Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
Premise Checker
I am strongly inclined to doubt it. The book that is the most eager to
ascribe Jewishness to musicians I know of is, Gdal Saleski, _Famous
Musicians of a Wandering Race_ (NY: Bloch Publishing Co., 1927) and its
expansion, _Famous Musicians of Jewish Origin_ (Block, 1949). It includes
Ravel and Saint-Saens, which other such lists do not.
Oskar Strauss is included but not Johann or Richard, whom the book says
is unrelated to Oskar.
S022589
http://www.sonoraproductions.com/s022589.html
JOHANN STRAUSS (I)
Radetzky-Marsch
JOHANN STRAUSS (II)
Vernügungzug (Luxury Train) Polka,
Persischer Marsch (Persian March),
Tritsch-Tratsch,
Geschichten aus dem Wiener Wald (Tales from the Vienna
Woods),
Perpetuum Mobile,
Nationalgarde-Marsch
JOSEPH STRAUSS
Dorfschwalben aus Österreich (Village Swallows from Austria)
EDUARD STRAUSS
Mit Dampf (With Steam) Polka
CHARLES GOUNOD
Petite Symphonie (for 9 Wind Instruments)
NIKOLAI RIMSKY-KORSAKOV
Flight of the Bumble Bee
_______________________________________________________________
Program Notes
Johannes Brahms inscribed Adele Strauss' fan with the opening bars
of An der Schönen blauen Donau (the Blue Danube Waltz) and the
words, "Leider nicht von Brahms" ("Regrettably not by Brahms"). This
was a measure of how the great Waltz Kings, Johann Strauss and his
sons, captivated the romantic yet formal Vienna society of the
nineteenth century with their exhilarating tunes, which came to be
played throughout the major capitals of Europe. Queen Victoria and
the Prince Consort, and other crowned heads of Europe were dancing
the waltz, and the waltzing craze became one of the greatest ever
dance phenomena.
Johann (Baptist) Strauss (I), known as "The Father of the Waltz" was
born in Vienna, Austria on March 14, 1804 and died there on
September 25, 1849. He was born into a humble Jewish family of
Hungarian descent and made a concerted effort to conceal his Jewish
origins. When the ancestry of the family was realized by the
chagrined Nazis a century later, they falsified the parish register
at St. Stephen's Cathedral in 1939 to make the family racially pure.
Johann's father was an innkeeper who apprenticed him to a
bookbinder, but his musical talent revealed itself at an early age.
After Strauss ran away, his parents consented to his becoming a
musician. He studied the violin under Polyschansky and harmony under
Seyfried becoming a violist in Michael Pamer's Dance Orchestra at
15. He became friends with Josef Lanner and in 1819 became a member
of the latter's small band, and later served as second conductor of
Lanner's orchestra (1824-25). In 1825, Strauss organized his own
orchestra, which quickly became popular in Viennese inns. He
composed his first waltz, Täuberln-Walzer, in 1826, transforming the
rigid oom-pah of the Landler Dance into the more elegant, but still
somewhat risqué, Viennese Waltz. His renown spread, and his
orchestra increased in size and efficiency. From 1833 he undertook
concert tours in Austria, and in 1834 was appointed bandmaster of
the 1st Vienna militia regiment. His tours extended to Berlin in
1834 and to the Netherlands and Belgium in 1836. In 1837-38 he
invaded Paris with a picked corps of 28, and had immense success
both there and in London. In 1846 he was named k.k (i.e., kiserlich
and königlich, or imperial and royal) Hofballmusikdirektor. After
catching scarlet fever from one of his children, he died at the age
of 45. Although he composed around 300 works, he is chiefly
remembered for the lovely waltz Loreley-Rhein-Klänge and for the
ubiquitous Radetzky-Marsch (1848) which honors the eponymous
82-year-old Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Austrian army. He had
three sons who carried on the family musical tradition.
Johann (Baptist) Strauss (II), known as "The Waltz King" was born in
Vienna on October 25, 1825 and died there on June 3, 1899. Despite
his great success, the elder Strauss was adamantly opposed to the
idea of his son pursuing a career in music and intended Johann II to
enter the banking profession. The younger Johann, however, displayed
musical gifts at an early age. He began composing when he was six
years old and wrote the first 36 bars of waltz music that later was
published as Erster Gedanhe. His mother arranged for him to secretly
study violin with Franz Amon, the concertmaster of his father's
dance orchestra. After his father left the family in 1842, he was
able to pursue violin training with Anton Kohlmann and music theory
with Joseph Drechsler until 1844. Every bandleader has a location
with which he is identified: Guy Lombardo at the Roosevelt Grill,
Freddy Martin at the Coconut Grove, Glenn Miller at the Glen Island
Casino, Chick Webb at the Savoy, Bob January at the Rainbow Room.
For Johann Strauss, it was Dommayer's Casino. He made his first
public appearance as conductor of his own ensemble at Dommayer's
Casino at Hietzing on October 15, 1844, performing both his own
works and those of his father. His success was instantaneous, and
his new waltzes won wide popularity. Despite his father's objections
to this rivalry in the family, Johann continued his concerts with
increasing success. After his father's death in 1849, he united his
father's band with his own, subsequently making regular tours of
Europe (1856-86). From 1863 to 1871, he was k.k.
Hofballmusikdirektor in Vienna. In 1872, he accepted an invitation
to visit the United States, and directed 14 "monster concerts" in
Boston and 4 in New York. He then turned to the theater. His finest
operetta is Die Fledermaus, an epitome of the Viennese spirit that
continues to hold the stage as one of the masterpieces of its genre.
It was first staged at the Theater an der Wien on April 5, 1874, and
within a few months was given its New York premiere (December 29,
1874). Productions followed all over the world. It was performed in
Paris with a new libretto as La Tzigane on October 30, 1877. The
original version was presented there as La Chauve-souris on April
22, 1904. Also very successful was the operetta Der Zigeunerbaron
premiered in Vienna on October 24, 1885. All his operettas were
first produced in Vienna, with the exception of Line Nacht in
Venedig that premiered in Berlin on October 3, 1883. Although
Strauss composed extensively for the theater, his supreme
achievement remains his dance music. He wrote almost 500 pieces of
it. He brought the Viennese waltz to its highest form with his gifts
for melody, interesting harmonic structures, and clever
orchestrations. The Waltz King created the music that made balls
flourish not just in Vienna, but all over the world. Without his
wonderful compositions and his extraordinary following the ball
would not have had the impact on the social life of the era. Of his
waltzes the greatest popularity was achieved by An der Schönen
blauen Donau, op. 314 (1867), whose main tune became one of the best
known in all music. Strauss contracted 3 marriages: to the singer
Henriette Treffi, the actress Angelika Dittrich, and Adele Strauss,
the widow of the banker Anton Strauss, who was no relation to
Johann's family. Strauss also composed numerous quadrilles, polkas,
polka-mazurkas, marches and gallops as well as several pieces in
collaboration with his brothers Josef and Eduard.
Josef Strauss was born in Vienna on August 22, 1827 and died there
on July 21, 1870, following a fall from the conductor's podium. He
studied music theory with Franz Dolleschal and violin with Franz
Anton. He was trained as an engineer, and worked for the city of
Vienna. In his spare time he put to good use his talents as an
artist, painter, poet, dramatist, singer, composer and inventor - he
designed the horse-drawn forerunner of today's revolving-brush
street-sweeping vehicles - and also published two textbooks on
mathematical subjects. It was only when his elder brother, Johann,
became ill from over-work, that he reluctantly took over -
temporarily, he thought - the leadership of the Strauss orchestra.
Johann once said of him: "Pepi [Josef] is the more gifted of us two;
I am merely the more popular..." Josef regularly appeared as a
conductor with his brother Johann's orchestra (1856-62). Their
younger brother Eduard joined them in 1862. When Johann left the
orchestra in 1863, Josef and Eduard continued to conduct the family
orchestra. Josef wrote 283 opus numbers many of which reveal a
composer of remarkable talent. He is best remembered today as
composer of the waltzes Village Swallows from Austria (1864), The
Mysterious Powers of Magnetism (1865) and Music of the Spheres
(1868) as well as co-writing the Pizzicato-Polka (1869) with his
brother Johann.
Eduard Strauss was born in Vienna on March 15, 1835 and died there
on December 28, 1916. He studied music theory and composition with
Gottfried Preyer and Simon Sechter, violin with Amen, and harp with
Parish-Alvars and Zamara. After playing harp in his brother Johann's
orchestra, he made his debut as a conductor and composer with it at
the Wintergarten of the Dianabad-Saal on April 6, 1862. Eduard and
his other brother Josef shared the conductorship of the orchestra
until the latter's death in 1870. From 1870 to 1878, Eduard was k.k.
Hofballmusikdirektor; subsequently made annual tours of Europe as a
guest conductor, and with his own orchestra. In 1890 and 1900-1901
he toured throughout the United States. He wrote some 300 works, but
they failed to rival the superior works of his brothers. Eduard was
a pompous, dictatorial person, who loved wearing his medals. He is
best remembered as the person who, to fulfill a promise he had made
to his brothers, burned the entire Strauss orchestra library, and
the original manuscripts of the entire Strauss Family in 1906. All
the dance arrangements of the Strauss Orchestra were destroyed in
the boiler room of his friend's chair factory. It took seven hours
amid frantic protestations from the many onlookers. His memoirs were
published in 1906.
Charles Gounod (1818-1893), the son of a painter father and a
musician mother was destined from early in life to be a composer. He
studied in Paris and Rome and fell under the influence of early
Italian church composers such as Palestrina. His enthusiasm for
religious music led him to the seminary. He never graduated, but was
known as "Abbe Gounod" throughout his life. He eventually tried his
hand at stage music composing several operas, of which Faust is the
most famous. Petite Symphonie for 9 Wind Instruments (1885) was a
commission from Gounod's friend Paul Taffanel (1844-1908), the
highly influential teacher of the flute at the Paris Conservatory.
Taffanel had organized an ensemble specifically to perform chamber
works for wind instruments, and in 1885 he asked Gounod to
contribute a piece. Gounod chose an instrumentation that closely
matched the scoring of some of Mozart's wind serenades - two each of
oboes, clarinets, horns, and bassoons - and then added a single
flute, in deference to Taffanel. The Petite Symphonie is a miniature
evocation of a complete classical symphony. The opening movement
begins with a slow introduction before a formal Sonata Allegro
movement begins. The slow movement features an extensive flute part.
The Scherzo contains a full trio and restatement. The finale is
filled with exuberance, varied rhythmic figures and musical ideas
that are passed from one instrument to the next throughout the
movement.
Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) was one of the greatest masters of
Russian music. His source of inspiration was Glinka's operatic
style. He made use of both the purely Russian idiom and coloristic
oriental melodic patterns. Flight of the Bumble Bee is a showpiece,
showing Rimsky-Korsakov's ear for the unusually shaped melody. The
fast runs in semitones clearly bring to mind a bee busily bumbling
about. The music is a bit more vindictive than it might seem. It
comes from Act 3 of the opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan (1903), when
the hero Prince Gvidon, transformed by magic into a bee by a
Swan-Princess, stings his wicked aunts and the old witch who helped
them plot against him and his mother.
_______________________________________________________________
Jews in Music
http://jbuff.com/c080703.htm
Commentary by Dr. Gerhard Falk
Jewish Musicians
In 1938, after the Germans had invaded Austria to the delight of the
Austrian population, the Nazi killers began to dig up Jewish
cemeteries. One of their main objectives was to discard the markers
of famous Jews so as to deny the Jewish contribution to the world's
civilization. Therefore they eradicated the grave of Johann Strauss,
the father of the first waltz king and grandfather of Johann Strauss
II, who wrote the Blue Danube, etc.
The first Strauss had come to Vienna from Hungary in 1804, the year
his son was born.
He was a Jew. Therefore, the haters to this day rant against the
Strauss family which had, of course, abandoned Judaism lest they not
be acceptable to the hate mad Austrian population who gave rise to
such "greats" as Hitler and Eichmann.
We ought not to consider the Strauss family Jewish except in the
eyes of the enemies of God and man.
Among so-called classical composers who were Jewish was of course
the great Felix Mendelssohn (1809 -1847), whose grandfather was the
philosopher Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786). Felix was raised a
Christian, although his grandfather was an orthodox Jew.
Hate mongers call him a Jew composer. Therefore, he was Jewish, at
least from the Nazi point of view. Be sure to listen to his great
violin concerto.
The so-called French composer Jacques Offenbach was a German Jew.
His name was Jacob Eberst (1819-1880). He left Germany in his youth
to escape the haters and settled in Paris. Be sure to listen to his
Gaite Parisinne.
There were many other European Jewish composers such as Giacomo
Meyerbeer, whose name was Meyer Beer (1791-1864).
Other European Jewish composers were Ernest Bloch (1880-1959), and
the great Gustav Mahler (1860-1911), whose Lied von der Erde or his
symphonies rank among the first class compositions of European
musicians. There were of course many others, such as Darius Milhaud,
Arnold Schoenberg (a great musical innovator), and Emil Waldteufel,
who wrote some gorgeous waltzes.
No doubt the leading American classical Jewish composer was George
Gershwin (1898-1937), although there are those who would concede
that honor to Aaron Copland (1900-1990). Leonard Bernstein
(1918-1990) was the third in this Jewish-classical triumvirate. He
wrote oratorios, stage plays such as West Side Story, and movie
music. He also wrote symphonies and all kinds of dances, songs,
concertos, etc.
In this country the Jewish genius truly unfolded. Harold Arlen, Burt
Bacharach, Irving Berlin, Neil Diamond, Bob Dylan, Art Garfunkel,
Marvin Hamlisch, Oscar Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Frank Loesser,
Frederick Lowe, Richard Rodgers, Neil Sedaka, Paul Simon, Stephen
Sondheim and Kurt Weill were and are all Jewish. This is a partial
list of those who created American music. Those not on the list were
also Jewish, with a few exceptions.
Jews have written a good number of the rock 'n roll songs and even
the Christian spirituals, such as the most popular Christian song
"Spirit in the Sky", whose composer is Norman Greenbaum.
Neil Sedaka, no doubt a major rock performer in this country, was a
piano student of the famous classical pianist Artur Rubenstein. In
the 1970's Simon and Garfunkel created today's popular music
together with Billy Joel, the son of a holocaust survivor. Then
there is the very much Jewish Barbra Streisand.
Consider that even the most important film scores have been written
by Jews such as Elmer Bernstein, Bernard Herrmann, Erich Korngold,
Andre Previn, Howard Shore, and Victor Young.
It is impossible to list even a fraction of the music these
composers gave the film industry. Elmer Bernstein alone wrote the
scores for movies from 1952 (Sudden Fear) to 2002 (Seven Women). His
best-known music may well be the Western melodies he composed for
movies of that type.
The truth is that from God Bless America written by the Jew Irving
Berlin to To Know Him is to Love Him by Phil Spector, American music
on the stage, the dance hall and on records is as Jewish as American
medicine. Even now, more and more American music is being created by
Jews whose genius in the music field is as great as it is in any
other enterprise.
We are indeed The Chosen People.
Shalom u'vracha.
Dr. Gerhard Falk is the author of numerous publications, including
Grandparents: A New Look at the Supporting Generation (with Dr.
Ursula A., Falk, 2002), & Man's Ascent to Reason (2003).
Matthew B. Tepper
letters to be typed in
news:Pine.NEB.4.64.08...@panix3.panix.com:
> Jews in Music
> http://jbuff.com/c080703.htm
>
> Commentary by Dr. Gerhard Falk
>
> Jewish Musicians
[ayn snippische leben]
> Frederick Lowe
Tsk!
> Those not on the list were also Jewish, with a few exceptions.
Like Viktor Hoibert, Kohl Porter, and George M. Cohen?
> Neil Sedaka, no doubt a major rock performer in this country, was a
> piano student of the famous classical pianist Artur Rubenstein.
^^^^^^^^^^
TSK!!!!!!
> We are indeed The Chosen People.
And some of us choose ALSO to honor the accomplishments of those of other
faiths, by removing the blinders which make us see only ourselves.
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
War is Peace. ** Freedom is Slavery. ** It's all Napster's fault!
notes...@yahoo.com
came from a long line of Presbyterians and just happened to have a
Jewish sounding name. Apparently the composer took it with a chuckle
and all good grace.
Bruce
Bob Lombard
--------
Samuel? That's an odd assumption to make. I have grand-nephews named
Joshua, Jacob and Joel. Are those Jewish sounding names? I know that
they appear in English versions of the Old Testament, but those seem
to have altered the Hebrew(Aramaic?) names, at least in the case of
Joshua/Yeshua.
bl
Alan Cooper
news:1f209cc3-ddc7-4630...@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.
com:
I remember when David Cone arrived in NYC to pitch for the Mets and plenty of folks
mistakenly assumed that "Cone" was a variant of "Cohen." Cone himself was amused by
the confusion. On a more musical note, the fine president of the Manhattan School of
Music, Robert Sirota, has a common Jewish surname--one that he shares with one of the
most famous cantors of the twentieth century--but he says that he is unaware of
having any Jewish ancestry.
AC
Don Phillipson
news:1f209cc3-ddc7-4630...@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
Yes but what did Abraham Lincoln and David Rockefeller say?
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)
Allen
><snip>
> And some of us choose ALSO to honor the accomplishments of those of other
> faiths, by removing the blinders which make us see only ourselves.
>
Amen!
Allen
Alan Cooper
news:NSuMj.79008$fB7....@en-nntp-06.dc1.easynews.com:
Those are the Latinized/Anglicized versions of the biblical names, and they are
not distinctively Jewish at all. If I saw Joel spelled as Yoel or Samuel as
Shmuel (in other words, as transliterations of the original Hebrew instead of
English "translations"), I generally would assume the bearer was Jewish.
The surname "Barber" belongs to the large category of names derived from
professions. My own name "Cooper" is such a one, although I know of no ancestors
involved in barrel-making. (If it wasn't chosen at random, most likely it's a
corruption of a longer name beginning with Kupr- or Kupfer-.) There's no reason
to assume that the bearer of such a surname would be Jewish, although the
likelihood increases if it's a profession that Jews commonly practiced and the
name is in Hebrew or Yiddish (e.g., Schneider as opposed to Taylor; Schechter or
Katsav rather than Butcher; Scherer instead of Barber). That's probably more than
anyone wanted to know :-)
AC
ansermetniac
<amco...@NOSPAMoptonline.net> wrote:
I thought Fleischer was butcher
Abbedd
Bob Harper
Not I.
Bob Harper
Bob Lombard
> Bob Lombard <thorste...@vermontel.net> wrote in
> news:NSuMj.79008$fB7....@en-nntp-06.dc1.easynews.com:
>
>> --------
>> Samuel? That's an odd assumption to make. I have grand-nephews
>> named Joshua, Jacob and Joel. Are those Jewish sounding names? I
>> know that they appear in English versions of the Old Testament,
>> but those seem to have altered the Hebrew(Aramaic?) names, at
>> least in the case of Joshua/Yeshua.
>
> Those are the Latinized/Anglicized versions of the biblical names, and they are
> not distinctively Jewish at all. If I saw Joel spelled as Yoel or Samuel as
> Shmuel (in other words, as transliterations of the original Hebrew instead of
> English "translations"), I generally would assume the bearer was Jewish.
>
> The surname "Barber" belongs to the large category of names derived from
> professions. My own name "Cooper" is such a one, although I know of no ancestors
> involved in barrel-making. (If it wasn't chosen at random, most likely it's a
> corruption of a longer name beginning with Kupr- or Kupfer-.) There's no reason
> to assume that the bearer of such a surname would be Jewish, although the
> likelihood increases if it's a profession that Jews commonly practiced and the
> name is in Hebrew or Yiddish (e.g., Schneider as opposed to Taylor; Schechter or
> Katsav rather than Butcher; Scherer instead of Barber). That's probably more than
> anyone wanted to know :-)
>
> AC
--------
It's more than fits the ng, but I tend to wonder about things... we
know that Western formal music mostly evolved from/in the Church, for
a while; but in Spain there was a strong Moorish influence. There is
whatever that was going on in Provence. In Italy at least one Jewish
composer had some degree of influence. It doesn't take much to get me
started on a useless line of speculation, e.g. what effect on Western
music did the Diaspora have?
bl
Matthew B. Tepper
in news:1f209cc3-ddc7-4630...@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.com:
Much the same thing happened to the late Robert Goulet, if memory serves.
Alan Cooper
news:4p2504lt92a3b08an...@4ax.com:
Yes. I was thinking of the founder of the institution that employs me, whose name
means "(ritual) slaughterer"--often a butcher, naturally.
AC
Alan Cooper
> Alan Cooper wrote:
>> Bob Lombard <thorste...@vermontel.net> wrote in
>> news:NSuMj.79008$fB7....@en-nntp-06.dc1.easynews.com:
> --------
> It's more than fits the ng, but I tend to wonder about things...
> we know that Western formal music mostly evolved from/in the
> Church, for a while; but in Spain there was a strong Moorish
> influence. There is whatever that was going on in Provence. In
> Italy at least one Jewish composer had some degree of influence.
> It doesn't take much to get me started on a useless line of
> speculation, e.g. what effect on Western music did the Diaspora
> have?
An interesting and controversial question. For some fascinating speculation and
argument, you might take a look at Eric Werner's book, The Sacred Bridge. Just
last week I happened to be riding the subway with a musicologist colleague, and by
an odd coincidence I asked him how well Werner's theories about East-->West
transmission of musical modes holds up. Naturally it is problematic to ascribe
any specific aspect of early Western music to direct Jewish influence, but there
undoubtedly were various Eastern influences (including Muslim and Eastern
Christian chants as well as the Jewish modes). Are we sufficiently OT yet? :-)
AC
ansermetniac
<amco...@NOSPAMoptonline.net> wrote:
My mother's sister married a Schechter who, I think, was a nephew of
Mordicai.
As for me, there is nothing like a traditonal milchadich meal
Abbedd
Sam
<che...@panix.com> wrote:
>Johann (Baptist) Strauss (I), known as "The Father of the Waltz" was
>born in Vienna, Austria on March 14, 1804 and died there on
>September 25, 1849. He was born into a humble Jewish family of
>Hungarian descent and made a concerted effort to conceal his Jewish
>origins. When the ancestry of the family was realized by the
>chagrined Nazis a century later, they falsified the parish register
>at St. Stephen's Cathedral in 1939 to make the family racially pure.
The PBS website has a somewhat different take on this:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/gperf/shows/vienna2004/essay2.html
If Vienna, its Philharmonic, and its Waltz King are firmly and
justifiably fused in the popular imagination, the New Year's Day
concert has a more equivocal legacy. The first one took place in 1939,
four decades after Johann Jr.'s death, and months after Austria had
been absorbed into Hitler's Germany. The Vienna Philharmonic's Web
site interprets that event as a cautiously subversive act: "In
performing a concert consisting entirely of works of the Strauss
dynasty, the orchestra subtly underscored Austrian nationality at a
time when the country had disappeared from the world map," the
orchestra's official history explains.
That account, however, omits several germane facts: that the elder
Strauss' grandfather, also named Johann, had been born a Jew and
converted to Catholicism; that Johann Jr.'s third wife, Adčle, was
also Jewish; and that in order to obtain a divorce and marry her, the
Waltz King had had to renounce his Austrian citizenship. (Here, the
ironies multiply, since Adčle's maiden name, Deutsch, means German and
in the 18th century, the word "deutsch" was used as a synonym for
waltz.) By 1939, Germany had not only annexed Austria, but its
cultural heritage, too, and the Gestapo had gone so far as to
obliterate all records of the Strauss family's Jewish past in order to
justify Hitler's personal fondness for their waltzes.
Sam
For those with an interest in Nazi trivia, here is the story of how
the 1762 marriage record of Johann Sr.'s grandfather was altered:
Bob Lombard
-------
I'm sure we are. I gather that we know quite a lot about Church music,
even during the Dark Ages, but what was going on in music in the
countryside is pretty much a blank. I don't even know what aspects of
middle-eastern music - modal or otherwise - could be discernibly
distinct in Western music now.
If I were a teenager again, with the financial means available (to
attend university), I think there would have eventually been a
doctoral thesis in there somewhere. But on that path I probably would
not have met many of the good friends I know now. I'm happy with what
I have.
bl
Peter T. Daniels
> noteset...@yahoo.com appears to have caused the following letters to be typed
> innews:1f209cc3-ddc7-4630...@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.com:
>
> > Samuel Barber was listed on a list of Jewish composers. In truth, he came
> > from a long line of Presbyterians and just happened to have a Jewish
> > sounding name. Apparently the composer took it with a chuckle and all good
> > grace.
>
> Much the same thing happened to the late Robert Goulet, if memory serves.
Well, he was Canadian.
david...@aol.com
> An interesting and controversial question. For some fascinating speculation and
> argument, you might take a look at Eric Werner's book, The Sacred Bridge. Just
> last week I happened to be riding the subway with a musicologist colleague, and by
> an odd coincidence I asked him how well Werner's theories about East-->West
> transmission of musical modes holds up. Naturally it is problematic to ascribe
> any specific aspect of early Western music to direct Jewish influence, but there
> undoubtedly were various Eastern influences (including Muslim and Eastern
> Christian chants as well as the Jewish modes). Are we sufficiently OT yet? :-)
No, you've veered back on topic. Needless to say, the early church
was split into an Eastern or Byzantine branch from which both the
present-day Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox churches are descended
and a Western branch, the so-called church of Rome. There were
different influences on each.
As for Moorish influence via the Iberian peninsula, suffice it to say
that one form of early liturgical chant contemporaneous with but
distinct from "Gregorian" chant was Mozarabic chant, aka Hispanic
chant, which originated in Spain. Mozarabic chant was the chant of
Christians living under Muslim rule following the Moorish conquest.
-david gable
Curtis Croulet
Matthew, I'm missing something here. Are you saying Goulet was alleged or
believed to be Jewish, when in fact he was not? What is the point you're
trying to make WRT Robert Goulet?
--
Curtis Croulet
Temecula, California
33°27'59"N, 117°05'53"W
TareeDawg
> I'm sure we are. I gather that we know quite a lot about Church music,
> even during the Dark Ages, but what was going on in music in the
> countryside is pretty much a blank.
So much so, that your good friend Bela Bartok, scoured his own backyard
on several 'expeditions' to find out. An interesting topic.
Apparently southern Mesopotania, 4000 bc is 'regarded' as the source of
many things 'western', including music, but earlier people banging on
drums and whistling through bones must have influenced even these people.
Ray (Dawg) Hall, Taree
Prai Jei
continuum:
> Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
Does it matter?
--
ξ:) Proud to be curly
Interchange the alphabetic letter groups to reply
John W Kennedy
> Premise Checker set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
> continuum:
>
>> Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
>
> Does it matter?
It does if you're a social historian focussed on 19th-century Mitteleuropa.
--
John W. Kennedy
"Give up vows and dogmas, and fixed things, and you may grow like
That. ...you may come to think a blow bad, because it hurts, and not
because it humiliates. You may come to think murder wrong, because it
is violent, and not because it is unjust."
-- G. K. Chesterton. "The Ball and the Cross"
Peter T. Daniels
> Prai Jei wrote:
> > Premise Checker set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
> > continuum:
>
> >> Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
>
> > Does it matter?
>
> It does if you're a social historian focussed on 19th-century Mitteleuropa.
Wouldn't the social historian be more interested in what was claimed
and why, than on whether the claim was accurate?
Ward Hardman
> Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
1. Was his mother Jewish?
--Ward Hardman
"The older I get, the more I admire and crave competence, just
simple competence, in any field from adultery to zoology."
H.L. Mencken
Ward Hardman
> On Apr 13, 12:34 pm, Premise Checker <chec...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> > Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
>
> 1. Was his mother Jewish?
> > Johann (Baptist) Strauss (I), known as "The Father of the Waltz" was
2. How many Jews are named after "Johann the Baptist"?
Ward Hardman
> On Apr 27, 12:16 am, Ward Hardman <ward.hard...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Apr 13, 12:34 pm, Premise Checker <chec...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> > > Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
>
> > 1. Was his mother Jewish?
> > > Johann (Baptist) Strauss (I), known as "The Father of the Waltz" was
>
> 2. How many Jews are named after "Johann the Baptist"?
> > > born in Vienna, Austria on March 14, 1804 and died there on
> > > September 25, 1849. He was born into a humble Jewish family of
3. Other sources say JBS, Sr. had a Jewish *grandfather* who
converted to Christianity. That would make Johann Sr. one-fourth
Jewish and Johann Jr. one-eighth Jewish. Is jewelry "gold" if
it is 12.5% gold in content (that's 3 karats!)? (If the Nazis
could
be convinced that as tiny a content percentage made something
"gold" as would make a person Jewish, a tidy fortune could have
been amassed by "wh*lesalers" peddling them "r*pl*ca" jewelry!)
Ward Hardman
1. Was his mother Jewish?
> Johann (Baptist) Strauss (I), known as "The Father of the Waltz" was
2. How many Jews are named after "Johann the Baptist"?
> born in Vienna, Austria on March 14, 1804 and died there on
> September 25, 1849. He was born into a humble Jewish family of
3. Other sources say JBS, Sr. had a Jewish *grandfather* who
converted to Christianity. That would make Johann Sr. one-fourth
Jewish and Johann Jr. one-eighth Jewish. Is jewelry "gold" if
it is 12.5% gold in content (that's 3 karats!)? (If the Nazis
could
be convinced that as tiny a content percentage made something
"gold" as would make a person Jewish, a tidy fortune could have
been amassed by "wh*lesalers" peddling them "r*pl*ca" jewelry!)
4. As for his third marriage, to Adele Strauss, must one be Jewish
to find a Jewish woman (especially a wealthy banker's
widow ;-) attractive ?
Sam
I posted this link when the thread started. The Vienna Institute for
Strauss Research has settled the issue. His great grandfather, Johann
Michael Strauss, was born Jewish:
http://www.johann-strauss.at/wissen/faelschung_e.shtml
Jon Alan Conrad
X-No-Archive:
> > Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
>
> Does it matter?
Only to those who care about biography or history.
JAC
John W Kennedy
> On Apr 26, 6:23 pm, John W Kennedy <jwke...@attglobal.net> wrote:
>> Prai Jei wrote:
>>> Premise Checker set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
>>> continuum:
>>>> Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
>>> Does it matter?
>
> Wouldn't the social historian be more interested in what was claimed
> and why, than on whether the claim was accurate?
Wel, if you want to argue that way, if you don't know the truth, how do
you know who's lying?
--
John W. Kennedy
"Information is light. Information, in itself, about anything, is light."
-- Tom Stoppard. "Night and Day"
John W Kennedy
> 3. Other sources say JBS, Sr. had a Jewish *grandfather* who
> converted to Christianity. That would make Johann Sr. one-fourth
> Jewish and Johann Jr. one-eighth Jewish. Is jewelry "gold" if
> it is 12.5% gold in content (that's 3 karats!)? (If the Nazis
> could be convinced that as tiny a content percentage made something
> "gold" as would make a person Jewish, a tidy fortune could have
> been amassed by "wh*lesalers" peddling them "r*pl*ca" jewelry!)
Never heard of the "one drop" theory? -- it's still pretty much in
effect in the US to define "black".
But the Nazis were kinder to operetta composers than to most other Jews.
There was even an attempt made to have Kálmán declared an "Honorary Aryan".
--
John W. Kennedy
"The bright critics assembled in this volume will doubtless show, in
their sophisticated and ingenious new ways, that, just as /Pooh/ is
suffused with humanism, our humanism itself, at this late date, has
become full of /Pooh./"
-- Frederick Crews. "Postmodern Pooh", Preface
Peter T. Daniels
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > On Apr 26, 6:23 pm, John W Kennedy <jwke...@attglobal.net> wrote:
> >> Prai Jei wrote:
> >>> Premise Checker set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
> >>> continuum:
> >>>> Was Johann Strauss Jewish?
> >>> Does it matter?
> >> It does if you're a social historian focussed on 19th-century Mitteleuropa..
>
> > Wouldn't the social historian be more interested in what was claimed
> > and why, than on whether the claim was accurate?
>
> Wel, if you want to argue that way, if you don't know the truth, how do
> you know who's lying?
Historians -- and not just postmodern historians -- would point out
that we can never know exactly what happened in the past. (The
postmodernist might add, and it doesn't matter.)