The Village

Abstract

Abstract The sixth chapter, “The Village,” discusses the ways in which ethnic and racial frames of listening shape how migrant Jewish musicians are heard, and the practices they use to subvert these listening frames. It focuses on two performances by Israeli musicians: Uri Gurvich and Anat Cohen. Both performances took place at the famed Village Vanguard club in Greenwich Village, and both dedicated to renowned jazz musicians—John Zorn and Benny Goodman. By analyzing how markers of Jewishness (or the lack thereof) appear in their performances and how both the choice of an ensemble and the interactions within the ensemble subvert these markers, I ultimately show how migrant musicians actively work to decouple simple notions of race and ethnicity from sound.