Composers Were Passed Over

It is difficult to decide if Mark Swed’s Perspective (“A Question for Passover,” March 24) is a review of a concert featuring Ernst Toch’s “Cantata of the Bitter Herbs” or an essay about all he might know about religious music, Middle East politics and synagogue artistic commissions. Swed started with the thesis that very little Passover music had been written, and wandered far and wide among the works honoring Christian themes by Bach, Handel, Golijov and Wagner.

Setting aside Swed’s woeful lack of knowledge about the purpose of a Seder (which means “Order”), he laments the lack of much public recognition of Passover musical traditions. To compare the popular, widely performed Easter and Christmas music in quantity and quality to Passover music is impossible.

The former has had the patronage of popes and large populations, while Jewish music carries the traditions of millenniums and is the treasure of a small minority of people.

The March 10 concert at Beverly Hills High was an opportunity to showcase Toch’s timely message of peace and hope.

Swed’s foray into Middle East politics was quite a stretch from Pharaoh to Arafat. His knowledge of synagogue musical commissions was equally superficial. Evidently, his exposure to music missed the work of Meir Finkelstein, Michael Horvit, Ami Aloni, Shalom Secunda, Michael Isaacson and Charles Davidson, just to name a few. The L.A. Zimriyah Chorale concentrates on this music and that of other American Jewish composers.

Do take another look, Mr. Swed.

SHERRI LIPMAN

Member, Los Angeles Zimriyah Chorale

Fullerton