In Search of Jews, Music, and Sound: Lost, Hidden, Revived
University of Pennsylvania
Benjamin Franklin Room, Houston Hall
3417 Spruce Street, Philadelphia PA 19104
Katz Center Spring Colloquium
In global Jewish life, music and nonverbal sounds have long served to elicit emotions and feelings that are difficult to conceptualize. In this two-day in-person conference, we will address the mystery of music and sound, both within Jewish experience and from outside the Jewish community. Examining a range of historical and social contexts, from ancient myths and biblical stories to our contemporary moment, this conference assembles experts to capture the roles that music and sound have played in governing political agendas, configuring personal values, and shaping modern national projects.
MONDAY, APRIL 15
9:30 AM Breakfast, Golkin Room, Houston Hall, 3417 Spruce Street
10:15 AM Welcome, Benjamin Franklin Room, Houston Hall
Steven Weitzman, Ella Darivoff Director
10:30 AM Recovered Performance
Chair: Mary Channen Caldwell, University of Pennsylvania/Katz Center Fellow
Arabic as Sacred: Contemporary Performance Practices among Mizrahi Haredim in Israel
Galeet Dardashti, New York University/Katz Center Fellow
Resonating Repentance: Sounding out Sliḥot in the Israeli Public Sphere
Naomi Cohn Zentner, Bar-Ilan University/Katz Center Fellow
Jews and Arabs in the Time of TikTok: The Sonic Economy of Israeli Ethnicities
Oded Erez, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Respondent: Klára Móricz, Amherst College
12:00 PM Lunch (by invitation) Golkin Room, Houston Hall
1:30 PM Acts of Musical Duplication
Moderator: Kay Kaufman Shelemay, Harvard University/Katz Center Fellow
Panelists: Yonatan Turgeman, Tel Aviv University/Katz Center Fellow
Gila Flam, The National Library of Jerusalem/Katz Center Fellow
Mark Kligman, UCLA/Katz Center Fellow
Hadar Feldman Samet, Tel Aviv University/Katz Center Fellow
Evan Rapport, The New School
Oren Cohen Roman, University of Haifa/Katz Center Fellow
3:15 PM Break
3:45 PM Behind the Scenes in the Music Business
Chair: Jim Sykes, University of Pennsylvania
“Between Biznes and Art”: Jewish Impresarios and Actors in the South American Yiddish Theatre Scene
Paula Ansaldo, University of Buenos Aires/Katz Center Fellow
"For Evening and Opera Occasions": Jewish Production and Consumption of Goods and Services for New York Opera Culture
Samantha M. Cooper, Harvard University/Katz Center Fellow
Sound Infrastructure: Jews and the Recording Industry in Twentieth-Century North Africa and the Middle East
Christopher Silver, McGill University
Respondent: Mark Slobin, Wesleyan University
5:15 PM Break
6:30 PM Dinner (By invitation) ARCH Building (Room 108), 3601 Locust Walk
TUESDAY, APRIL 16
8:30 AM Breakfast, Golkin Room, Houston Hall
9:00 AM Murmuring Archives
Chair: Talya Fishman, University of Pennsylvania
Daughter of a Lost Tribe: Madame Goldye Steiner, Shahanna McKinney Baldon and Echoes of Black Khazones
Jeremiah Lockwood, Yale Institute of Sacred Music/Katz Center Fellow
Musical Life in Terezín: A Reconsideration
Kai Hinrich Müller, Cologne University of Music and Dance
Bene Israel Women’s Song Notebooks: A Relational Archive of Performance
Anna Schultz, University of Chicago
Respondent: Lyudmila Sholokhova, The New York Public Library
10:30 AM Break
11:00 AM Beyond Reason: Music between Mysticism, Esotericism and Healing
Moderator: Edwin Seroussi, Hebrew University of Jerusalem/Katz Center Fellow
Panelists: Jessica Roda, Georgetown University/Katz Center Fellow
Richard Jankowsky, Tufts University
Michael Lukin, Hebrew University of Jerusalem/Katz Center Fellow
Collin Edouard, Yale University
12:30 PM Luncheon (by invitation) Café 58, Irvine Auditorium, 3401 Spruce Street
