Do Jews count in klezmer? The problem of ‘Jewface’ in the British world music industry
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Klezmer has become an established genre in world music, but its performance is dominated by non-Jewish musicians. Against the backdrop of the ‘Jewface’ scandal in London’s West End, I explore the issue of Jewish representation in klezmer in the British world music industry, examining recurrent trends of cultural appropriation that result in the exclusion and exploitation of Jewish musicians and the exoticisation and erasure of Yiddish culture. I highlight how this systemic marginalisation illustrates a double standard in the industry, providing another example of how Jews are being left out of the progressive drive towards diversity in the performing arts.
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This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any med-ium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
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Link to article including link to pdf, Do Jews count in klezmer? The problem of ‘Jewface’ in the British world music industry
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Do Jews count in klezmer? The problem of ‘Jewface’ in the British world music industry. 2023: https://archive.jpr.org.uk/10.1080/1462169X.2023.2235855
