London Jewish Male Choir

80 Years The London Jewish Male Choir was founded in 1926 by Isadore R Berman, who was a highly regarded musician in the Jewish community. Before founding the choir, Berman had written several arrangements of Yiddish music which were published in 1910 and he was at one time musical director of the Pavilion Theatre in Whitechapel, which, prior to its closure in 1935, was one of the world's major centres of Yiddish culture.
Many of the 18 men who formed the original choir were singers in London's many synagogue choirs. The repertoire was mostly liturgical and Yiddish folk music, much of it arranged for the choir by Berman.
When he was unavailable to take rehearsals baritone Martin White acted as stand-in conductor. From the first stroke of his baton, he revealed a hidden talent and when, in 1945, Berman died he became the natural successor.

The choir had been disbanded during the war and after demobilisation White began to reassemble it, starting with a nucleus of five of the original members. Soon he started holding weekly auditions for would-be members and by 1948 he had built up the choir to some 45 singers.

White expanded the repertoire, introducing contemporary arrangements as well as bringing in secular music, including English, Scottish and Welsh folk songs.

White was a passionate Zionist and he took the choir to Israel to participate in the first Zimriya Israeli choral festival, as well as touring the country performing 12 concerts. The Zimriya festival became a regular feature of Israel's musical life and it is considered today to be one of the world's most prestigious choral events.

Both Berman and White were accomplished musical arrangers and they established with the choir a unique style of performance which has defined the way Jewish liturgical choral music is performed around the world to this day.

In 1957, when White emigrated to Israel, his understudy, Emmanuel "Manny" Fisher, was a natural successor. Fisher's father had been one of the choir's founding members and, since its revival after the war, Manny and his two brothers had become stalwarts.

Under Fisher's leadership the choir reached new heights, performing with the leading cantors of the day, including David Kusevitsky, Moshe Korn, Simon Hass, Moshe Stern and Joseph Malovany.

Fisher conducted the choir on recordings, in radio performances and, famously, on two television shows, ITV's Stars on Sunday and a popular arts programme, Chelsea at Eight. Fisher also wrote music for several films, including A Hard Days Night with the Beatles, Solomon and Sheba and Yentl.

1969 - 2004

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80 Years