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In Reply to: RE: I think that EVERY LAST AUDIO WRITER ON THE PLANET should read this memoir... posted by John Marks on November 02, 2015 at 16:46:40
nt
Des
Follow Ups:
Setright was Jewish, I believe Orthodox, but he was very educated in music, and he once observed that Edward Elgar's Newman setting "The Dream of Gerontius" could turn ANYONE into a Catholic for as long as it was playing.
THAT was gracious.
jm
Jewish, but still managed to be educated in music. Unlike: Szell, Walter, Horenstein, Mahler, Horowitz, Rubinstein, Bernstein, Copland, Riech, Pearlman, Feldman, Solti, Glass, Barenboim, MTT, Klemperer, Kissen, etc, etc, etc.
The key qualifier in that sentence was ORTHODOX.
I have known Orthodox Jews who were educated in Jewish religious schools and their education was remarkable intense in some areas (Talmud studies for the boys) but rather scanty otherwise (the culture of the outside Gentile world). A neighbor of mine when I was growing up was ordained as an Orthodox Rabbi. He had not really heard American popular or Western classical until he went away to a secular Gentile college.
You rattle off a list of musicians with Jewish ancestry, but in some cases with ironies you seem unaware of.
Um, exactly how "Orthodox" was Aaron Copland??? Answer: Not very.
Mahler as an adult converted to Christianity, and IIRC as a child sang in churches.
I don't think that there is one Orthodox Jew on your list.
There is no question that European Jewish Orthodoxy had a vibrant musical culture, but I also think that it would be unusual and noteworthy for someone raised and for instance trained as a cantor in a traditional Orthodox community to be very familiar with a work by Elgar that was at the end of the day an apologia for certain Catholic beliefs that the Anglican Church found uncongenial.
That is the sum total of what I meant.
And I assume that most people took it that way.
jm
In defense of poster BenE, I also read your sentence as referring to his being Jewish, rather than Orthodox. The phrase about his being Orthodox was set off by commas, suggesting to me that it was to be read parenthetically. In any case, the confusion serves only to underscore the danger of readers misinterpreting one's writing, which was the point of your initial post. Thus, the misunderstanding fortuitously serves your original purpose.
nt
The Russian Orthodox Church had a similar hostility towards secular music that had a major impact in Russia, at least until the time of Peter the Great. I guess this is characteristic of many religious institutions that seek to keep their followers free (or isolated) from "heretical" outside cultural influences and ideas.
I don't think your sentence is clear in terms of Orthodox being the key issue. I do realize my throwing out, off the top of my head, a list of Jewish musicians contains some who later converted, like Szell, etc. They were born Jewish and in many cases into observant homes. They certainly were regarded as Jews whether they converted or not. Do you think the Mahler was ever regarded as anything but a Jew in Viena or in Germany?
That said, I'm sorry I misunderstood your intent.
Believe it or not, I am personally no stranger to antisemitism, and due to my peculiar circumstances, I have also had on (rare) occasion Jewish people confide anti-Irish remarks to me, they being ignorant that my mother's family came from County Cork.So I am under no allusions about Mahler.
My ancestral name (according to myth and legend) was von Marx. There are supposedly three coats of arms in Austria and Germany for von Marx, and all three prominently feature golden Stars of David.
They might allow you to purchase an increment of status or respectability, but, by the same coin, they will make sure that nobody is deceived or uninformed.
NOW, if my original intent was ungenerous or narrow-minded, I probably should regret that. But I have seen religiously-driven cultural narrowness too many times and so perhaps I am hypersensitive to it.
There's an ultra-orthodox Catholic schismatic group up in Massachusetts and they have an active website, blah blah blah and they have these self-declared Holier than the Vatican types who purport to give spiritual counsel through bulletin boards, and the most tragically uproarious exchange I saw was this poor girl wrote in to say that her (valid and licit) Roman Catholic parish was starting to offer Irish Step Dancing Lessons, and was it OK for her to attend and take part?
No, nay, never! quickly came the response. The ultra-orthodox Catholic site told her that all kinds of awful things could happen. They made Irish Step Dancing sound like the gateway drug to the porn industry.
Which reminds me of the famous Jewish joke about the nervous young bridegroom and the Ultra-Orthodox Rabbi...
Shalom,
JM
Edits: 11/03/15
To the reason Southern Baptists will not make love standing up?
nt
Interesting observations/life experience...
Are you implying John was off the "Mark" .... :)
NT
I didn't know that. I loved his writing in "Car" magazine - his trip to
visit Linn Products in Glasgow was a highlight - but when I read one of his
books, I was dreadfully disappointed - run-on sentences, overlong
paragraphs etc, etc. Definitely needed to work with empathetic editors!
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Hey John,I'm glad that you brought that up. I'm an excellent speller, but I struggle with the proper usage of semi-colons, elipseseses, dashes, quotation marks/ending punctuation.
I'm a big fan of Charles Osgood with regard to this - he seems to have all of this under control, and is quite likely the most grammatically articulate person I've heard (along with Bill Buckley).
But, the written word is a different animal than the spoken word, and the written word is where I have trouble duplicating the intent of the spoken word.
Can you point me to a good, more-or-less concise, reference source for these things?
Thanks!
:)
Edits: 11/05/15
> the written word is a different animal than the spoken word, and the
> written word is where I have trouble duplicating the intent of the spoken
> word. Can you point me to a good, more-or-less concise, reference source
> for these things?
This is an enormous subject. For those of us "of a certain age," the bible
is Fowler's "Modern English Usage," linked below. Though first published
in 1928, its wisdom is still relevant. The fourth edition was published
this year.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Thanks for sharing as that is some very interesting ideas that I need to truly consider.
Jim Tavegia
nt
NT
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