The song isn't over, it's just beginning - Haaretz

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Sun., August 12, 2007 Av 28, 5767

Israel Time: 18:46 (EST+7)

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The song isn't over, it's just beginning

By Noam Ben-Zeev

Israel's hills are alive with the sound of choral music: The Zimriya - The World Assembly of Choirs - has been held every three years since 1952, and this month the workshops and daily concerts are taking place on the Mt. Scopus campus of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Last weekend, dozens of vocal ensembles and hundreds of singers participating in the convention held eight concerts throughout the country (the last two of which will be held tonight at 8 P.M., at Einav Cultural Center in Tel Aviv and at Independence Hall on Mt. Scopus). The focus has now turned to preparations for the final gala concert, featuring the Jerusalem Baroque Orchestra and 300 choral singers from Israel and abroad, under the baton of three conductors, including celebrated British conductor Andrew Parrott (Jerusalem Theater, tomorrow at 8:30 P.M.).

"I'm really excited," says Esther Herlitz, the chairwoman of the Zimriya, one of the assembly's former directors (she served 20 years) and the person who makes it all happen. "You can't do it properly without getting emotional. Even Abba Eban, so he told me, bit his fingernails before giving a speech, and we all know what a fine public speaker he was."

It is not by chance that Herlitz, who was born in 1921, mentioned Abba Eban: Her rich biography includes an impressive political chapter, during which she served two terms as a Labor MK, served as chair of the Na'amat women's organization, was a labor representative on the National Labor Court, served as the Israeli consul in New York and was Israel's first female ambassador (to Denmark) - and that's just one of many chapters in Herlitz's life. Now she concentrates on a wide range of activities related to the Zimriya and also directs the International Harp Contest in Israel. Her political experience has come in handy there, too: "The oldest harp in the world, 3,000 years old, was displayed in Baghdad's Iraq National Museum but was stolen when the museum was looted during the last Gulf War," Herlitz says in an interview held in her apartment in Tel Aviv. "I had to e-mail the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad to get them to find it."

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And did they?

"Yes, but without its golden head, which was stolen. But it was renovated and restored."

The Zimriya is her baby: "Aharon Zvi Propes, who founded the Zimriya, conceived it as an assembly of Jewish choirs only, like the Maccabiah," Herlitz says, "but there's no such thing anymore. Eastern Europe's Jewish choirs were destroyed in the Holocaust, the Jews of the West are no longer interested, the Jewish Agency never got involved - and that's a pity, because choirs are a great opportunity for forming romantic relationships and for becoming acquainted with the people of Israel through its music. But there has never been a cultural department in the Jewish Agency, which means that the legacy of Ahad Ha'am does not reside there."

Nevertheless, this year's program includes a few Jewish choirs from abroad.

"Jewish choirs in quotation marks only," Herlitz calls them. "In Zagreb and in Belgrade, where these choirs originated, the communities sought to preserve Jewish culture but there are no singers, so 90 percent of the members are non-Jews. Sometimes you can see men wearing skullcaps and women wearing crosses in the same choir. And so, under the initiative of choral conductor Avner Itai, at a certain point the event became international, with a mostly classical repertoire, and with workshops. It's much more successful."

Nine choirs came from abroad this year for the 10 days of the Zimriya: "They pay $425 for each singer, excluding flights," Herlitz explains, "and combined with the payments from the Israeli choirs, the Zimriya's self-funding adds up to NIS 1 million, but the event costs NIS 2 million."

So where does the missing million come from?

"We do some schnorring, but not well enough. Embassies and cultural departments pay the conductors' airline tickets, private companies contribute, and of course there are the employees, who do everything on a volunteer basis. Excellent conductors, including Parrott, Fred Sjoberg of Sweden, Volker Hempfling of Germany, the Israeli Naomi Faran and Walter Whitman from the U.S. come to conduct and to teach in the workshops during the intensive working days."

They aren't paid?

"No, just their flights and meals on campus are covered."

And yourself?

"I've got my Knesset pension, I don't need money."

Israeli choirs have not given Herlitz much joy over the past few years, either: "Much fewer of them come now. In the past the kibbutzim were the main source of Israeli choirs, they wanted them and could afford to absorb the singers' time off from work. That's nearly over now. Local governments, too, no longer subsidize the choirs. Thus in the past few Zimriyot there have been more partial choirs instead of full ones, such as the Gitit Choir, which has 40 members but only 20 of them came; the Ihud Choir doesn't show up at all anymore. Once the Zimriya consisted of two-thirds Israeli choirs and one-third from abroad, now it's about half and half. Choral singing is in decline."

Is it only because of money?

"Not necessarily. We have some excellent youth choirs, but there's no future. The members are drafted into the army when they turn 18 and they disappear. In many countries there are university choirs, intended to ensure continuity, but not in Israel. And there's the lack of money as well. Our budget is decreasing: The cultural administration [of the Education, Culture and Sports Ministry] gave us NIS 270,000 this year, for example, compared with NIS 400,000 three years ago. How can we keep going like that?"

When the Zimriya was founded in the 1950s, it enjoyed the backing of many politicians and intellectuals. There are photographs showing its founders in the company of prime minister David Ben-Gurion and cabinet ministers, as well as celebrated musicians, such as composer Darius Milhaud or conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein. When he served as mayor of Jerusalem, Teddy Kollek "adopted" the event, which was the first international convention of choirs in history. The opening conference featured "Ve kibatzti etchem" ("I will Gather You from the People"), by Israeli composer Haim Alexander.

"In the Zimriya's golden age, we numbered 1,000, with 10 workshops. Today there are 700 participants and six workshops," Herlitz says, but her spirit has not faltered. In conversations held throughout the course of the convention she is lively and optimistic and demonstrates uncompromising determination, like her singers: "After each concert and workshop, one cafeteria on campus, the Frank Sinatra Cafeteria, always stays open," she reports, "and it sells beer and wine and sausages. Everyone comes, and they sing the concert once more from the beginning. The Israelis bring their instruments and everyone has a great time."

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1.	Zymria	12:22	\|	rk	08/08/07

2.	choir	12:59	\|	NR	08/08/07

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