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Berlin Klezmer and Urban Scenes

Author(s): Alexander, Phil

Editor(s): Frühauf, Tina

Date: 2023

Topics: Cities and Suburbs, Jewish Music, Main Topic: Culture and Heritage, Klezmer

Abstract: This chapter considers klezmer music’s changing social role: from the ritual musical expression of distinct ethnic and geographic nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Ashkenazic Jewish communities in eastern Europe and subsequently the United States, to a looser twenty-first-century articulation of musical connectivity, as expressed within multiple local scenes. It focuses particularly on developments in Berlin over the past three decades, during which time the city has hosted the busiest and most dynamic klezmer scenes outside of North America. The analysis follows a narrative that has moved from committed but isolated pioneers, through a rapid post-reunification take-up (initially by a majority of non-Jews), to a contemporary sense of community as seen in the work of a group of younger, international musicians, some of whom have also brought a renewed emphasis to the Jewishness of klezmer. The chapter argues that the city and its cosmopolitanism facilitate the conjuncture of local scene and transnational community.