EXHIBIT: Jews, Rock & Roll at City Winery, NYC (5/26/15)
On Tuesday, May 26, a benefit was held at City Winery in New York City to raise awareness and funds for a new traveling pop-up museum called “Jews, Rock & Roll.” The museum will tour the country as a traveling event for exhibition spaces, storefronts, and other venues in 10 to 15 cities across North America starting in the spring of 2016 and will hopefully find a permanent home in New York City afterwards. Over 250,000 people will see the exhibit during its travels, and it’s organized around five specific eras: The Rise of the American, The Rise of the Teenager, The Rise of Counter Culture, The Rise of Record Industry, and The Rise of the Post Modern/Ethnic American.
The exhibit was co-created by Michael Dorf, founder of City Winery, who’s considered one of the most successful Jewish music producers in North America, and David Franklin, founder of the International Jewish Presenters Association Schmooze Culture Conference, aided by Ben Sidran, Ph.D., an award-winning artist, music producer and journalist, and author of the book, There Was a Fire: Jews, Music and the American Dream, a National Jewish Book Award finalist.
The event included just a small taste of what the full exhibit will be like, featuring a brief history of Jews in popular music, beginning in the early 1900s with people like Irving Berlin and George Gershwin and continuing through the decades to the writers of the Brill Building, all the way through genres like punk to the present day. Along the way, even in this truncated setting, attendees were treated to interesting artifacts and stories featuring the Jews who helped make the popular music scene into what it is today in the form of photographs, interviews and video.
When it takes off officially, the complete museum will feature memorabilia on loan from the permanent collection of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, as well as material from other leading collections such as the Smithsonian Museum and various artists’ private holdings. Viewers will learn how Alan Freed gave rock ‘n’ roll its name and how Jefferson Airplane might never have happened without the state of Israel. The exhibit will also include personal anecdotes from Bob Dylan, Lieber and Stoller, Carole King, Joey Ramone, and Phish.
The exhibit will tell the stories of how Jews have been an integral part onstage and backstage, as performers, record label owners, recording studio executives, and on-air DJs. It showcases not only great musicians, but also other people who made American popular music a great driving force of culture and influence, such as the Chess Brothers, Rick Rubin, Milt Gabler, and Moe Asch. Discussing of the unique role of these figures in the evolution of American popular music opens the way to talk about the intersection between ethnicity, Jewish tradition and pop culture. “Jews, Rock and Roll” reveals how one particular population, once on the margins of American culture, not only helped define the mainstream, it also made room for other minorities to shine.
Michael Dorf gave a brief introduction of the exhibit and a rundown of the evening, and then turned the microphone over to David Franklin, who presided over one of the highlights of the evening — a ceremonial presentation by Mike Stoller, one-half of the legendary songwriting team of Leiber and Stoller, of a signed original score for their song “Hound Dog.” Stoller was warmly greeted onstage and shared a few anecdotes about working in the music industry and with his equally esteemed partner, pointing out that even though they came from different kinds of Jewish backgrounds (for instance, Stoller’s family was more assimilated than Leiber’s, and he grew up never speaking Yiddish, which was actually Leiber’s first language), they found common ground in the sounds of popular music.
A brief video was then shown, featuring interviews with people like rock photographer Bob Gruen and musicians Al Kooper and Matisyahu, all of whom discussed how their Judaism affected them, whether in their lives generally or in the music industry specifically, opening the conversation about the places where ethnicity, religion and popular culture collide.
Then it was Ben Sidran’s turn to take the podium. He gave a charming, interesting and informative talk (complete with musical accompaniment) about the history of Jews in popular music, from the early 20th century roots in the Great American Songbook and its connections to Black America, though the heyday of rock ‘n’ roll, which continued that tradition, to the present day. Sidran pointed out that it was important to note that even though Jews make up only 2% of the population of the United States, they have contributed to 80% of all the aspects of the music industry over the years. He noted that there were similarities between the Black experience in America and the Jewish one, and why, even from the very beginning, this commonality enabled Jewish songwriters and record label owners and producers to work with African-American artists, and create their own songs with similar themes.
Sidran went on to talk more specifically about the ways that Jews in the music industry have connected with their Judaism over the years. Many embraced it, but not necessarily in ways that were immediately clear – though if people listen to many of the songs written by or performed by Jewish artists, there always seem to be some underlying ethnic themes, particularly that of finding a home and achieving one’s dreams, as well as the more over-arching values of social justice and tikkun olam (repairing the world) in songs as far back as “Brother, Can You Spare A Dime” or the song that was voted Time magazine’s Song of the Century, Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit,” written by Jewish songwriter Abel Meeropol. Whether they were religious or secular, Jews embraced these themes and used them in their music, regardless of time period or genre.
As Sidran has said, “Even as the Jews were searching for America, so America was searching for the Jews.” Without all the Jewish contributions to American popular music, the scene — indeed, the world — would not be the same as we know it to be today. He also mentioned that Judaism is one religion where it is not necessary to believe in God in order to be very Jewish — in fact, many of the artists profiled in the exhibit are quite secular, and yet the Judaism of their childhoods and the cultural touchstones of Judaism has found its way into their work, whether they realized it at the time or not.
“Jews, Rock & Roll” is now in the process of fundraising in order to bring this traveling exhibit to fruition. Donations will go towards curating the artifacts and obtaining necessary permissions and authentication, getting the proper insurance for rare artifacts, constructing and designing the exhibit itself, editing interviews, shipping and tour logistics and staff. If you’re interested in donating, you can go to www.jewsrockandroll.com/#donate, or you can send a check, made out to Downtown Arts Development, Inc., 155 Varick Street, New York, NY 10013.The exhibit is housed under the auspices of Downtown Arts Development, Inc., a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization, and any donations are 100% tax deductible. Donations do not have to be large, because every little bit will help bring this fascinating and important traveling museum closer to its goal.
To find out more about the Jews, Rock & Roll project or to find out future stops on the pop-up museum’s tour, visit jewsrockandroll.com.
