Contemporary klezmer performance in Russia as a cultural practice: between world music and representation of national tradition

The object of this study is klezmer music as a cultural practice in modern Russia. During the last decades, the characteristics of klezmer music were transformed, and it becomes something different than its historical tradition. Contemporary klezmer movement in Russia begins since 1990s with the fall of USSR and rise of national movements. Since that time till the present there was a series of festivals and big concerts held in many Russian cities. Musicians and organizers of Russian festivals claim to be performing traditional Jewish music. Though there is no continuance due to historical reasons, and tradition remain invented. I suppose that modern klezmer music can be a key to the multicultural world for musicians as well as for audience and is different from any other ethnical music genre.  I assume, that klezmer for these musicians is not just an instrument for exotic musical stylization, but is connected to complex Jewish identity and culture, concept of grief complex, connection between collective and personal trauma and the image of a "performative Jewishness". This research may help understand, how the biggest national-oriented musical stage in modern Russia is formed, how personal collective consciousness of musicians and social status of this music are constructed through Invented tradition of Klezmer performance and the formation of a new social network.