Jewish Music Web Center Announcements

Svigals-Rushefsky in "Mahler's World: Jewish Music in the Hapsburg Empire"

Klezmer violin superstar Alicia Svigals returns to the Maverick on July 14 at 8:00 p.m. with tsimblist Pete Rushefsky.

Ms. Svigals and Mr. Rushefsky brought down the house last summer at Maverick, and this year¹s concert is called "Mahler¹s World: Jewish Music in the Hapsburg Empire." The concert is part of Maverick¹s season-long celebration of the centenary of Gustav Mahler¹s arrival in America to lead the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic.

Classical concerts are Saturday evenings at 6:00 and Sunday afternoons at 3:00, with jazz, world music, and klezmer on selected Saturday nights at 8:00. Young people¹s concerts are Saturday mornings at 11:00.

The box office opens an hour before each concert; the hall opens half an hour before curtain time. Except for the last weekend of the season, ticket prices are $20 for adults and $5 for students. Books of ten tickets, to be used in any combination at any regular concert throughout the season, may be purchased at the box office for $150 or by writing to Maverick Concerts, P.O. Box 9, Woodstock, NY 12498. Children under 12 are admitted free when accompanied by an adult. Donors of $50 or more to the sustaining fund of the series may attend the season-closer Friends of Maverick Concert.

Tickets are general admission with no reserved seating, and a special ³rock bottom² area provides pay-what-you-can seating. The Maverick Concert Hall is accessible to persons with disabilities.

The Maverick Concert Hall is located on Maverick Road, near Woodstock, approximately one mile from the road¹s junctions with either Route 375 or Route 28. For additional information, visit www.maverickconcerts.org , call the Maverick¹s recorded message line at 845-679-8217, or send e-mail to maverickmuse@aol.com. Klezmer is the traditional, celebratory music of eastern European Jewry, played in the old world and the new at weddings, bar mitzvahs, and other simkhes, or happy occasions. Euphoric, ecstatic, and heart-wrenching, its beauty and high emotion have made it a worldwide phenomenon, as electrifying on the concert stage as it is joyful to dance to with family and friends. Klezmer music in this country has typically been jazzy brass bands led by clarinets, but earlier Eastern European klezmer ensembles were string bands led by violins accompanied by the tsimbl. A stringed instrument played like a xylophone, the tsimbl is played with mallets padded with cotton or leather. The multiple strings at each pitch give the tsimbl its rich and haunting sonority. It was a popular instrument in klezmer bands across Eastern Europe from the 1600's through the first decades of the twentieth century. The instrument is still quite popular in parts of Eastern Europe and Balkans and is often associated with Rom (gypsy) musicians. Gustav Mahler was a towering figure in the artistic and intellectual hotbed that was Vienna at the end of the 19th Century. Mahler used, in his symphonies and vocal works, music from both ³high² and ³low² culture to a degree unknown before this. He was born to Jewish parents in what is now the Czech Republic and, to a great extent, the klezmer music of eastern Europe was a root source of melodic and harmonic material for him. Violinist/composer Alicia Svigals, a founder of the Klezmatics and of the all-women band Mikveh, is considered by many to be the world's foremost klezmer fiddler. During the past decade, she almost singlehandedly revived klezmer fiddle playing, which came close to extinction in the last century; traditional klezmer violin style is now being played again by hundreds of her students, including most of today's best professional players. She taught and toured with violinist Itzhak Perlman, who recorded her compositions as duets with Ms. Svigals accompanied by the Klezmatics. Pete Rushefsky is a leading revivalist of the tsimbl. He is also executive director of the Center for Traditional Music and Dance, a New York not-for-profit dedicated to preserving and nurturing the performing arts traditions of immigrant and ethnic communities. He is a well-known performer and lecturer on klezmer and other traditional musics and has a number of published articles to his credit. Maverick Concerts, near Woodstock, New York, is the oldest continuous summer chamber music series in America. The Maverick Concert Hall was built by hand in 1916 in the pristine Catskill woodland, and now it is a multi-starred attraction on the National Register of Historic Places. Presenting concerts by nationally and internationally known performers at affordable prices, Maverick continues the vision of Hervey White, founder of the collaborative 101-year-old Maverick Art Colony.

Yamaha is The Official Piano of Maverick Concerts; the C7 grand piano on the Maverick stage appears through the generosity of Yamaha Music Corporation of America.

Maverick Concerts, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization, is supported by The Maverick Endowment Fund, Friends of Maverick, public and private foundations, local businesses, the Towns of Woodstock and Hurley, and by public funds from The New York State Council on The Arts, a state agency. The commissioning and performance of the chamber orchestra version of ³Final Alice² is supported by the New York State Music Fund, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.

Posted by jmwc at July 10, 2007 11:37 PM