Record Group 19: Cantors Institute/Seminary College of Jewish Music

• Dates: ca. 1947-1979
• Size: 5 linear ft.
• Number of Boxes: 4
• Languages: English
• Location: Special Collections Reading Room, Jewish Theological Seminary Library.
• Restrictions: Jewish Theological Seminary records are available for research, with permission, through 1972; records dating from 1973 and afterward are currently closed. For permission to see records of The Jewish Theological Seminary write to: Archivist, Ratner Center for the Study of Conservative Judaism, Jewish Theological Seminary, 3080 Broadway, New York, NY 10027. Reproduction of fragile items is not permitted; consult the archivist about literary rights.
• Related Collections: Solomon Rosowsky Papers, Jewish Theological Seminary Library

JM, 8/12/93

Table of Contents:

•   A Note on Folder Headings
•   Historical Note
•   Collection Description
•   Box List

A Note on Folder Headings

Individual folders are identified in the following way: record group# -- box# -- folder#, as in R.G.1-10-32. Please use this format in citations and when referring to files for any other reason.

Historical Note

Portrait of cantor Israel Goldfarb, rabbinical school class of 1902. Photographer: M. Froomkin, New York.

The Jewish Theological Seminary's Cantors Institute, a training school for cantors in the Conservative movement, was founded in 1952. The Cantors Institute is closely affiliated with the Seminary College of Jewish Music which grants both graduate and undergraduate degrees in Jewish music to students who are not necessarily cantors. The Seminary College of Jewish Music has long granted degrees to both men and women, but the Cantors Institute only began certifying women as cantors in 1987.

Collection Description

Records of the Cantors Institute/Seminary College of Jewish Music cover five linear feet and date from the Cantors Institute's founding in 1952 through the 1970s. Some material concerns the establishment of the Cantors Institute and dates from the late 1940s.

Included are: award, prize, and scholarship files, 1952-1977; communications between the Cantors Assembly and the Cantors Institute, plus some material dating from prior to the foundation of the Cantors Institute concerning its establishment, 1947-1977; material from commencements and convocations, 1952-1975; files, 1955-1977, concerning graduation recitals and documenting arrangements for concerts given by the Cantors Institute chorus and other musical groups; photographs, programs, clippings, announcements, and other material from an exhibit about the Cantors Institute's history, 1977; faculty biographical and correspondence files, 1951-1977; faculty meeting minutes, 1951-1977; a scrapbook (which has been disbound for preservation reasons) consisting of programs, announcements, clippings, and other material documenting the Cantors Institute's history, 1952-1977; and subject files, 1952-1979, mainly containing correspondence and memoranda, on a wide variety of topics.

Of particular note is a manuscript score of Charles Davidson's "I Never Saw Another Butterfly," a musical setting of poems written by children at the Theresienstadt concentration camp, 1942-1944. Material about a performance of the piece at the Seminary by the Columbus Boy-Choir in 1973 is also included.

Also of note is the file titled "Proposed School for Cantors" (box 1, folder 53) which contains correspondence between the Cantors Assembly and the Seminary concerning the establishment of the Cantors Institute. Additional material about the Institute's establishment, including printed announcements of its opening, can be found in the scrapbook and exhibit files.

Box List