"Guteism": Facilitating Jewish Joy An Ethnographic Study of an Israeli Wedding Ensemble 

Authors

  • Amira Ehrlich Levinsky College of Education, Tel Aviv Author

Keywords:

community music ensemble, ethnography, Jewish Israeli music, music education

Abstract

The current study focuses on a group of graduates of Israel`s musical high school for Jewish National Religious boys who have reunited as an ensemble called Gute Gute (Yiddish for "Good, Good"). The purpose of this study is to explore group members` experience and conceptualizations of making a living and making music, and to learn how the members of the ensemble work to design, plan, manage, and perform Jewish wedding ceremonies and celebrations. Findings present the ensemble as enacting a marriage between Slobin's (1993) notions of "banding" – business, material, functional and practical aspects of communal music making – and "bonding" – transcendental aspects of ensemble member`s experience and phenomenological ensemble rationale. Ensemble member`s phenomenological reasoning reveals mystical underpinnings as instrumental in conceptualization of rationales that balance their experience of making a living and making music, and synthesizes ritual with transcendence. Ensemble members envision themselves as facilitators of a triumph of spirit over matter that I interpret as Guteism: Facilitating Jewish Joy. 

Author Biography

  • Amira Ehrlich, Levinsky College of Education, Tel Aviv

    Amira Ehrlich, PhD, is a lecturer and Program Coordinator of the Graduate Studies (M. Ed) in Music Education at Levinsky College of Education, Tel Aviv; and Academic Program Director of Mandel Leadership Institute's Program for Ultraorthodox women in Jerusalem. Amira is a music educator with more than twenty years’ experience in the field of music, as a teacher, producer, and researcher. Among other positions, she has served as a member of the national leadership team for the Ministry of Education’s Experiments and Entrepreneurship Division; as a lecturer in music, music education, educational leadership, and qualitative research at the Levinsky College of Education; as a teacher and music subject coordinator in Israeli high schools. She has completed two master’s degrees cum laude, one in music education at the Levinsky College of Education, and the other in English literature and musicology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 2018, she received her doctorate in music education from Boston University. Her dissertation examined cultural implications of Israeli music education. Her published writings explore sociological and cultural aspects of music education, and the interfaces between music, education, leadership, and culture. Amira has presented her research at international conferences (MayDay Group Colloquium; ISME; CDIME; and others) and is currently involved in Global Visions through Mobilizing Networks: Co-Developing Intercultural Music Teacher Education in Finland, Israel and Nepal, a research project funded by the Academy of Finland (2015-2019). 

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Published

2024-02-04

Issue

Vol. 15 (2018)

Section

Articles