Talk:Abraham Zevi Idelsohn

message: “Bashir Am Israelim” is not likely a pseudonym of Abraham Zevi, but instead a poor transliteration of “בשירי עם ישׂראלי(ם)‏” (Ba-šîrê ʻam Yiśrəʼēlî[m]) in the program notes. It would mean something like “From the songs of the Israeli people.” Would this be considered original research? Elyaqim (talk) 11:01, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm certain that's right: it just meant "Israeli folk tune" (which may or may not have been notated by Idelsohn).  I would be in favour of removing this paragraph altogether.  Anyone disagree? --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 10:18, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: “Bashir Am Israelim”

message: The third paragraph of this article begins by stating that "Idelsohn is generally acknowledged as the “father” of modern musicology."  By whom?  If he is so important, why is he unmentioned in the article on Musicology.  While his contributions may be significant, the only reference link for this entire paragraph is now dead, making the assertion difficult to back up. 
Idelsohn's contributions do appear to be significant in a subset of Musicology -- but probably not the vague and undefined "Modern musicology", a topic absent from Wikipedia.  When (if) Wikipedia decides to define Modern Musicology, it probably will identify a broader parentage.  (He certainly is not the father of New Musicology, itself somewhat greying around the temples.)  
Encyclopaedia Britannica's entry on Idelsohn: http://www.britannica.com/biography/Abraham-Zevi-Idelsohn, is respectful of his contributions; the article may deserve use as a reference or outside source.  While EB does not elevate him to founder status, it seems that he deserves some mention in the Musicology article.  Whomever have written about Musicology and Idelsohn need to correspond with each other.
I am far removed from scholar on this topic, having followed the link mentioning Idelsohn in the article about Melisma.  Melisma, a singing technique of running many notes in one syllable, is also employed by some pop singers, but it is hard to imagine Abraham Zevi Idelsohn and Whitney Houston or Frenchie Davis as close ideological companions. 
GeeBee60 (talk) 13:00, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: He is certainly not considered the father of musicology but he is in a way considered the father of modern Jewish music research.  The title ("father of") itself cannot really be considered as a scholarly claim. But this is just one of many of the problems in this paper, into which I do not want to get except for one really very odd claim regarding the correspondence with three of the "antient Greek modes (a problematic use of terminology in and of itself).  Indeed, it is supported by a source that seems to be program notes for a recording (?) this cannot be relied upon for anything, let alone discussion of a topic about which a lot (serious scholarly work) has indeed been written. I have not seen such claim in any of the literature concerning Idelsohn, and indeed it does not really compute with what we do know about his work; I think it needs to be removed.  Also the third footnote refers to some Israeli music website - again, not a scholarly source, and upon a quick scan does not seem of much quality, let alone when it comes to Jewish musicology, this is not an acceptable source.  Incidentally, the story of Hava Nagila, which it addresses (and on which there are many more - legitimate - sources, is a bit more involved and there is some disagreement regarding the matter.  I really do not know what needs to be done with this entry (I do suspect that there may be a much better entry in Hebrew which I may check later; perhaps a translation may be called for.)Pilcatbt (talk) 01:53, 11 November 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Considering the claim that others started before he did, perhaps his informal title should be not "the father of ...", but "the uncle of ..." :) TooManyFingers (talk) 02:51, 17 May 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Modern Musicology 

message: The article says Idelsohn emigrated in 1905 to Palestine. Latvia was proclaimed a sovereign state in 1918. Prior to the Republic of Latvia, the only way someone was considered Latvian was by ethnicity. Is Idelsohn to be considered ethnic Latvian? Or did he gain citizenship after 1918, even though he was not an inhabitant of Latvia? Talk/♥фĩłдωəß♥\Work 22:12, 30 July 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  In what sense is Idelsohn Latvian?