Joel Engel

His work in preserving the musical tradition of the shtetl—the 19th-century Jewish village of eastern Europe—made possible the revival of klezmer music today.

• Name — Joel Engel • Birthplace — Berdyansk, Russian Empire • Died — 11 February 1927 • Place of death — Tel Aviv, Mandatory Palestine • Genre — Jewish art music • Occupation — * Composer • critic • teacher • impresario • Works — Founder of the Jewish art music movement • Years Active — 1900–1927

Engel was born Yuliy Dmitrievich Engel in Berdyansk (present-day Ukraine). Unlike most Jewish families of the period, he grew up outside of the Pale of Settlement, the area designated by the Tsar as legal for Jewish residence. His parents were secular Jews. Engel studied law at Kharkov University, and later, at the urging of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, who heard his compositions, entered the Moscow Conservatory. After graduating from the conservatory, Engel worked as the music critic of the influential Russian newspaper Russkiye Vedomosti. He became an influential figure in Russian musical life, supporting composers who wrote in the increasingly popular Russian nationalist style. In 1907, he published his Brief Musical Dictionary (Kratkiy muzykal'nyy slovar; P. Jurgenson, Moscow/Leipzig), and between 1901 and 1904, the Russian edition of H. Riemann's comprehensive Musik-Lexikon had been published under his editorship.

According to Jacob Weinberg (1879–1956), a concert pianist, classical composer and close associate, Engel had no interest in Jewish music until a catalyzing meeting in 1899 with Vladimir Stasov, art critic and a leading proponent of Russian nationalism in art and music. According to Weinberg, Stasov shouted at Engel, "Where is your national pride in your own people?" Engel experienced an epiphany, and took a profound interest in his Jewish musical roots. In the summer of 1900, Engel returned to his home in Berdyansk, and collected Yiddish folk melodies. The next year, he organized lecture-concerts in Moscow and St. Petersburg, which included performances of the songs he had recorded and arranged. Engel dedicated the next years to gathering and arranging Jewish folk music, presenting concerts, and encouraging other Jewish composers to rediscover their national roots and create a Jewish national musical style. Engel wrote Jewish Folksongs, volume I in 1909 and Volume II in 1912, composing instrumentation for existing Jewish folk songs.

• Illustration — Title page of a publication of Juwal. The cover sheet shows the logo that appeared on the Society's publications: a star of David enclosing a harp, flanked by a winged lion and a deer, recalling the Biblical verse "Strong as a lion, quick as a deer." In 1922, the Society sent Engel on a mission to Germany, to promote the new Jewish music movement in the German Jewish community. Engel organized a series of concerts in Berlin and Leipzig, including performances of songs and instrumental works by Engel, Krein, Gnesin, Rosowsky, and others. Among the performers in these concerts was Gregor Piatigorsky. The following year, Engel opened the Juwal (Yuval) publishing house in Berlin. Juwal became the main publisher for composers of the society, printing editions of songs and chamber works in the new Jewish style. Yet, despite his intense activity in Germany as a composer, publisher and impresario, Engel was dissatisfied, and decided to move to Palestine. By now a renowned composer in the Jewish world, Engel's arrival was awaited anxiously by the Jewish community in Tel Aviv and Jaffa. He was offered a position teaching theory at the Shulamit music school, and there was some discussion of setting up a full conservatory under his direction. Engel moved to Palestine in 1924. In Palestine, Engel devoted himself to teaching and to composing, primarily children's and folk songs. Concerned that children's songs at the time were either European tunes with new words in Yiddish or Hebrew, or Yiddish songs from the shtetl, Engel tried to create a new, indigenous style. "How can we sing the song of the Diaspora in the promised land?" he wrote in a letter. Many of his new songs were based on Yemenite melodies or motifs. During his life in Palestine, Engel also became associated with the Ohel theater group, one of the first theaters in Palestine. He wrote incidental music for the original play "Neshef Peretz", which toured the Jewish settlements of Palestine. He organized and conducted the Ohel choir, and wrote many new songs for choir and solo. His songs were popular, and were sung throughout Palestine. In spite of the warm reception he received, Engel had a difficult time adjusting to life in Palestine. "I was pampered in Moscow and Berlin," he wrote in a letter in 1924. "... Here no one knows what Engel the composer wrote then, and what he is writing now." His health gradually failed, and on 11 February 1927, he died in Tel Aviv.

Engel was one of the first—perhaps the first—musician to recognize that traditional Jewish music was not based on the major-minor tonal system that dominated classical and popular music of the period. "Most Jewish songs are built on the ancient modes (Aeolian, Dorian, Mixolydian, and so on)," he wrote in 1900. "Occasionally, one encounters major or minor; but more common are modes that are not written in our modern text books, and could be called 'eastern'." This harmonic conception is apparent in Engel's compositions. For example, in the Dybbuk suite, opus 35, Engel uses an augmented fifth as the tonic chord, rather than a standard major or minor chord. Aside from the Dybbuk suite, for string orchestra and clarinet, Engel wrote no orchestral music, and no large-scale works (symphonies, operas, concertos, and so on). His entire oevre is either piano solo, chamber works, or songs. He frequently used innovative combinations for his chamber music; for example, "Adagio Mysterioso", opus 22, is scored for violin, cello, harp and organ. He, like others of the Jewish art music movement, favored songs with obbligato string parts. The song "Ahava Rahya", for example, is scored for singer and violin, flute, viola and organ. Many of Engel's songs are based on traditional Jewish folksongs. For example, his cradle song "Numi Numi Yaldaty" ("sleep, sleep my child"), is a variant of a traditional Yiddish lullaby. However, Engel often draws on sources other than Jewish traditional music, as well. Ahava Rahya, cited above, is based on an Arabic melody, and many of the tunes he composed in Palestine are based on Yemenite songs. Engel's popular music, which during his lifetime dominated the popular music scene in Palestine, has been largely forgotten. Some of his songs, however, are still sung today. These include "Numi Numi", one of Israel's most popular lullabies; "Omrim Yeshna Eretz", the children's song "Geshem Geshem Mishamayim", and others.