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March comes in with a roar of new Yiddish music
(New York Jewish Week) — As they say in the mameloshn (mother tongue), “Dos Yidish lid iz umetum.” In other words, “Yiddish song is in the air.”
This month a collection of new Yiddish songs will be performed for the first time in America at a Manhattan museum; two Brooklyn blues musicians will release their recordings of old Yiddish folk songs and a new web site preserving the work of a couple who played a pivotal role in promoting Yiddish song is set to debut.
If all that weren’t enough, the stars of the Yiddish stage will also appear at an event celebrating the woman who was dubbed “the Sherlock Holmes of Yiddish song.”
“Because we all have this weird relationship with Yiddish, every project that people do takes it to a different place,” Alex Weiser, director of public programs at YIVO, told the New York Jewish Week. “Interesting, weird things are currently happening with Yiddish song.”
Read on for ways to get your Yiddish on.
Sister act
As part of Carnegie Hall’s multi-venue celebration of women in music, on Sunday, March 5, the Paul Shapiro Quartet takes the stage at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Battery Park to perform “Di Shvester: The Sisters.” The sisters (by another mother, anyway) in this concert of Jewish and Yiddish music are Eleanor Reissa, the singer/director/actress who is fluent in Yiddish, and Cilla Owens, the superb jazz vocalist who teaches at Hunter College and can sing in Yiddish as well.
Reissa and Owens will perform some songs by the Barry Sisters, the Bronx-born trio of the mid-20th century who brought Yiddish songs into the mainstream. One of the songs they will perform is based on a poem by the Yiddish poet Aliza Greenblatt, aka Woody Guthrie’s mother-in-law. In a cross-genre segue, Reissa and Owens will follow “Zumer Bay Nakht Oyf Dekher” (“Summer At Night On The Roof”) with “Up On the Roof,” the Carole King/Gerry Goffin sung memorably by Laura Nyro.
Shapiro, whose albums for John Zorn’s Radical Jewish Culture series were critically acclaimed, has worked with Owens, who has spent most of her life in Crown Heights, since 1990. Shapiro first started collaborating with Reissa, who grew up in Brownsville, at Yiddish New York in 2017.
“To me they’re both Brooklyn royalty,” said Shapiro, who hangs his fedora in the Lower East Side’s Grand Street Co-ops.
“When I sing with Cilla, I feel like I’m home,” Reissa said
The two vocalists have appeared together several times in Shapiro’s Ribs and Brisket Revue, which began at the now-shuttered Cornelia Street Café.
Percussionist Ricky Gordon, right, and Jeremiah Lockwood, the front man for The Sway Machinery, form the duet Gordon Lockwood. (Courtesy)
A right to sing the blues
For the entire month of March a free five-song EP titled “Once Upon a Time the Fire Burned Brighter: Ballads from the Yiddish Gothic” is available for download. Created by the Brooklyn-based blues performers Gordon Lockwood, these are re-interpretations of Yiddish folk songs, three of them by Lifshe Schaecter Widman, a Yiddish folksinger who begot the Yiddish poet Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, who begot the Yiddish scholar and former newspaper editor Itzik Gottesman, now a senior lecturer in Yiddish language and culture at the University of Texas at Austin whose Yiddish Song of the Week blog is an important source for lovers of Yiddish song.
The EP will be accompanied by videos of the five songs, plus additional multimedia that will be viewable online. Gordon Lockwood may sound like a Canadian folk singer, but it is actually a duo comprised of percussionist Ricky Gordon, who performs with Wynton Marsalis and has collaborated with Spike Lee, and Jeremiah Lockwood, the front man for The Sway Machinery, a brass-heavy world music band. Lockwood, a card-carrying ethnomusicologist with a PhD from Stanford, recently produced an album of music that features several Hasidic cantors from Brooklyn. In April, Gordon Lockwood will perform their “Once Upon A Time” repertoire in New Haven and New York.
Yiddish royalty
On March 23, the life of Chana Mlotek — the late, great musicologist, folklorist and archivist, who curated the Yiddish music collection at the vaunted YIVO archives — will be celebrated at YIVO’s West 16th St. headquarters. Nine descendants of the Mlotek clan will participate, along with actors Reissa and Steven Skybell, who played Tevye in the Yiddish production of “Fiddler On The Roof.”
Singers will include Lorin Sklamberg of The Klezmatics and Sarah Gordon of the Brooklyn Yiddish rock band Yiddish Princess. Gordon is the daughter of the late Adrienne Cooper, often referred to as the “mother of the Yiddish revival.” The evening’s musical director will be Zalmen Mlotek, Chana and Yosl’s son and artistic director of the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene.
On March 20, the Workers Circle is expected to launch The Yosl and Chana Mlotek Collection of Yiddish Song, a website that turns the Mloteks’ three-volume “Pearls of Yiddish Song” anthology into a searchable multimedia resource. Consisting of more than 400 Yiddish songs, the web site will include content curated from YouTube and TikTok, according to an email from the publicist.
The Mlotek collection adds another important resource to a field that includes YIVO’s collection of 4,000-plus Yiddish songs, a project directed by Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett and featuring the field recordings of the late musicologist Ruth Rubin, and many in the Yiddish song scene are looking forward to it.
“We’ve been waiting for this for many, many years,” said Linda Gritz, a retired molecular biologist active in the monthly sing at the Workers Circle in Brookline, Massachusetts. The group has been meeting online during the pandemic and unable to use the couple dozen copies of each Mlotek book, so it has had to create PDFs of 30 songs for its monthly virtual gatherings.
“When it’s online, people could request any song from any book and we could put the URL in the chat and go to it,” said Gritz. “That’ll be an amazing resource.”
Songs for and about refugees
On March 26, “Pleytem Tsuzamen” (“Refugees Together”) will be performed at the Museum of Jewish Heritage-A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. Two performances of Josh Waletzky’s Yiddish song cycle will mark the American debut of the work, which was first performed in 2019 at the Weimar Republic of Yiddishland gathering in Germany. Performers will come from Latvia, Germany, England and Canada, and Brooklyn violinists Jake Shulman-Ment and Deborah Strauss are part of the cast.
“It’s fitting that we’re doing it a couple of weeks before Pesach [Passover] because there’s a Pesach theme that goes through a lot of the songs,” said singer Daniel Kahn, who lives on a houseboat in Hamburg and plays accordion in the production. “It’s incredible how prescient and universal Josh’s song cycle has proven to be…. Those songs and their themes of displacement and upheaval resonate with the liberational traditions within Yiddishkayt [secular Yiddish culture] and Jewish practice.”
English and Ukrainian supertitles will make the two-hour concert, co-sponsored by National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, accessible to non-Yiddish speakers.
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The post March comes in with a roar of new Yiddish music appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Yiddish has a long list of words for ‘cemetery‘
נישט אַלע ווייסן אַז אויף ייִדיש איז דאָ אַ גאַנצער וואָקאַבולאַר וועגן דעם, וווּ מע לייגט ייִדן נאָכן טויט.
וואָס טוט מען טאַקע מיט אַ מת? מע באַגראָבט אים אָדער מע באַהאַלט אים, אָדער מע איז אים מקבר, אָדער מע ברענגט אים צו קבֿר־ישׂראל. „באַגראָבן“ האָט דאָך אויך אַ פֿאַרשפּרייטן מעטאַפֿאָרישן טײַטש, „רויִנירן“. אָט איז דאָ אַ ווערטערשפּיל: „שטאַרבן איז נאָך ווי ס’איז, אָבער דאָס אַרײַנלייגן אין דר’ערד, דאָס באַגראָבט אַ מענטשן!“
וועגן דעם אָרט, וווּ ס’ליגן ייִדן נאָכן טויט, איז דאָ אַ לאַנגע רשימה ווערטער, כּמעט אַלע אייפֿעמיזמען. נאָך די הונדערט יאָר ליגן ייִדן און ייִדישע טעכטער, קודם־כּל, אויף אַ בית־עולם. אויף לשון־קודש איז „עולם“, פֿאַרשטייט זיך, טײַטש „וועלט“ און אויף ייִדיש — „אַ גרופּע מענטשן“; אָבער אויף לשון־קודש האָט „עולם“ נאָך אַ טײַטש, „אייביקייט“. איז אַ בית־עולם דאָס אָרט, וווּ מע בלײַבט אויף אייביק. דאָס אייגענע איז שייך צום אַרמיש־שטאַמיקע „בית־עלמין“.
אַ פֿאַל פֿון לשון סגי־נהור, דאָס הייסט וווּ מע זאָגט איין זאַך אָבער מע מיינט דאָס פֿאַרקערטע, איז „בית־חיים“, טײַטש „דאָס הויז פֿון לעבן“. אַן אַנדער וואָרט, נישט קיין אייפֿעמיזם, איז „בית־הקבֿרות“, דאָס הייסט, דאָרטן, וווּ ס’געפֿינען זיך קבֿרים.
אָבער נישט אַלע ווערטער נעמען זיך פֿון לשון־קודש. מע זאָגט דאָך אויך „דאָס פֿעלד“, „דאָס גוטע־אָרט“, „דאָס הייליקע אָרט“, „דאָס ריינע אָרט“. אַ טשיקאַווער משל דערפֿון: איך בין אַ מאָל געפֿאָרן אין דער שטאָט גער, נישט ווײַט פֿון וואַרשע, וואָס ביזן חורבן איז זי געווען דער זיץ פֿונעם באַקאַנטן גערער רבין. אין 2007 זענען אין דער שטאָט געבליבן גאַנצע דרײַ ייִדן, האָב איך געהאַט די זכיה זיך צו באַקענען, און צו כאַפּן אַ ייִדישן שמועס, מיט צוויי. (וויפֿל מאָל אין לעבן איז מיר אויסגעקומען צו שמועסן אויף ייִדיש מיט אַ ייִד, וואָס האָט איבערגעלעבט דעם חורבן און וווינט נאָך אין זײַן מיזרח־אייראָפּעיִשער היימשטאָט?)
איינער פֿון זיי, וועלוול קאַרפּמאַן, האָט מיט אַ פּאָר יאָר שפּעטער געגעבן אַן אינטערוויו דער ייִדישער ראַדיאָ־אוידיציע פֿונעם פּוילישן ראַדיאָ (צום באַדויערן, האָט מען די ראַדיאָ־אוידיציע דערנאָכדעם אָפּגעשאַפֿט). ווען די זשורנאַליסטקע האָט אים אַ פֿרעג געטאָן וועגן דעם גורל פֿונעם גערער בית־עולם, האָט ער זי איבערגעפֿרעגט: „איר מיינט ס’גוטע־אָרט?“ יעדעס מאָל, וואָס זי האָט ווײַטער געזאָגט „בית־עולם“, האָט ער געענטפֿערט „ס’גוטע־אָרט“.
אויך בײַ די אומות־העולם זענען די ווערטער דערפֿאַר אייפֿעמיזמען. דאָס פֿאַרשפּרייטסטע וואָרט אין אייראָפּע איז ס’ענגלישע cemetery, ס’פֿראַנצייזישע cimetière אד”גל, פֿון אַן אַלטגריכישן ווערב פֿאַר „ליגן/לייגן שלאָפֿן“. גאָר אַ מאָל, פֿאַר דער הײַנטיקער צײַט־רעכענונג, איז ס’גריכישע וואָרט געווען טײַטש „שלאָפֿשטוב“; בײַ די קריסטן בשעתּו האָט עס באַקומען דעם מאָדערנעם טײַטש. אַ ווײַטער קרובֿ פֿון דעם וואָרט איז ס’ייִדישע „היים“, אַ פּנים, ווײַל אין דער היים שלאָפֿט מען, אָבער נישט פּונקט אַזוי ווי אויפֿן בית־עולם…
דאָס דײַטשישע Friedhof איז דער „שלום־הויף“; און Kirchhof „קלויסטערהויף“ איז מגולגל געוואָרן אינעם פּוילישן Kirkut „ייִדישער בית־עולם“!
און אַזוי ווי מאַמע־לשון האָט פּאַראַלעלע וואָקאַבולאַרן פֿאַר ייִדן און פֿאַר קריסטן איז גאָר קיין חידוש נישט, וואָס אויפֿן אָרט, וווּ ס’ליגן קריסטן זאָגט מען „צווינטער“ אָדער „צמענטער“, מסתּמא, פֿון פּוילישן cmentarz פֿונעם זעלביקן גריכישן שורש וואָס cemetery.
The post Yiddish has a long list of words for ‘cemetery‘ appeared first on The Forward.
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IHOP denies inviting Florida GOP candidate who said ‘Americans shouldn’t die for Israel’
(JTA) — James Fishback, the fringe GOP candidate courting the online far right in his long-shot bid for governor of Florida, had a bit of food-service drama this week — and it wasn’t about the “goyslop” he previously claimed was being served in the state’s school cafeterias.
Waffle House, he alleged, had banned him from every restaurant in the state after he announced his intent to campaign at the chain’s Florida locations. The reason, he claimed, was because he said that “Americans shouldn’t die for Israel.”
But not to worry, Fishback quickly announced: Another breakfast chain, International House of Pancakes, had extended an invitation to him personally.
“Hey, wanna come over?” reads a direct message Fishback posted to social media, a photo of which appears to come from IHOP’s official corporate account. An elated Fishback soon posted photos from a campaign stop at an IHOP, which he deemed “International House of Patriots.”
Not so, an IHOP spokesperson told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“Since our founding, IHOP and its franchisees have been committed to providing warm and welcoming dining experiences for all guests. We are not working with James Fishback or his campaign in any capacity,” the spokesperson told JTA in an email. “Additionally, we have confirmed that the image circulating on social media is not authentic.”
Fishback did not return a request for comment by JTA about IHOP’s claim. The former investment banker has used terms on the campaign trail considered dogwhistles to the online far right and boasts a large online profile that has included interviews with Tucker Carlson and antisemitic podcaster Myron Gaines. He has also praised the followers of antisemitic streamer Nick Fuentes.
Asked by JTA why he had made his earlier “goyslop” comments, Fishback replied, “Because it’s funny. Get a life.”
He then posted the exchange to his X account under the caption, “Journalists are insufferable.”
Earlier in the same conversation, asked about recently revealed racist and antisemitic messages from a Florida Young Republicans regional group chat, Fishback replied, “I condemn all forms of hatred.”
The post IHOP denies inviting Florida GOP candidate who said ‘Americans shouldn’t die for Israel’ appeared first on The Forward.
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Iran Names Khamenei’s Hardline Son Mojtaba as New Supreme Leader
FILE PHOTO: Mojtaba Khamenei, the second son of Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, visits Hezbollah’s office in Tehran, Iran, October 1, 2024. Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS/File Photo
Iran on Monday named Mojtaba Khamenei to succeed his father Ali Khamenei as Supreme Leader, signaling that hardliners remain firmly in charge in Tehran a week into its conflict with the United States and Israel.
Mojtaba, a mid-ranking cleric with influence inside Iran’s security forces and vast business networks under his father, had been seen as a frontrunner in the lead up to the vote by the assembly, a body of 88 clerics charged with choosing the new leader after Ali Khamenei.
“By a decisive vote, the Assembly of Experts, appointed Ayatollah Seyyed Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei as the third Leader of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” the assembly said in a statement issued just after midnight Tehran time.
The position gives Mojtaba the final say in all matters of state in the Islamic Republic.
Mojtaba’s appointment will likely draw the ire of US President Donald Trump, who said on Sunday that Washington should have a say in the selection. “If he doesn’t get approval from us, he’s not going to last long,” he told ABC News. Israel, ahead of the announcement, threatened to target whoever was chosen.
Mojtaba’s father, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, was killed in one of the first strikes launched against Iran more than a week ago.
The US military on Sunday reported a seventh American has died from wounds sustained during Iran’s initial counter-attack a week ago, a day after Trump presided over the return to the United States of the remains of the six others who died.
The US-Israeli attacks have killed at least 1,332 Iranian civilians and wounded thousands, according to Iran’s U.N. ambassador.
As Trump pressed for an “unconditional surrender,” Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker, said Tehran was not seeking a ceasefire to the war and would punish aggressors.
Israel continued to target senior Iranian figures, including Abolqasem Babaian, the recently appointed head of the military office of the supreme leader, saying he was killed in a Saturday strike.
BLACK SMOKE HANGS OVER TEHRAN
As fighting escalated on day nine of the US-Israeli campaign against Iran, thick black smoke hung over Tehran on Sunday, residents said, after strikes on oil storage facilities had lit up the night sky with plumes of orange flame.
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said the large-scale attack marked a “dangerous new phase” of the conflict and amounted to a war crime.
“By targeting fuel depots, the aggressors are releasing hazardous materials and toxic substances into the air,” he wrote on X.
Israeli military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani told reporters the depots were used to fuel Iran’s war effort, including producing or storing propellant for ballistic missiles. “They are a legal military target,” he said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his government would press on with the assault and strike Iran’s rulers “without mercy.”
“We have an organized plan with many surprises to destabilize the regime and enable change,” he said in a video statement.
US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner will visit Israel on Tuesday, according to Axios, citing a senior US official.
Trump told reporters on Air Force One that he was not seeking negotiations to end the conflict, which has driven up global energy prices, disrupted business and snarled air travel.
“At some point, I don’t think there will be anybody left maybe to say, ‘We surrender,’” he said.