Thanks to my advisor, Ray Allen and graduate deputy Stephanie Jensen-Moulton, and department chair Bruce MacIntyre. And to my outside editors Rokhl Kafrissen and Jeremy Berger. Thanks is also due to some of the great teachers I had as an undergraduate at Northeastern University in Boston, Judith Tick, Susan Asai, Joshua Jacobson, and Leon Janikian. Last thanks must be given to Hankus Netsky at New England Conservatory.
This paper also owes thanks to teachers I have had outside of academia, starting with my first teachers of Jewish music when I was playing with the Maxwell Street Junior Klezmer Orchestra in Chicago, Lori Lippitz-Chintz and Sam Margolis z'l, and my drum teacher at the time Steve Hawk. Next come all of the great teachers I have had at KlezKamp and KlezKanada, Elaine Hoffman-Watts, Julie Epstein, David Licht, Aaron Alexander, Walter Zev Feldman, Michael Alpert, Henry Sapoznik, Peter Sokolow, Stuart Brotman, Jim Guttman, Mark Rubin, Paul Pincus a''h, Howie Leess a''h, Ray Musiker, Merlin Shepard, Mike Cohen and Margot Leverett.
Last but not least thanks goes out to my family that has supported me along this journey.