Izso G. Glickstein was a fourth-generation Russian-American cantor or hazzan (September 20, 1889 – April 17, 1947). . Other last names: Gleuckstein, Glueckstein. Other first names: Izzo, Isidore, Isadore, Iczek, Isaak, Isaac, Yitzchak, Yitzchok. Other middle names: Garai, Garay, Gary. Glickstein immigrated from Hungary to the United States through Ellis Island on May 4, 1923. He became a naturalized citizen on June 7, 1928.Declaration of Intention to Naturalize, US Department of Labor No. 31922, filed July 2, 1923. Petition for Naturalization, US Department of Labor No. 106628, granted on July 7, 1927. Copies filed with Ancestry.com.
Glickstein was a cantor, ranked with Cantor Josef "Yossele" Rosenblatt. He served as Chief Cantor at multiple synagogues including Europe's largest, the Great Synagogue or Dohány Street Synagogue of Budapest. Glickstein served for nearly 25 years at Leonard Bernstein's childhood synagogue Mishkan Tefila in Roxbury. Bernstein described Glickstein as a "fabulous cantor" and his "favorite cantor." He hosted radio programs on Boston's WNAC to popularize Hebrew music. He performed in hundreds of concerts, was the President of the New England Cantor's Association, and made multiple recordings of cantorial music.
A movie was made about Glickstein and his granddaughter called My Grandfather's Prayers, which premiered on January 25, 2020. Two videos were made about his cantorial music. Short biographies were published in 1923 and 1924, and a larger one in 1933.
Early life and lineage Izso G. Glickstein was born on September 20, 1889, in Kishinev, Russia (now Chișinău, Moldova). He was the oldest son of Gittel (née Paskar) and cantor and rabbi Ezekiel Glickstein. Ezekiel was born in Hannopil, Russia (now in Ukraine). Ezekiel moved to Zhytomyr (also now in Ukraine) where he was an Orthodox cantor, and then to Kishinev for rabbinical education.
Izso Glickstein's earliest memory of wanting to become a cantor was listening to his grandfather, cantor Moshe Glickstein, chant ancient prayers at the Great Synagogue of Kishinev or the Chișinău Choral Synagogue. At an early age, Izso started singing in grandfather Moshe's choir. Izso recalled this as one of the greatest events in his life, and Izso came to be hailed by Moshe's congregation as a prodigy or "wonder child." It was also during this time that Izso heard the cantor Zaydl (Zeidel) Rovner (Jacob Samuel Maragowsky) sing when he visited the Great Synagogue of Kishinev. This is when Izso formed his aspiration to become a great cantor.
Izso's father Ezekiel had a cantorial post outside the city of Kishinev while he attended rabbinical school in Kishinev. Izso would sing both for his father's and his grandfather's congregations. For the High Holidays, both father and grandfather wanted Izso to sing at their synagogue. Izso preferred his grandfather's great synagogue over his father's small, remote synagogue. The dispute was resolved when Ezekiel offered to pay Moshe to let nine-year-old Izso sing at the Great Synagogue of Kishinev for the High Holidays.
Disputes over young Izso and his vocal talent broadened. Other synagogues wanted Izso to sing for their choirs, but Ezekiel refused. One cantor actually kidnapped Izso for the High Holidays. The raider came in the night and took him 20 kilometers away. Izso was returned after the festival along with candy, toys, and 200 rubles (a small fortune at the time).
Izso's cantorial lineage starts in Hannopil, where Haskel, Moshe, and Ezekiel were born and Haskel and Moshe were cantors. Hannopil was an important center of Hasidic Judaism, which is where Rabbi Dov Ber of Mezeritch and his son Avraham Ha-Malach (the Angel) lived. The Jewish population of Hannopil was exterminated during the The Holocaust, but a mausoleum remains where Dov Ber is burried. The Hasidic branch of Jewish practice had a significant influence on Haskel, Moshe, and Ezekiel.
Ezekiel graduated from rabbinical school in Kishinev in 1900 and sought a larger congregation and post. Sensing a rise in anti-semitic tensions in Kishinev, Ezekiel moved his family to Rákoscsaba, Hungary in 1900. (Ezekiel was right; the Kishinev pogrom erupted in 1903, killing or gravely injuring 140 Jews.) Izso was 11 years old when his family moved to Rákoscsaba. Ezekiel served as Orthodox rabbi, cantor, and dayan in Rákoscsaba. Later, Ezekiel immigrated to the United States where he was cantor and rabbi for an Orthodox community in Peabody, MA.
Izso Glickstein's cantorial lineage is summarized below, with details on his cantorial posts described at Chief Cantor Positions in Europe and Mishkan Tefila. +Izso G. Glickstein Cantorial LineageGenerationGiven NameBirth YearBirth CityCantorial PostBranch1stHaskel~1810Hannopil, Russia (now Ukraine)HannopilHasidic2ndMoshe~1830Hannopil, RussiaHannopil
The Great Synagogue, Kisinev, RussiaHasidic
Orthodox3rdEzekiel1859Hannopil, RussiaZhitomir (now Zhytomyr in Ukraine), Russia Town outside Kishinev
Rákoscsaba, Hungary
Peabody, Massachusetts, USOrthodox Orthodox
Orthodox
Orthodox4thIzso1889Kishinev, RussiaCelldömölk, Hungary Dohány Street Synagogue, Budapest, Hungary (aka The Great Synagogue, Tabac Temple)
Győr Synagogue, Hungary (city of Raab, Hungary in German)
Temple Mishkan Tefila, Boston, Massachusetts, USNeolog Neolog
Neolog
Conservative
Education Izso Glickstein and his younger brothers studied Talmud and learned Hebrew melodies in the oral tradition from their father Ezekiel and grandfather Moshe from an early age. Glickstein entered public school in Rákoscsaba and sang in the Orthodox Rumbach Street Synagogue for the cantor Jacob Bachman. But at the age of 12, Glickstein's voice changed and he stopped singing. Instead, he concentrated on high school and Talmudic studies in a Budapest yeshiva. By the age of 18, Glickstein had graduated from both forms of education at the top of his class.
At the age of 19 (1908), Glickstein's voice returned as a tenor and he began singing again. He was sponsored by a wealthy Budapest woman to study voice in Nitra, Slovakia for a year. The following year, at age 20 (1909), a wealthy merchant living in Rákoscsaba sponsored Glickstein's attendance for a year at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music (then, the National Academy of Music) in Budapest. During his first year, Glickstein won an additional three-year scholarship from the school and completed four years of study (1909 to 1913). During his tenure at the Liszt Academy, Glickstein studied under Jenő Hubay as did Fritz Reiner and Joseph Szigeti, another prodigy.
Early career Glickstein graduated from the Liszt Academy in 1913 with an annual scholarship at the Budapest Opera House. This was a distinction for a 24-year-old graduate. He took the position and performed in several operas in Berlin. He was offered the position of lead tenor.
"When my father found out that I was thinking of an operatic career, there was a tragic scene, He came to Budapest with tears in his eyes. He thought that the worst thing that could happen to him was that his son would go on the stage, I pleaded with him, but he insisted that if I could be an opera singer then I surely could be a famous cantor, and that if I ... continued in the opera he would disown me ..."
Glickstein could not bear the risk of losing his family, so he declined the lead tenor position at the Budapest Opera House.
Not long after Glickstein left the opera, World War I erupted. He was caught up in the quick mobilization and served as a chaplain in the Austro-Hungarian army. He was active on the Piave for eight months, but was seriously wounded in the leg by an Italian artillery shell fragment. His injury on the Piave aligns with the early Battles of the Isonzo in 1915.
While recovering from his war wounds in Rákoscsaba, Glickstein met Gizella (also Gizela) Hochman. Their Jewish marriage was in Rákoscsaba on June 25, 1916. Marriage was important professionally for Glickstein; unmarried cantors were frowned upon in Hungarian synagogues.
Chief cantor positions in Europe
Celldömölk Glickstein's first cantorial post came in 1916 at Celldömölk, Hungary at a Neolog synagogue where he also taught Yeshiva students. Two years later, Izso and Gizella fled Celldömölk after the first phase of the White Terror struck on August 23, 1919. Soldiers broke into the synagogue, captured the rabbi, desecrated the synagogue, and robbed, raped, and murdered congregants.
Dohány Izso and Gizella fled to Budapest. Izso became uber cantor at the Dohány Street Synagogue or the Great Synagogue in 1920. Dohány was the center of Neolog Judaism and the largest synagogue in Europe, seating 3,000 worshipers. This was the most prestigious cantorial post in all of Europe at the time. The post was open because Zevulun (Zavel) Kwartin had left for the United States the previous year.
Győr Glickstein took the position of Chief Cantor at the Győr Synagogue (Raab Temple in German) in 1922. The Győr congregation was well-funded. They allowed Glickstein to give concerts in Vienna and other large European cities.
Mishkan Tefila Mishkan Tefila was founded as Mishkan Israel in 1858, and then as Mishkan Tefila in a merger with Shaarei Tefila in 1894. In 1907 Mishkan Tefila moved to Moreland Street and embraced what became known as Conservative Judaism. In 1910 the congregation installed Herman H. Rubenovitz as its rabbi, a graduate of Jewish Theological Seminary.
Preparation and recruitment Mishkan Tefila was among a group of congregations in the United States that created an era of Jewish music called the Golden Age of the Cantor. The process of change at Michkan Tefila was slow for Rubenovitz. In 1914, his small congregation agreed by a vote of 67 to 54 to allow organ music and a mixed choir. With these changes, membership and funding started to grow.
In October 1922, Mishkan Tefila broke ground on a new 2,000-seat synagogue on Seaver Street in Roxbury. This would become the largest synagogue in New England for decades, complete with a large organ second only to Symphony Hall.
By 1923, the congregation approved and funded the recruitment of a European cantor. In the spring of 1923, Rubenovitz scouted Europe's synagogues, found Glickstein in Győr, and invited him to audition in Boston. The offer was countered by Győr's president with a paid two-year sabbatical, but Glickstein decided to immigrate to the United States. Glickstein auditioned at Mishkan Tefila on July 21 and was elected cantor on August 9, 1923.
Glickstein's appointment at Mishkan Tefila was front-page news in Boston's The Jewish Advocate. He was described as the "famous chief cantor of Temple Tabakgasse, Budapest, the largest synagogue in Hungary."
Early success Glickstein's was promoted in a front-page article and large High Holy Days ads with his photo. Then he was booked on the first ever radio broadcast of Hebrew music on Boston's WNAC. He sang at a neighboring temple, where he received a "most enthusiastic ovation" and his voice was described as "sweet and it is powerful." Then a "very large crowd was present" for High Holidays services at Mishkan Tefila.
After the 1923 High Holidays, Glickstein was elected instructor of the Cantors' Seminary along with Pinhas Minkowsky. He was featured in the Three World Famous Cantors tour across New England with Minkowsky and Isadore Adelsman. And he sang again in a WNAC Hanukkah broadcast.
High Holy Days Glickistein had an impact on the growth and popularity of Mishkan Tefila. He was regularly featured in its High Holy Days services. Starting in 1925, the new 2,000-seat Temple is filled. Glickstein directed music and the choir from 1923 to 1928.
1923: as described above. 1924: Glickstein was the featured vocalist, assisted by choir of 16.