Sonic Sightlines: The Music and Moving Image of Mickey Katz, Talk by Mark Kligman at Sonic Representations of Jewishness on Screen and Off at UCLA, April 19-21, 2026.

The humor of Mickey Katz is deeply integrated into his song titles, lyrical content, and unique sonic landscape. While his parody is most visible in album art and promotional materials, there also exists a limited but insightful collection of moving images from films and talk show appearances. These include a scene in Ladies’ Man (1947) and an appearance on The Mike Douglas Show (1973), as well as other examples. Although Katz’s image and auditory satire are staples of the Jewish-American cultural canon, these filmic records offer a fresh perspective on his comedic persona.

Mark Kligman is the Inaugural holder of the Mickey Katz Endowed Chair in Jewish Music at The UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music where he is a professor of Ethnomusicology and Musicology. He specializes in the liturgical traditions of Middle Eastern Jewish communities and various areas of popular Jewish music. He has published on the liturgical music of Syrian Jews in Brooklyn in journals as well as his book, Maqam and Liturgy: Ritual, Music and Aesthetics of Syrian Jews in Brooklyn (Wayne
State University, 2009), which shows the interconnection between the music of Syrian Jews and their cultural way of life. His other publications focus on the intersection of contemporary Jewish life and
various liturgical and paraliturgical musical contexts. Orthodox Popular music is the subject of his current work. He is the academic Chair of the Jewish Music Forum and co-editor of the journal Musica Judaica. From 2014-2016 he was on the board of the Association for Jewish Studies. Presently, he is the Chair of the Jewish Studies and Music Group for the American Musicological Society. Professor Kligman is the Director of the Lowell Milken Center for Music of American Jewish Experience.