Winner of the 2011 University of Southern California Book Prize in Literary and Cultural Studies sponsored by the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Finalist for the 2012 Sami Rohr Book Prize for Jewish Literature, as given by the Jewish Book Council. Selected as a Choice Outstanding Academic Title for 2011 in the Music category. Won the Béla Bartók Award for Outstanding Ethnomusicological Book sponsored by ASCAP Honorable Mention from the Association for Jewish Studies, Jordan Schnitzer Book Award in the category of Cultural Studies and Media Studies. Long-listed for the 2012 Historia Nova Prize for the Best Book on Russian Intellectual History sponsored by the Mikhail Prokhorov Foundation and Academic Studies Press. Drawing on a mass of unpublished writings and archival sources from prerevolutionary Russian conservatories, this book offers an insightful account of the Jewish search for a modern identity in Russia through music, rather than politics or religion.