Singapore, a South-East Asian haven: The Sephardi-Singaporean liturgical music of its Jewish community, 1841 to the present

Abstract

Despite the extensive contributions of several major musicologists, our knowledge of the music of the many Jewish communities of the world is still far from complete. Music of many Jewish diaspora communities in South-East Asia, East Asia, Australia, South America, and Africa still await research and comparative study. The music of the Singapore Jewish community, which is primarily Babylonian-Sephardi, is one such area. This article aims to give an overview of the Singaporean community's historico-musical experience, to describe a few samples of its liturgical music, and to account for this music's continuity and change over the past 160 years. In contrast with neighbouring Indonesia and Malaysia, where militant Islam has recently grown strong, Singapore has served as a haven for Jews in South-East Asia over the past century and a half.