Giora Feidman’s clarinet donated to the core exhibition
Invitation to press photo session on 26 July, 2 pm and 9 pm
Press Release, Tue 12 Jul 2022
To celebrate his 75 years performing on stage, Giora Feidman is giving a concert at the Jewish Museum Berlin on 26 July 2022. After the concert, the klezmer musician will donate his valuable clarinet to the museum collection. It will be displayed in the museum’s core exhibition, which reopened in 2020. Admission has been free since 2021.
- Kontakt
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Dr. Margret Karsch
Press Officer
T +49 (0)30 259 93 419
presse@jmberlin.de - Address
Jewish Museum Berlin Foundation
Lindenstraße 9–14
10969 Berlin
photo session
| 2 pm with Hetty Berg and Giora Feidman | Location: The Jewish Object theme room in the core exhibition, by the display case |
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| 9 pm, after the concert | Location: The museum garden; by the stage |
Giora Feidman has been one of the world’s best-known klezmer musicians for decades. He became famous overnight in Germany for his role in the contemporary historical drama Ghetto by Israeli playwright Joshua Sobol, which was staged by Peter Zadek at the Freie Volksbühne theater in West Berlin in 1984 and was named play of the year. His music was everywhere in the FRG from that point onwards – in both non-Jewish and Jewish contexts. To date, the “King of Klezmer” has released more than 40 CDs and contributed music to many films, including Schindler's List. Feidman has received many awards, such as the renowned German music prize Echo Klassik and the Federal Cross of Merit, the latter for his services to relations between Jews and Germans.
“My parents emigrated from Bessarabia to Buenos Aires, where I was born in 1936,”
Giora Feidman tells us. “They brought with them from Eastern Europe the Jewish melodies and songs that have accompanied me since my childhood – in Argentina, later in Israel, Germany, and ultimately all over the world. I’ve been singing them on stage with my clarinet for 75 years; they connect me with God.”
Feidman had the clarinet he is giving to the JMB made in 2018. “It has a beautiful, lush, full tone. I was personally involved with the development of its tone,”
he says enthusiastically. “I am donating this precious instrument to the JMB because I want to support the mission and work of this special place. My visit to the new core exhibition last year touched me deeply.”
Hetty Berg, Director of the Jewish Museum Berlin, is delighted with the donation: “Feidman sparked a klezmer boom in Germany. An entire generation has associated his clarinet music with “Jewishness”, even though klezmer is a musical tradition that initially had nothing to do with the German-Jewish heritage and only became linked to it through the revival. His clarinet will mean our collection includes a musical instrument that not only represents a Jewish style of music but also the revival of Jewish culture in Germany. That’s why it will be part of our new core exhibition.”
The JMB will be exhibiting the clarinet in its segment entitled The Jewish Object. The concept behind it is the question of what is or could be “Jewish” about an object. The objects are always set in context with a quotation from the owners or donors. “Feidman’s clarinet fits in perfectly here,”
says Hetty Berg. “What’s Jewish about a clarinet? Nothing, per se – but it becomes Jewish through Feidman’s music and musical mission.”
Tickets for the concert on 26 July 2022 are available from eventim (43.35 € / concessions 21 € plus postage) and from the box office.
The concert is being held in cooperation with MACC Management GmbH.
Please register for the photo sessions by emailing presse@jmberlin.de or calling +49 (0)30 259 93 419 at the latest by noon on Monday, 25 July 2022.
