Katherine Needleman: Kinnah

Instrumentation: English horn/cor anglais and piano

Date of composition: 2021

Commissioner: International Double Reed Society

In Memoriam: L.S.

Premiere: Alison Teale and Charis Lai at the IDRS Virtual Symposium in 2021; Live IDRS premiere 2022

Recording made by the composer can be heard here.

The score is now available exclusively through Presser at this link, but a piano rehearsal track for your practicing pleasure or to shorten rehearsal time is in the menu below.

A kinnah is a dirge, lamentation, and elegy all together. Known particularly for their associations with Jewish professional mourning women, kinnot have likely been sung since the composition of these poems began in the 6th century. They cover themes of loss, destruction, God's fury, exile, arguing with God, dreams, and longing. New kinnot have been created to address modern tragedies as they have occurred over the course of human history, with most having been composed in medieval times. There has been debate about what constitutes appropriate material for new kinnot, including the Holocaust. It has been argued that new kinnot should not be written because the oldest writers were the best ones and that modern minds and writers are not the equals of the original authors whose kinnot are sometimes considered holy. Often, these poems take an alpabetic acrostic shape. Some are painful and grotesque while others are hopeful. These kinnot support an idea that there is a common source of all tragedy. This Kinnah makes no attempts at holiness. Zog nit keyn beymol, a Yiddish song written by Hirsh Glick in the Vilna Ghetto in 1943, is quoted extensively. It is sung in memorial services around the world and employed as an anthem of Holocaust surivors. The Horst-Wessel-Lied, an anthem of the Nazi party that has been banned in Germany and Austria since 1945, is deployed three times. This tune is an obscenity and it is intended to be obvious that these are non-reverential references. The name of a dear friend, departed suddenly and before her time in 2021, appears multiple times in musical acrostic form. This work was commissioned by the International Double Reed Society. The first performance of this work was given virtually (due to COVID-19 cancellations) at their 2021 Virtual Symposium by Alison Teale of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, with a live performance following at their 2022 Conference in Boulder, Colorado.