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Conversion as a Professional Success Strategy in 19th Century Europe: The Case of Ignaz Moscheles and his Conflicted Jewish Identity

Sun, December 17, 12:45 to 2:15pm, Marriott Marquis Washington, DC, Marquis Salon 2

Abstract

While aspects of Jewish identity in 19th century European professional artistic life have witnessed a number of recent significant investigations (Sposato, Botstein, and HaCohen), many important questions remain regarding professional ambition and the will to be accepted and embraced at the highest levels of recognition without the stigma of negative associations of Jewish religious identity in a dominant Christian culture. In the post-emancipation period in Europe, when Jews were given the freedom to maintain their Jewish identity and practice their Jewish religion, and many did, there was still an inclination on the part of many aspiring artists born Jewish, especially composers and performing musicians, to take on a Christian identity as a furtherance to their professional careers. Although Felix Mendelssohn was already a converted Lutheran from childhood, others retained their Jewish identity well into adulthood, embracing Christianity only later in life. Such a person was Ignaz Moscheles (1794-1870), a renowned figure in 19th century European musical life whose conducting and virtuosic piano performing took him to every corner of the continent, as well as England and Scotland, for over five decades. Using the case study of Moscheles and his unique path, this paper will explore questions of public and private Jewishness, motivation to convert, as well as public and private behavior and the conflicts and compromises to be made by the Jewish professional in early 19th century Europe. What exactly do we mean by ‘conversion’? What makes a Jew a Jew? Did Moscheles consider himself Jewish culturally? Religiously? Why did he choose baptism for himself and his family in a Lutheran Church in London in 1832 at the age of 38? Was it an act of religious affirmation or an act of professional and social pragmatism? Or perhaps both? How did that change over time? My paper offers new evidence culled from Moscheles’ diary entries, his correspondence with Mendelssohn and other important documents that reveals a much more nuanced view of this Jewish-born musical professional’s public and private persona over a lifetime providing an important example of the converted Jewish professional’s religious and cultural identity in that era.

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