Ernest Bloch, composer, believes that the has finally succeeded in expressing his ”spiritual credo” in the ”Sacred Service,” a setting of the Reformed liturgy for barition, chorus, and orchestra, which will have its American premiere at Carnegie Hall on April 21st.
The sevice will be sung by Friedrich Schoor of the Metroplitan will be provided by an orchestra of eighty from the Metropolitan Symphony Society.
Behind these have facts is a story that bgins in 1924, when Bloch became director of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. He met Reuben R. Rindr, cantor of Temple Emanu-El and president of the Society for the Advancement of Synague Music. They became fast friends. In 1930 Rinder suggested that Bloch turn his genuys ti writing synagogue music. gerald F. Warburg, son fo Felix Warburg, offered to commission him to write the music. bloch accepted. The familly of Jacob and Rosa stern set aside a fund of $100,000 to provide and income for the composer.
SWETZERLAN RETEAT
The great composer set about studying Hobrew to get ”closer to his work.” He close an obscure little village high in the Swies mountains as his retreat, for it was in Switzerland that he was born in 1884. The work, finished in 19232 was acclaimed at its preliminary Rome performance.
Ernest Bloch is the composer of the opera ”Macbeth,” the symphony ”America,” which received the Musical America prize, and many suites.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
