The Case of Erich Walter Sternberg

The consolidation of Israeli art music in the 1930`s was late and abrupt. As result of which, Historical complexities and narrative gaps led to a lack of academic discussion on some central figures that laid the foundations of Israeli music. One such figure was Erich Walter Sternberg.

Shortly before the Nazis rise to power, Sternberg emigrates to then British Mandate Palestine (Israel). Upon his immigration, Sternberg was confronted with a convoluted and tangled set of ideological expectations: to assimilate and write in the local national vain.

Sternberg`s response was complex: He challenged the veritable sources of Jewish - Israeli music, questioning its origins and aesthetics as spurious.

On this backdrop, this paper will offer a study of Sternberg`s music and explore what might be perceived as a certain duality in his music: On the one hand, in 1953, the very Western European, even "German" setting of The Raven, for bass-baritone and orchestra (Text by Edgar Allan Poe).

On the other hand, in the 1924, 1st String quartet for solo alt (Set to Eliakum Zunser`s - Der Pharom), or in his 1946 Cantata, Yishtabach to poems by Yehuda Halevi, Sternberg does indeed draw on Jewish and even Israeli semiotics.

This paper will try to account for the seeming duality in Sternberg`s music. Did he embed Jewish as well as Israeli tropes despite his obvious rejection of it?

I will accordingly discuss Sternberg`s compositional technique and his overall musical contribution – in context of both Israeli and non – Israeli music.

This paper is a first in depth academic discussion of Sternberg`s music.