JEWISH MUSIC INSTITUTE SOAS (JMI) JMI is dedicated to the celebration, preservation and development of the liv­ ing heritage of Jewish music for the benefit of all. JMI education, performance and information programmes encompass the diversity of Jewish music including: Ashkenazi [music of the Jews of Eastern Europe and the traditions of Yiddish culture!' Sephardi [music of the Jews of the Iberian penninsula before 1492 and their dispersion around the Mediterranean, Israeli [music of the Holy Land, its indigenous traditions and the fusion brought about by Jewish immigrants!. liturgical [musical tradi­ tions of the synagogue!. the Jewish contribution to Western classical music. The JMI International Forum Suppressed Mu sic focu ses on twentieth centu­ ry music which was banned by the Nazis. JMI is an independent arts organisation with charitable status, based at SOAS University of London. Presidents: Lady Solti, Leopold de Rothschild CBE Senior Vice Presidents: Lady Lipworth, Jonathon Lyons; Vice presidents: David and Tanya Josefowitz Chairman : Walter Goldsmith FCA FRSA General Director: Geraldine Auerbach MBE Founder Fellows: Bertie and Doris Black JMI Forum for Israeli Music The JMI Forum for Israeli Mu sic [FIM) was established in 2003 as a platform for bringing greater awareness of the music of Israel in all its guises to the UK and to enhance inter-cultural dialogue and understanding. While many international artists from Israel are widely known in the inter­ national arena, the music by composers in Israel is still unfamiliar in the UK and beyond. Unique to Israeli music, is the meeting of East and West: the assimilation of elements from diverse traditions, combining the strands of Jewish traditions, Arab and Middle Eastern musics with Western approaches. Director: Or Malcolm Miller International Advisory Board: Tzvi Avni, Nelly Ben - Or, Rivka Golani Patrons: Ralph Kohn Hon FRAM, Lady Collins Committee: Malcolm Miller [director!, Ruti Halvani [education and vocal co-ordinator!' Daphna Sadeh [world music co-ordinator!, Geraldine Auerbach MB E, Adam Gorb, Alexander Knapp, Malcolm Singer, Malcolm Troup [consultants) JMI forum for Arab-Jewish Dialogue Through Music This Forum, set up in 2000 , strives to promote harmony and understanding between Jews and Arabs through music. It co-ordinates a network of organ­ isations under the heading 'Building Bridges', providing a meeting point for individuals and organisations active in the work of encouraging mutual respect and understanding through cultural exchange and creating co-oper­ ative arts projects between Muslims and Jews, Palestinians and Israelis. www.buildingbridges.org.uk Co-ordinators: Sarah Manasseh, Adel Salameh, Daphna Sadeh Musical Dialogues of East and West JMI Jewish Culture Day on the South Bank 2004 Qu ee n Eli za beth Hall and Purce ll Room Sund ay 28 November 2004. 10 .00 am- 10.00pm Celebrating the confluence of Jewish, Arabic and European traditions in classical and world music Introduction Malcolm Miller, JMI Forum for Israeli Music 10 .00am-12.00 noon. The Voi ce Box Composers' Discussion 3 10.00am-12 noon. Queen Elizabe th Hall Foyer Dance Workshop 4 12.30-2.00pm . Purcell Room Ben-Haim in his Time 4 2.30- 4.00pm. Queen Eli zabeth Hall Orchestral Concert with Klezmer, Choir and Cantor 11 5.00- 6.30pm. Purcell Room Dances and Suites from the Balkans to Baghdad 17 7.00-7.30pm. Queen Eliza beth Hall Pre-concert talk on the oratorio and the Bible story 20 7.45-10.15pm. Queen Elizabeth Hall George Frideric Handel: Judas Maccabaeus 20 8.00pm - l0.00pm. Purcell Room Different Points on the Same Line: q Musical Dialogue 28 The composers Haim Alexander 31 Paul Ben-Haim 31 Ernest Bloch 32 Alexander Uriah Boskovich 32 Yehezkel Braun 33 Yoel Engel 34 Hans Gell 34 Adam Gorb 34 George Frideric Handel 34 Rohan Kriwaczek 35 Chonon Lewis 35 Maurice Ravel 36 Nikolai Rimsky Korsakov 36 Mordechai Seter 36 Naomi Shemer 37 Menachem Wiesenberg 37 Mordec hai Ze ira 38 The Organisers Jewish Music Institute SOAS IJMII JMI For um for Israeli Music JMI forum for Arab-Jewish Di alogue Th rough Music Building Bridges Many initiatives have emerged pursuing a cultural dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians, Arabs and Jews, Jews and Muslims. The JM I Forum for Arab-Jewish Dialogue Through Music welcomes many here today. Visit the display in the foyer of Multi-Exposure, Neveh Shalom-Wahat el Salaam, the Olive Tree Project and others. The Supporters These events are supported by The Jewish Chronicle, The Goldsmith Charitable Trust, the Harold Hyam Wingate Foundation, the Culture Department of the Embassy of Israel and Bnai Brith Leo Baeck Women's Lodge, Bnai Brith First Lodge of England and Bnai Brith Raoul Wa llenburg Lodge. South Bank Centre Please switch off your mobile phones and other noisy appliances. In accor­ dance with Lambeth regulations, you may not stand or sit in the gangways and smoking is not permitted in the auditorium. You are not allowed to take photographs, or to make any recording of the performance without the prior permission of the promoter and the hall. Contact and information Jewish Music Institute SOAS The School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1 H OXG Registered Charity no. 328228 Company no. 2387749 T 020 8909 2445 F 020 8909 1030 E jewishmusic0jmi.org.uk www.jmi.org.uk JMI Jewish Culture Day on the South Bank 2004 Introduction Malcolm Miller, Director , JMI Forum for Israe li Music A warm we lcome to Mu sical Dialogues of East and West, an exciting programme of concerts, dance and discussion, which explores and aims to illuminate the diverse cross-influences of Middle Eastern and European musical styles as exemplified particularly in the music of Israel and her Arab neighbours, Certainly, the incorporation of a variety of Eastern \ ~ -.usical styles within Western music has a long and colourful history, One needs cite only a few famous examples as the Turkish music of Mozart and Beethoven, the Hungarian and Gypsy styles of Liszt, Spanish and Japanese works by Ravel and Debussy, Rimsky-Korsakov's Arabian orientalism in Sh eherezade and Benjamin Britten's uses of Javanese gamelan, Since the tonal language of the Western tradition was based on Gregorian Church modes, themselves an evolution of the Byzantine and earlier biblica l temple modes, one could even argue that the whole repertoire of Western music is an expression of an on-going dialogue of East and West! Yet the music of Israel, which features prominently in today's fascinating concerts, embodies the synthesis of East and West perhaps more than that of any other country, perhaps due to its unique historical and geographical position, with its sources and traditions drawn from communities scattered across the world including the Midd le East and the Levant, Already from the begi nning of the twentieth century, fieldwork by com­ posers from Russia and ce ntra l Europe had rediscovered the rich vein of Jewish, Arabic and East European fo lk music in expeditions ranging from Palestine to the Pale of Settlement. The work of Abraham Zvi Idelsohn, the 'father of Jewish Music', in Jerusalem resulted in a vast Th esa urus of Hebrew Or iental Melodies (1923-19331. which made available for the first time Jewish folk music drawn from Sephardi and Oriental communities in Arabic and African lands, It became a basic resource for the immigrant gen­ eration of composers who came to Israel in the 1930s from central Europe, including such leading figures as Boskovich and Ben-Haim, These com­ posers made conscious efforts to absorb Middle Eastern musical idioms, benefiting from local performers such as the Yemenite singer Bracha Zefira, for whom many songs were arranged, Rejecting their heritage of Eastern European and Yiddish culture, they forged a new vision of collective art in which music reflected the national aspirations of Zionism, The resu ltant 'Mediterranean Style' was a pastoral evocation of the biblical and desert landscape of the Holy Land, awakening the dynamic idealism of its people and drawing on both Arab dance rhythms and scales and Israeli Hora and Jewish modes, as well as biblical and Psalm texts, The new idiom represented a rejection of the Germanic tradition in favour of French impressionism and its exoticism, as shown in many works featured today, notably Boskovich's Se mitic Suite with its imitations of the oud and Ben - Haim's lyrical works such as the solo sonatas for violin and for the piano, with their evocative Eastern flavours of decorative melisma and colourful dance rhythms, Such assimilation of folkloric influences into a Muical Dialogues of East and West 2 Western formal idiom can be compared to the folk-inspired works of their contemporaries around the world, Vaughan Williams, Holst and later Britten in Britain, Copland in America, Bartok and Kodilly in Hungary. At the same time certain Israeli composers retained ties with central European mod­ ernism, notably Josef Tal, a pioneer of electro-acoustics, and Mordechai Seter, whose music i.s included in this afternoon's choral concert. The music of the two Israeli composers, Yehezkel Braun and Menachem Wiesenberg, whom we are honoured to welcome to this event, highlights the way that subsequent generations deepened their awareness of Arabic, Judeo-Spanish and other Jewish and Middle Eastern styles. Their music increasingly combines Arabic techniques such as improvisatory taqsim and the maqam modes as well as Jewish cantillation and Hebrew text setting, with Western forms and techniques. For Menachem Wi esenberg , like many of the younger generation, the varied musical soundscape of modern Israel, symbolised perhaps by the intermingling of the chants of the muezzin and chazzan , is no longer exotic but a part of the fabric of daily life.