Pinhas Minkowsky
Personal
Born(1859-04-05)April 5, 1859
Bila Tserkva, Kiev Governorate Russian Empire
DiedJanuary 18, 1924(1924-01-18) (aged 64)
Boston, Massachusetts, United States
ReligionJudaism
OccupationHazzan (tenor)[1]

Pinhas Minkowsky (Yiddish: פנחס מינקאווסקי; April 5, 1859 – January 18, 1924) was a Russian hazzan and composer.

Biography

Phinehas Minkovsky was born in Bila Tserkva in April 1859. His father, Mordecai, a descendant of Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller, was cantor in the city's Great Synagogue, and he himself was a singer in his father's choir.[2]

After having studied the Tanakh and Talmud under different teachers, Minkovsky continued his Talmudical studies alone in the bet hamidrash of his native town. At the age of eighteen he began to study Russian and German, and he mastered these two languages. His first teacher in vocal music was his father; later he studied it under Nissan Spivak, whom he succeeded as chief cantor of the Choral Synagogue in Kishinev.[3]

Minkovsky thereafter went to Vienna, where he continued his studies under Robert Fuchs, from whom he obtained a diploma as singer. He was afterwards successively cantor in Kherson and Lemberg. In 1881 he became cantor in Odessa (in the great synagogue), but soon departed for New York to work at the Kahal Adath Jeshurun synagogue.[4][5] In 1892 he was called back to Odessa, where he served as cantor of the Broder Synagogue for thirty years until its closure by the Bolsheviks in 1922.[6][7]

He returned to the United States in August 1923, dying there the following year at the age of 65.[8] Over 1,000 people attended his memorial service on the Lower East Side, which included performances by Yossele Rosenblatt and other well-known cantors.[9]

Partial bibliography

  • "Shirei ʻam" [Folk Music]. Ha-Shiloaḥ (in Hebrew). Berlin. 5: 10–20, 105–114, 205–216. 1899.
  • Die Entwicklung der synagogalen Liturgie bis nach der Reformation des 19. Jahrhunderts [The Development of Synagogue Liturgy until after the Reformation of the Nineteenth Century] (in German). Odessa: Lewinsohn. 1902.
  • Moderne Liturgie in underzere Sinagogn in Rusland [Modern Liturgy in Our Synagogues in Russia] (in Yiddish). Odessa: Ḥ. N. Bialik. 1910.
  • Ein Vortrag von Oberkantor P. Minkowsky. Gehalten in dem Brody'er Tempel zu Odessa am Samstag, den 20 November 1910 zur Feier des 40-jährigen Jubiläums des Chordirigenten und Componisten Dawid Nowakowski (in German). Odessa: Ḥ. N. Bialik & S. Buryschkin. 1911.

References

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rosenthal, Herman; Eisenstadt, Benzion (1904). "Minkovsky, Phinehas". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol. 8. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. p. 598.

  1. ↑ Matis, Benjamin (2016). "An Annotated Translation of Pinchas Szerman's Poilishe Khazones In Fargangenheit Un Tzukunft, 1924". Scripta Judaica Cracoviensia. 14: 107. doi:10.4467/20843925sj.16.007.5666.
  2. ↑ Edelman, Marsha Bryan (2003). Discovering Jewish Music. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society. pp. 66–67. ISBN 9780827610279.
  3. ↑ Ne'eman, Joshua Leib (2007). "Minkowski, Pinchas". In Berenbaum, Michael; Skolnik, Fred (eds.). Encyclopaedia Judaica (2nd ed.). Detroit: Macmillan Reference. ISBN 978-0-02-866097-4.
  4. ↑ Fuks, Khayim Leyb (November 1, 2017). "Pinkhes Minkovski". Yiddish Leksikon. Translated by Fogel, Joshua. Retrieved April 10, 2022.
  5. ↑ Moisan, Luc (August 19, 2016). "From Odessa to the Lower East Side and Back Again – The Story of Cantor Pinhas Minkowsky". Museum at Eldridge Street. Retrieved April 10, 2022.
  6. ↑ "Pinhas Minkowski: Russian cantor & composer, 1859–1924". Jewish Music Research Centre. Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Retrieved April 10, 2022.
  7. ↑ Odessa Mama: Jewish Soundscapes of Odessa (PDF). Da'at Hamakom & Jewish Music Research Centre. 2018. pp. 6, 13–14. Retrieved April 10, 2022.
  8. ↑ Cohen, Judah M. (2017). "Embodying Musical Heritage in a New-Old Profession: American Jewish Cantorial Schools, 1904–1939". Journal of the Society for American Music. 11 (1): 42–44. doi:10.1017/S1752196316000511. S2CID 193720678.
  9. ↑ Shandler, Jeffrey (2008). "A Tale of Two Cantors: Pinhas Minkowski and Yosele Rosenblatt" (PDF). Academic Angles. Museum at Eldridge Street: 24–28.
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