the United States. In a giving example, in a particular successful concert in Chicago, he was offered literally in somewhere around 1916, $1.000 a night to sing in opera because they regarded him as perhaps one of the great tenors. And the Chicago Opera Company wanted him desperately and he refused to do so. He said his love of Yiddish Kip was such that he couldn’t see himself being an opera singer. Unfortunately, he then went into business in 1922 and that left him bankrupt, forcing him to give up the pulpit and concentrate on concerts in order to make money to recoup, to recoup that which we had lost. In 1927, Rosenblatt is offered a $1.000, a huge sum of money at those days to co-star with Al Johnson in the jazz singer and to sing Kol Nidrei, but he would not do. So he said, Kol Nidrei cannot be sung in a film, I refuse to do that and therefore he never appeared in the jazz singer. In 1928 he was engaged by the Anshe Sfard congregation in Brooklyn and paid the very significant sum of $12,000 a year. That was certainly the highest paid by any hazan at that time. He was then offered the chance to film in the Holy Land by the Palestine American Fox Film Company.
And he thought he had to do that in order to recoup the debts that he’d incur, sorry to pay off the debts that he’d incurred during his bankruptcy. But sadly, on July 19th, 1933, he died of a heart attack at the age of 51, same age as my great musical hero, Gustof Marla. But more on a later occasion. His funeral service was conducted by Chief Rabbi Cook, who was the chief rabbi of Palestine at the time, attended by more than 20,000 people. Rosenblatt was not only a remarkable chazan, he also compares round about 180 compositions and many of them we still play today. for example, is one, there are a series of others that we play that we use, chazan all over wonderful ones. As I say, I certainly think is fabulous. But what I wanted to play for you as the first in which he sings with his brother-in-law, Malig Kaufman, they sing it together, is his composition of Tal, and let me just explain this. So the midrash tells us that when Isaac Pesto’s blessing on on Jacob, he declared that pacer the time of redemption to be the time of redemption and praise of God. And it was also the time he said, when the heavenly chambers of Jew and blessing were open, that’s what the midrash tells us, which of course amplifies on the reporters. Particularly interesting, this was that the prayer of Jew, which we say at the time of pacer, was essentially a symbol that this season of Jew, which essentially was the commencement of… As it were recreation of nature, took place at the same time when the Jewish people were, again, as it were, if you wish, recreated by being redeemed from Egypt and beginning their own independent nationhood.
And Tal, therefore is traditionally sung on PE and many, many caners around the world. Many sing this version and I’m going to play, which of course in this case the one I could find was one where he sings with Malia Kaufman. I’m just going to play the first four or five minutes of it for you. It really indicates the sophistication by which Rosenblatt, who appears on your screen, was able to, as it were, compose these beautiful renditions for the synagogue. And of course he had a magnificent voice to boot. So here is Rosenblatt singing his own composition of Tal, which we sing at the additional service on Pesach. ♪ Tal, Tal, Tal ♪ Judy you can stop it now if you may, if you can. I’d love to play the the rest of the other five minutes, but I’ve got to squeeze in all of the material. I want then, I think course, I mean most people think that he was the greatest of all, and I think you would agree with me. It’s extraordinary, sophisticated, beautifully sung peace. The second of the great chazanim that I want to devote attention to is Moshe Koussevitzky. I said 1899 to 1966. Certainly as well as one of the great chazanim of the 20th century, certainly of the latter part of the 20th century, probably the best. Of course there were four of them. Simcha, David, Yakov and Moshe, I’ll come back to Simcha in a moment. Moshe Koussevitzky at a very young age, one, a amazing Hazan auditions for the coveted pulpit of the Tłomackie Shul in Warsaw. And he held that as had been held previously by Sirota. And Moshe Koussevitzky took it over. He than, it’s interesting that there was a concert performance at that Shul of heightens the creation done in Hebrew in which he was a central player.
He plays the 10 role and his brother David, played the role of Gabriel, which originally was written for a soprano. They had no women singing at that point. We’ll get back to that too. Koussevitzky, as I say, was really regarded as one of the great chazanim during the Second World War. Remarkably with the hope of the Polish underground, he managed to find his way to Russia and saved himself by singing operatic roles in Russia, introduction such as Boris Godunov, for various companies in Russia at the time. After the war, he was reconciled with his brothers. And there was a very famous concert song at the Alberto, which was apparently an unbelievable sellout. In 1947, shortly before he resettled, he settled, should I say, in the United States of America where he continued his marvellous kind of career as a chazan. At the time of his death in 1966, he was a chazan at the temple be El of Burra Park in Brooklyn. And really, there’s such a lot above his stuff, it’s hard to choose. But what I decided to choose, I’ve spoken about this before, was, and there’s a picture of him as a young man when he was of course the cantor at the Tomanic Street synagogue in 1928, which would’ve made him 29 years old at the time. But what I decided to play for you was remarkable piece, which is his singing of Kol Nidrei, which was broadcast and then sent or broadcast for Russian jury in 1963.
I cannot imagine what Russian Jews hearing this very interesting rendition of Kol Nidrei, would’ve thought as they listened to it, sung by khaki and notice as you listen to it, just how he’s got a very original way of actually dealing with the text, which was something that marked him out. That if you listen to five Moshe Koussevitzky recordings of the same piece, they’re all different. But this one I am going to play to the end. It’s only five minutes, it’s Kol Nidrei by Moshe Koussevitzky, broadcast for Russian jury in 1963. I just think the range which he… Of his voice and the subtlety was, which he brings to bear to Kol Nidrei is utterly remarkable. And I can only imagine what Russian Jews listening to that before must have thought. There are many chazanim that I could choose ‘cause I wanted to divide my little section into sort of more modern chazanim in the older ones. Many from that golden era that I could have chosen. Many who came to South Africa, South Africa was blessed with very, very great chazanim. At one particular point in time, the famous was the chazan at the Doornfontein shul which was very, very famous for great chazanim, which he was one. There was at Woman’s Speech and at Berea respectively, Cantors Adler, Alta, sorry, and Mandel who were just absolutely brilliant. But I decided, and you forgive me for doing this, for choosing one who I knew because he was chazan at , it’s Schoonder Spiritual in Cape Town many of you may have heard him.
And that was the brother of Moshe Koussevitzky, Simcha Koussevitzky, Simcha Koussevitzky who was from 1905 and died at the rip old age of 93 in 1998. Who too had been a prodigy, who had been a hazan in Europe, had managed to get to England, to Scotland, actually he started, and then in number of Shuls in London before in 1947, he came to the Glen Hazel, not the Glen Hazel, to the, oh goodness, I’ve just having one of my senior moments, I’ll think about the moment. He went to one of the Shuls in Johannesburg. And then in 1953 the newly built Schoonder spiritual hired him where he remained until he retired. He too had an unbelievably magnificent voice. There are one I’m going to play for you. His recording, there’re not that many of his, his recording of the Havdoloh. That’s the piece between that we sing at the end of Shabbat. And it’s an interesting piece because of Havdoloh course really means distinction. And the whole point of the prayer of Havdoloh right at the end of the Shabbat is to like the fact that we make the fundamental distinction between the holy day that we’ve just gone through and now moving, differentiating between holiness and ordinariness by facing the rest of the week. So Havdoloh prayer, which actually demarcates the differentiation between the holy and the ordinary is particularly important here. This is a recording of Simcha Koussevitzky doing the Havdoloh. And you’ll see a number of photographs.
Some people who come from South African Cape particularly may recognise people here, a number of them are of course of his family. And there’s one photograph which you’ll see, which is him and my great mentors that were Rabbi And what I was saying earlier was he, at somebody that I always thought him as an old man, but he said he looked much younger in this photograph than I am now. But here is Simcha Havdoloh. Extraordinary to me that somebody of that talent just sang around the corner from us. Just amazing. And he was the first of the chazanim that I ever heard who sang with a, not with the Ashkenazi kind of pronunciations, the slightly pronunciation, the modern Hebrew pronunciation, which of course was a great debate amongst the Chazanim. But certainly when he was singing, he sang as opposed to as it were. I want to move on, if I may, to some of the more modern chazanim because I think they deserve a say and partly because I think there’s always a tendency to look back and say, well these were the best singers. When you think about it, that’s not necessarily always true. And there are one’s modern opera as well as modern Chazanim really extraordinary quantity. And here’s a real treat because I’m going to play for you a recording of Cantor Meir Helfgot. He is the chazan, Chief chazan at the Park East Synagogue. And it was interesting to me because he is Meir Helfgot because he, he’s a sort of and for such a long time we got these kind of Eastern European chazanim who came out and certainly will not talk chazanim as such.
But he and the next person I’m going to play certainly come from that tradition. But basically continue the tradition of cantorial music in the most wonderful way, in the most absolutely wonderful way. And Cantor Helfgot, who I have heard, I went with my friend Ard Stern. We went to Johannesburg and he sang in a concert and thanks to my friend Seymour Cap when I was teaching at NYU as a whole chavist in which Helfgot sang the Kush Koussevitzky’s. So he sang all of Moshe Koussevitzky’s composition. The show is absolutely magnificent voice here he is now in collaboration and I hope you will enjoy this. It’s something a little different. He’s in collaboration with his kilman and there’s a great CD by the way, which you can get of Perlman and Helfgot collaborating. Here they were in a concert and in the first part there’s a lovely rendition by Helfgot, accompanied by Perlman of from the, from the mu of the additional service and Shabbat the joy of the Shabbat being sung. And then there’s a further little bit where Perlman actually plays the violin with an orchestra with a real Hasidic theme. And please feel free to clap in your hands, hum along 'cause it’s really fabulous. So here is Cantor Yitzhhak Meir Helfgot with I kind of think Perlman’s enjoying that more than any time I’ve ever, not that he doesn’t enjoy playing the great Tech Concerti. Helfgot as a doer. I suppose what I wanted to say about the three that I’ve played plus Helfgot is just this remarkable ability of, even as I say, Helfgot of the modern generation.
And we’ll hear again now how they were able to capture in their singing, both the tragedy, the trauma, the joy, the complexity of Jewish life through the ages. There’s something about if you listen to them, you can almost see cast your mind back to previous generations who would’ve heard this music in particular ways under very difficult conditions. And I just think they’re able to convey in really magnificent ways, just all of the nuance of it. And talking of that, our next and pen ultimate recording that I’m going to play for you is one that many has anim play. I think it was a composed first by the Reverend Abe singer who did a whole lot of Jewish compositions in the late 19th century. And of course that’s what the title says here, but it was reaped by Shalom Secunda who famous for and other compositions. And he did… And in fact, if any of you have got the Richard Tucker Kol Nidrei service, he composed much of that, but doesn’t really matter, it’s played here , It’s basically Yiddish, it’s a Yiddish song talking about the coming of the in the Rosh HaShanah Yom Kippur. And most of it’s, say for a couple of the prayers, which you will hear in traditional sang, traditional manor by chazan would do. It sang her by really magnificent Hazan Cantor Yaakov Lemmer, who is now the chief hazan at the Lincoln Square Synagogue in New York. And I’ve been there a few times, fantastic.
And my friend Leon Blitz tells me, some of you might have heard him in London recently where he did a concert. And thanks to Leon, he sent me some of the recordings, absolutely fabulous, but I couldn’t actually get a decent enough version to play for you. So here I am playing his with a Jewish Cantors Choir. It was sung in that magnificent Shul in Budapest and let’s hear it. It’s just, again, it captures so much of both the tragedy, the joy, the tension, the nuance of Jewish life over the Vas of Jewish history. Cantor Yaakov Lemmer. To think that got a brother who also sings magnificently, also chazan quite extraordinary. The last recording I’m going to play for you 'cause time is running out for me, is of course of Shalom Aleichem which we sing on a Friday night. And of course it’s the wonderful tells us that the two main string angels who accompany us home from shul on a Friday night and if they find at the home that the table is laid and everything is prepared for Shabbat, the good angel blesses us and the evil angels compelled to say Amen. But if it’s not, then the evil angel sins may it always be like this.
And the good angel is then compelled to say Amen. And from that Talmudic passage, this particular wonderful song that we sing on during the period is sung. And the the version I’ve got for you is of course I’ve played him before, he’s wonderful. There’s Azi Schwartz who was is chazan as well at the Park East synagogue. And Rachel Brook, who is a magnificent chazan and I think now is got her own show where she is the first woman chazan with a magnificent voice. And if you’re not going to be moved by anything, I just think this rendition of Shalom Aleichem and is absolutely fabulous. So let’s enjoy this by way of conclusion. I should correct myself before I get corrected by a whole lot of you, which is that Azi Schwartz is in Park Avenue, not Park East. So wonderful husband and so is Rachel Brook. Wendy, I’ve got a hell of a lot of questions I’m not quite sure what to do at this time of night and be guided by you.
Dennis. It’s interesting. All right, so maybe what we should do is maybe we should have another session because I’m sure that, I’m sure that it’s time for-
I’m happy to do another session. I’ve just been looking, there are about 67 questions that I’ve for long time and I’m just anxious that it’s gone 10 o'clock.
Okay, so you know what? I think let’s just say that was our most fabulous presentation. Thank you so much. So upbeat is really made, really uplifted me. I can imagine-
Absolutely.
Yeah. All thousand participants. That signed in today. So that was absolutely great. Yeah, let’s have another session, I’ll-
Another session and I’ll do it shorter so I’ll be able to answer everybody’s questions the time.
I’ll download all the Q and A I’ll send you a copy of the questions if you’d like to have a look at-
Oh yeah, anybody, Judy, if you could do that. I promise that I will answer people by email since I’m sitting at-
Oh no, no, don’t say that. Please do not promise that Dennis-
Okay sorry. All right. Okay, fair enough.
I’m sorry, I’m jumping in. What I want to say is I’m vetoing that, read the questions and then what you can do is you can give another , answering many of the questions.
If you send me questions, I’ll do that at the next time.
Fantastic. All right.
Big hug, big hug to Claudette, and lots of love and thank you so much everybody.
Stay safe. Yeah.
Thank you. And to you.
Good night.
[Judy] Thank you. Bye-bye.