Today I went to a klezmer jam. A folk session of Jewish folk music. It’s by ear, so there’s no music. Which isn’t my usual way of doing things. But it had felt like a while since I’d enjoyed playing with others just for fun, so I put my violin on my back and pootled off.
They were a very friendly bunch. A few people I’d met before, but not everyone. Klezmer is usually done by ear. Someone starts a tune, and then if you know it you join in. And if not, you join in quietly as you learn it.
Learning by ear
Music learnt by ear goes into a different part of the brain than music learnt by eye. So I was able to extract tunes from the back shelf of my memory and play them on the violin. Memory
Before the printing press, learning by ear was the norm. Stories, music, learning all passed down by mouth to ear. Before reading for knowledge was the norm, listening for knowledge was. I would imagine that people’s memories were better. And those with a good ear, or who could remember stories were important for the community’s memory.
Communal memory
In Judaism, children become adults at 13, with their bar mitzvah. The challenging part of that is that they have to memorise a weekly segment of the bible in hebrew and aramaic. The bible is read each week in synagogue, spread out across the liturgical year. They learn the words along with the melody, written into the scroll with extra signs.
Over time, and with enough people in the community, the whole Torah is in their communal memory. Even if the scroll itself is lost, it can be rewritten with the help of members recalling their own part.
It’s the same with klezmer. Written klezmer is much newer. It’s only in the 20th century that klezmorim started writing the tunes down. Before that they were handed down by ear, (or finger!). Often there are different versions of the same tunes across countries. As if someone heard the tune, remembered the main line of it, but had learnt a few bits differently.
Repetition without repetition
Add ornaments, and you have one of Feldenkrais’ principles of learning. That is, to repeat a movement with micro variations, so the neural networks become more complex; there’s more choice of movement pathways, and the brain doesn’t get bored. Repetition, without repetition. It’s something that if you hear klezmorim happens in an audible way. We call it heterophony. The same tune, with individual ornamentation, colour and timings.
the Feldenkrais Method with Emma Alter 