Regenerating a Choral Music Culture

Abstract

In the course of the 1950s and 1960s, different trends emerged with regard to choral music culture in the Jewish communities (and continued thereafter): New synagogue choirs formed and there were several children’s and youth choirs which sang during liturgy and nonritual contexts. If this suggests a lively choral music soundscape in the Jewish communities, the opposite was the case. Choral music held a complicated stance therein. Due to the difficulties of establishing and maintaining synagogue choirs, some communities relied on visiting choirs that operated as independent (concert) choirs and on local secular and even church choirs. The repertoire largely reveals an adherence to prewar aesthetics. As such, choral music culture offered an opportunity to approach and define the communities’ musical identity both in the context of worship and in relation to mainstream society.