CHSA 5027 FRONT.qxd 21/9/06 10:47 am Page 1 CHSA 5027 CHANDOS SUPER AUDIO CD CHSA 5027 BOOK.qxd 21/9/06 10:52 am Page 2 premiere recordings 1 Vi bist du gevezn far prohibition* (trad.) 3:19 2 Kolomeke* (trad.) 2:36 3 Moldavian Hora* (trad.) 4:30 4 Zol zayn gelebt† (trad.) 3:11 5 Ma Yofus/Odessa Bulgar† (trad.) 7:04 Guest appearance by David Sela 6 Firen di Mehutonim Aheym† (trad.) 4:20 7 Freylekh Yidelakh* (trad.) 3:26 8 Di Zilberne Khasene† (trad.) 4:05 9 Dem Trisker rebbins chosid* (trad.) 4:38 10 Going Home† (H. Oppenheim/A. Legault) 3:58 11 Dem rebin’s Nigun, Oy Tate† (trad.) 3:37 12 Omer Tantz† (H. Oppenheim) 4:22 Dedicated to/À Omer Sami Çosar 13 Violin Doina‡ (trad.) 6:39 3 CHSA 5027 BOOK.qxd 21/9/06 10:52 am Page 4 14 Fun Tashlikh* (trad.) 6:42 Kleztory Airat Ichmouratov clarinet 15 Tears of Israel* (trad.) 5:37 Alain Legault guitar Largo Elvira Misbakhova violin TT 69:24 Mark Peetsma double-bass Henri Oppenheim accordion *arr. Airat Ichmouratov Guest musician †arr. Henri Oppenheim Bertil Schulrabe percussion ‡ arr. Airat Ichmouratov & Elvira Misbakhova I Musici de Montréal Kleztory Yuli Turovsky artistic director and conductor I Musici de Montréal violins violas Eleonora Turovsky (concert master) Anne Beaudry Yuli Turovsky Denis Béliveau Suzanne Careau Gisèle Maria Bonadeo-Böll Jacques Proulx Madeleine Messier Françoise Morin-Lyons cellos Christian Prévost Alain Aubut Catherine Sansfaçon-Bolduc Timothy Bruce Halliday Julie Triquet Natalya Turovsky double-bass Constantino Greco 4 5 CHSA 5027 BOOK.qxd 21/9/06 10:52 am Page 6 Klezmer Klezmer is the traditional music of the eighteenth century, the instrumentalist. Only Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe, born of a recently has it been applied to the music itself, Olivier Samson Arcand Yiddish culture that has today almost as a result of the ‘Klezmer revival’ in America. disappeared. Though instrumental music was ‘A marriage without klezmorim is worse than outlawed by the rabbis after the destruction of a funeral without tears.’ (Yiddish proverb) the Second Temple in 70 AD, it has nonetheless Weddings were almost the sole occasions – evolved over the centuries, serving as a conduit the festivals of Sukkot, Purim and Hanukkah for the Jewish soul, and as a salve in times of apart – when instrumental music could be great misfortune, its development intimately played with the approval of the rabbi, and as linked to the troubled fate of the Jewish people the celebrations could last several days, they since their exile from Palestine at the start of were the primary source of income for the the Christian era. Over the past thirty years klezmorim. With their elaborate rituals, such there has been an unprecedented surge in the occasions united whole villages and cemented music’s popularity throughout the world. small communities together, even (and perhaps The earliest evidence that Jewish above all) during the most difficult times. The instrumental groups existed in Central Europe music of the ensemble (kapelye) – by turns dates from the fifteenth century. Thereafter, joyful and energetic for fun and dancing, and fleeing the Spanish Inquisition and persecution, intense and poignant for quiet listening and Jewish communities gradually moved eastwards reflection – mirrored the ambivalence felt by to Poland, Ukraine and Romania, and thence to the newly-weds and their families; and the urban centres of the nineteenth century probably, by extension, that of the Jewish such as Constantinople, Odessa, Rivne, Kiev people towards the world and towards God. and Vilnius. The musicians, jesters and wedding ‘If my eldest daughter marries a tailor, entertainers of these communities were whom will I find for my youngest? A musician?’ originally called leytsim and marshalik. The Musicians were generally on the lowest term ‘Klezmer’ – a contraction of the Hebrew rung of the social ladder. Poor, often Kleztory words kely (instrument) and zemer (melody) – uneducated and non-practising, the klezmorim www.kleztory.com first denoted an instrument, then, from the led a dissolute itinerant life, away from the 7 CHSA 5027 BOOK.qxd 21/9/06 10:52 am Page 8 stability of the shtetl (village) and out of reach among others) who undertook to research, In the nineteenth century it was the violinist, demonstrating a flamboyant and rewarding of the rabbi’s authority. Traumatic events such archive and refresh the old repertoire. However, with his instrument’s voice-like expressive fusion of classical and Klezmer violin as epidemics and pogroms tended to increase the real watershed was the unprecedented capabilities, who was the indisputable leader of techniques. In fact, the Jewish contribution to religious fundamentalism, which in turn brought success of the disc ‘In the Fiddler’s House’, the ensemble, responsible for the majority of ‘serious’ music is considerable: as well as further restrictions on vagrant musicians. recorded in 1995 by Itzhak Perlman with some melodies and improvisations. Public Sir Yehudi Menuhin and Isaac Stern, there are Moreover, from the sixteenth century onwards, of the better-known Klezmer ensembles, such acceptance, and the success and reputation of composers such as Felix Mendelssohn, local councils had implemented arbitrary rules as Brave Old World and The Klezmatics. the ensemble, depended on his virtuosity as a Jacques Offenbach, Arnold Schönberg, George that discriminated against Jews (restricting The music of the klezmorim, product of a performer. The later emergence of the clarinet Gershwin, Aaron Copland and Leonard when and where they could play, which purely oral tradition, has undergone was undoubtedly a result of the forced Bernstein. instruments were permitted, and levying taxes). innumerable transformations over time. A enrolment of Jews into the Tsar’s army during Klezmer is effectively the ‘living memory’ of These, together with the pervading great many rich influences – the music of the the terrible rule of Nicholas I (1825–1855): centuries of European and Middle-Eastern anti-Semitism and the general risks on the road, synagogue, Hasidic and gypsy music, Central paradoxically, this proved a means of music. It embodies the enduring resistance – made the life of the klezmorim grim indeed. European and Greco-Turkish dances, local folk education and social advancement for the through time, migrations and trauma – of the During the nineteenth century, the situation for music – have been distilled down the centuries klezmorim. On their return to the shtetl, the ‘language of the Jewish soul’, and perpetuates the Jews of Eastern Europe became increasingly to create the many-faceted music we hear musicians’ musical baggage had changed the link with the generations that have gone desperate, and the first mass migrations to today. The meditative chanting of the cantor in dramatically and the clarinet reigned supreme, before, those we never knew. Palestine and America took place: this would the synagogue provided the model for ‘the inspiring most of Klezmer’s greatest names of ultimately ensure that Klezmer music survive Jewish musician’: the ornamentation, melodic the twentieth century: Dave Tarras, Naftule © 2004 Henri Oppenheim the tragedies of the twentieth century. In 1939 modes and quasi-vocal effects that mimic Brandwein and Giora Feidman. As for the Translation: Elizabeth Long an estimated 5,000 klezmorim still lived in tears, laughter, mourning and mocking. The accordion, invented in 1852, it was a Eastern Europe. modes, although they do include the late-nineteenth-century addition. Born in Russia, Airat Ichmouratov studied By 1924 about two and a half million Jews trademark ‘Jewish sound’ (the famous A few exceptional figures were clarinet at Kazan Musical College and Kazan had reached the ‘New World’. In these new augmented second), are not strictly of Jewish acknowledged outside the Jewish world for State Conservatory. In 1993 he was appointed surroundings, Klezmer was a victim of the origin but are found in much European and their brilliance, such as the Bielorussian Associate Clarinettist of the Symphony desire for integration, and in spite of several Middle-Eastern music. The distinctive character cimbalist Mikhl Guzikow (1809–1837) who Orchestra of the Kazan Opera Theatre, and of reasonably successful attempts to synthesise it of Klezmer music derives more from its was admired by Mendelssohn. But it was not the Kazan State Symphony Orchestra, with with jazz music Klezmer began its long decline heterophonic nature (accompanied melody), until after the emancipation (haskala) and which he toured Europe. In 2000 he obtained during the 1930s. Its return to favour in the melodic phrasing, use of the minor scale in liberation under Tsar Alexander II a Masters degree at the University of 1970s owes much to the Israeli classical dances, characteristic cadences, rhythms, (1856–1881) that truly great musicians – Montreal. He then founded the Muczynski Trio clarinettist Giora Feidman, and to the passion modulations, structures of three to five clearly principally violinists – issued from the huge which won first prize and Grand Award at the of young American musicians (Andy Statman, defined sixteen-bar sections, and above all well of talent kept secret for centuries, with National Music Festival (Canada, 2002). Michael Alpert, Alan Bern and Henry Sapoznik from the role of the soloist. musicians Jascha Heifetz and David Oistrakh Having performed solo recitals and with 8 9 CHSA 5027 BOOK.qxd 21/9/06 10:52 am Page 10 orchestras in Russia and Canada he is now a was Assistant Principal Viola in the Kazan In 1997, having obtained a PhD in orchestra received the Grand Prix from the doctorate student in conducting at the chamber orchestra ‘La Primavera’. In 1999 she Mathematics in Paris, French-born Henri Montreal Urban Community Arts Council in University of Montreal under Jean-Francois came to Canada to pursue her Masters degree Oppenheim enrolled in McGill University’s March 1999 for its outstanding contribution Rivest and Paolo Bellomia.