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Bernard's heart belongs to klezmer music.
Follow the Music
Like many government concentrators, Rhoda Bernard '88 expected to attend
law school and pursue a traditional career path. Eight years later, after
earning a degree in jazz voice performance at the New England Conservatory
of Music, she is a full-time professional musician-lead singer for Klezamir,
a Yiddish music group-who intends to devote the rest of her life to learning,
teaching, and performing.
Though her repertoire includes jazz standards, musical theater numbers,
and cabaret material, Bernard's primary focus these days is klezmer music,
which she describes as "Eastern European Jewish soul music." Though
she was raised in an observant Jewish household, Bernard did not encounter
klezmer music until a professor at the New England Conservatory introduced
her to the genre in 1991. "I loved it," she recalls. "I think
the reason I connected with it so immediately was that I have always loved
the music in synagogue, and although that is sacred music in Hebrew and
this is secular music in Yiddish, they are very similar in style and spirit."
When Bernard first performed in a klezmer ensemble, she understood none
of the Yiddish words she was singing; to remedy that, she enrolled in an
intensive Yiddish immersion program at Columbia University from which she
emerged a proficient speaker. Yiddish language and culture have since become
an important part of her life; she says she feels "a great responsibility
to help preserve this music for future generations since many of those who
speak Yiddish and know the culture are leaving us." Bernard not only
supports Yiddish survival through her music, she also substitutes frequently
for the anchor of a Boston-area Yiddish radio show.
Though Bernard's background in political theory has not figured in her postgraduate
career, her college extracurricular involvements have: she appeared in several
Gilbert & Sullivan productions, including one in which she met her future
spouse, David Schrag '89. She admits that a career as a professional musician
had always been one of her dreams, but she says she "didn't have the
guts" to pursue that path while at Harvard. Now, however, despite the
long hours and the uncertainties of the music profession, she is thoroughly
satisfied with her choice. "People always ask me, 'so what are you
going to do after this?'" she says. "There is nothing else I would
rather be doing. I love to teach and to learn about music, and I see this
as something I will do in one form or another as long as I live."
