Today a city in Ukraine, Czernowitz / ________ (Chernivtsi) / Cern_u_i / Czerniowce / __________ (Tschernowitz) – to give it its German, Ukrainian, Romanian, Polish, and Yiddish names – boasted five linguistic communities and five religious denominations around 1900. This dissertation examines the music culture of one of the most diverse cities in the Eastern European borderlands in this period, exploring the role of music in cultural and social relations and the imprint this culture left on the city’s compositional legacy. Although often regarded as a model of successful multiculturalism, Czernowitz has mostly been studied from national perspectives, and its music – arguably the locus classicus for the study of the aspirations and cultural negotiations of fin-de-siècle Central European society – has received little scholarly attention. Making use of extensive archival research in eight countries, the dissertation explores a music culture that had been forgotten, erased, or rewritten in nationalizing histories. It examines intricate biographies of musicians with ties to several cultures, their compositions in several languages, and their music for the houses of prayer of different denominations; it analyzes “supranational” music institutions as well as sectarian ones and their outreach and reception across boundaries; and it reconstructs musical events aimed at cultural inclusiveness. By examining earlier historical accounts, the dissertation offers a critique of musical historiography, drawing attention to the mechanics of constructing music history, and investigating the role of music in the construction of nation and the practice of national identification. The project connects several currents in recent musicological, ethnographic, and historical scholarship: microhistory (especially urban and regional studies); migration and multicultural identities; and peripheries and borderlands. As became clear at the Mandyczewski Festival in Chernivtsi, founded in 2017 to bring to re-sounding life my recent archival discoveries, much remains at stake. This study shows how a musical legacy from a complex shared past, even with the many exclusive claims still being made on this heritage, has the potential to act as a bridge in a divided border region.