Mendelson, Solomon

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MENDELSON, SOLOMON

MENDELSON, SOLOMON (1933– ), ḥazzan. Solomon Mendelson was born in New York to a well-known family of cantors. Since 1954 he has been cantor of the Beth Shalom Synagogue in Long Beach, New York. At the Jerusalem congress of the Cantors' Assembly he was elected president of the assembly, which is the largest organization of cantors in the world. He was a member of the administration of the Cantorial School of the Jewish Theological Seminary and a teacher of the traditional style of the prayer services. He served in the U.S. Army with the rank of captain. Mendelson initiated and organized concerts of cantorial music. He assisted in the writing of new compositions in the areas of Jewish and cantorial music and was president of the Cantors' Assembly (1987–89). In 1994 the Jewish Theological Seminary awarded him the degree of Doctor of Music honoris causa. His brother is the cantor Jacob Ben-Zion *Mendelson.

[Akiva Zimmerman]

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