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Last update - 09:13 24/01/2008 Israeli universities cease researching Palestinian musicology By Tamara Traubmann, Haaretz Correspondent Tags: Israeli universities  Professors emeritae Dalia Cohen and Ruth Katz began studying Palestinian music in the 1960s. While Israel's Arab population was still under military rule, they traveled to the villages of the Galilee and the Triangle and recorded performances of traditional music. The music was passed down in an oral tradition and was rarely written down. In their laboratory at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the musicologists developed the Jerusalem, or Cohen-Katz, Melograph. This mechanical musical transcription device created a graph that provided precise information about the pitch, duration and volume of sounds. "Notation is a Western system of writing that refers to Western musical materials," Cohen explains. "Most non-Western cultures do not have a notation system, and we don't know exactly what the raw materials of the music are." Cohen and Katz studied the scales and rhythms, as well as the connection between text and music, of traditional Palestinian music. Advertisement "They created strong relationships with musicians in the Galilee," the chairman of Hebrew University's Department of Musicology, Prof. Edwin Seroussi, said. "They did not only do research, they also helped to promote the musicians within society. Dalia Cohen pushed for the establishment of a department for Arab music within the music academy, for example." Cohen and Katz are both around 80 now and are retired. Their old laboratory is now a seminar room, with some of their equipment, draped in plastic, still on tables. The walls are decorated with graphs from their device, their edges curled with age. Their colleagues now use software instead of the Melograph, and senior department members no longer research Palestinian music. "It's a very important area in the context of our region, and today there are doctoral dissertations on it but no faculty members who specialize in it," former Hebrew University musicology department chair Prof. Ruth HaCohen (Pinczower) says. "In the 1980s there were musicology departments in Jerusalem and at Bar-Ilan and Tel Aviv universities, with about 30 faculty members altogether, today there are about a dozen in total," HaCohen said. Tel Aviv University's musicology department was folded into the music school three years ago. Bar-Ilan's music department is in crisis after one-third of its faculty positions were cut. The theoretical fields have suffered the most. According to department chair, Prof. Dov Schwartz, "We are managing to hold onto the prestigious programs such as composition, which is the only one in the country, or music therapy. But research, including that of Jewish music and the music of Arab national traditions, has been hurt badly." Schwartz links it to the general crisis in humanities studies. "Today the department is half of what it was in the '80s," Seroussi says of Hebrew University's Musicology Department. "The last faculty member was hired seven years ago and since then three people have retired. However, the number of junior faculty members has grown, because the university exchanged senior appointments for positions with inferior salaries." "There are a many myths about music as the language of the soul, to the point where it seems distasteful to speak about music in rationalist terms," Seroussi continues. "When you say 'musicology' it sounds exotic, because music speaks for itself, you don't need a musicologist, you can just enjoy the music. But musicologists saved from oblivion types of music that had been lost because they were unappreciated at the time." In contrast to some of his colleagues, Seroussi argues that the field is not in decline but has simply changed. Instead of research on deciphering medieval manuscripts, research is being done on music in the drug rehabilitation process, in cooperation with the School of Social Work; children's musical concepts; and partnerships with people in the natural sciences, into music and cognitive thought. "I don't know if it's an issue of profitability or ideology or intellectual development - it's what is needed now," Seroussi said. Bookmark to del.icio.us   And the Oscar goes to... Olmert is pulling for Beaufort, saying 'it's time Israel won an Oscar.' Battling on foreign soil Israeli Americans voted Clinton, but Obama won the global primary.   1.   And now.... 05:10  |  Simon 24/01/08   2.   Most misleading headline in Haaretz history 06:38  |  Yossi 24/01/08   3.   Plaestinians don`t exist so why study myths? 06:44  |  Palestiniansareamyth 24/01/08   4.   Israeli Universities Cease Resarching Hebrew 08:22  |  Staney J.Krammerhead 24/01/08   5.   Keep americans out 08:26  |  Refugee 24/01/08   6.   2. "There is no plot again Palestinian music." 08:55  |  sings-like-an-owl 24/01/08   7.   After ethnic cleansing, Palestinian culture to be erased 10:24  |  Chanalau, Tova 24/01/08   8.   headline 10:43  |  jonny 24/01/08   9.   Editors are supposed to write Eye Catching Headlines 11:22  |  Marty 24/01/08   10.   Treasury cuts funding Palestinian Math and Philosophy courses 11:31  |  Aaron 24/01/08   11.   Daft headline 11:38  |  sh 24/01/08   12.   Johnny come headline 11:44  |  meir gush etzion 24/01/08   13.   Univ boycotts are for brit racists, not us 12:00  |  Alain 24/01/08   14.   Tova`le, Identical Arab Music is live and well all around you 22:40  |  Genuine Tosefta 24/01/08   15.   "3",Lefties fund themselves by appropriating funds to study myths 22:57  |  Absolute Sweden 24/01/08   16.   The show must go on 23:17  |  Reisz 24/01/08   17.   Absolute, how is Arab music studies status in Stockholm? 23:54  |  Genuine Tosefta 24/01/08   18.   #7; Pure Insanity! NeitherPalestine or Palestinians have ever ex 07:42  |  Palestinansareamyth 25/01/08   19.   Palestine is the name given by the Romans to the region 09:05  |  Sara 25/01/08   20.   Jc 14:10  |  Jc 25/02/08

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