YIVO Appoints First Anne E. Leibowitz Visiting Professor-in-Residence in Music

New York, NY – The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Neil W. Levin as the Anne E. Leibowitz Visiting Professor-in-Residence in Music for the Spring semester, February – May 2017.

This marks YIVO’s first such academic residence in music, among its many past and current visiting professorships in other areas, such as Jacob Kronhill Visiting Scholar in East European Jewish History, The Albert Ratner Visiting Scholar in East European Jewish Literature, and The Atran Visiting Professor of Yiddish Language and Linguistics.

Dr. Levin is a leading musicological and historical scholar and authority on the music of Jewish experience and connection in both its secular-cultural and sacred-liturgical realms. He is the Artistic Director and Editor in Chief of the Milken Archive of Jewish Music and emeritus professor of Jewish music at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Dr. Levin holds B.A. and M.A. degrees from Columbia University and a PHD in Jewish music from the Jewish Theological Seminary. For many years, Dr. Levin was Editor of the scholarly journal, Musica Judaica, and in addition to two books, he has published more than 300 articles, essays, and monographs on numerous aspects of Jewishly-related music and its various historical, literary, and cultural contexts.

Dr. Levin’s residency, as the Anne E. Leibowitz Visiting Professor, will include a graduate seminar on topics of Music of Jewish Experience and related music, as well as a public lecture and concert with an exhibition drawing upon the music of Eastern European Jewish culture. The residency will also include archival research, a pre-cataloguing assessment of YIVO’s music collection, and preliminary exploration of music education programs at YIVO.

“We are honored to have Dr. Levin with us this semester and to provide the depth and range of his knowledge in Jewish music. We are also very happy to be able to enable him to offer some of the fruits of his scholarship to students and the general public.”
— Jonathan Brent, Executive Director, YIVO Institute for Jewish Research

The Anne E. Leibowitz Visiting Professor-in-Residence program at YIVO was made possible by a generous grant from the Anne E. Leibowitz Fund, which was created by the Leibowitz family to honor the memory of their late mother, Anne E. Leibowitz.

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Melissa S. Cohen
Chief Development Officer
(212) 294-6156

About YIVO

The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is dedicated to the preservation and study of the history and culture of East European Jewry worldwide. For nearly a century, YIVO has pioneered new forms of Jewish scholarship, research, education, and cultural expression. Our public programs and exhibitions, as well as online and on-site courses, extend our outreach to a global community. The YIVO Archives contains 24 million unique items and YIVO’s Library has over 400,000 volumes—the single largest resource for the study of East European Jewish life in the world. yivo.org / yivo.org/the-whole-story