“A diverse collection of works written by American Jewish composers…. The cultural contribution they made, and are still making, to American music and the arts is invaluable and incalculable. The Milken Archive has documented  a significant portion…. of that legacy.”

 

This third disc in the Milken Archive’s three-part series, Great Songs of the Yiddish Stage, features 16 selections derived from two major genres of live Yiddish entertainment in America. The primary source, the American Yiddish musical theatre, originated in the lower Manhattan district of Second Avenue, where the most prestigious theaters stood, and soon took its name from that area. Leading Second Avenue personalities became virtual folk heroes among segments of American Jewish society, and many later achieved prominence in the broader stage and screen world. A second source of these songs was the Yiddish vaudeville that played in variety houses and music halls.

 

The selections on this CD - all but three of them by one of the most celebrated of the Second Avenue songwriters, Joseph Rumshinsky - illustrate the wide range of Yiddish theater songs - lively and spirited, lyrical and quasi-operatic, comical, nostalgic, and moralistic. They reveal as well the genre’s various musical sources, among them Viennese light operetta, perceived Eastern European folk idioms and klezmer sonorities, cantorial tradition, and liturgical chant.

 

Tracklist:
1. Mayn Goldele
Nell Snaidas, soprano
Robert Bloch, tenor
2. Fifty-fifty
Joanne Borts, mezzo-soprano
3. In A Kleyn Shtibele
Amy Goldstein, soprano
Simon Spiro, tenor
4. Oy, Iz Dos a Meydl
Simon Spiro, tenor
5. Es Tsit, Es Brit
Amy Goldstein, soprano
6. Hamavdil
Benzion Miller, tenor

Jorge Mester, conductor
7. A Brivele Der Mamen (Solomon Smulewitz)
Elizabeth Shammash, mezzo-soprano
8. Watch Your Step!
Joanne Borts, mezzo-soprano
9. Got Un Zayn Mishpet Iz Gerekht (David Meyerowitz)
Robert Abelson, baritone
10. Hu-Tsa-Tsa (Fischel Kanapoff)
Bruce Adler, tenor

Barcelona Symphony/National Orchestra of Catalonia
11. Oyb S’iz Geven Gut Far Mayn Mamen
Amy Goldstein, soprano
Simon Spiro, tenor
12. Du Bist Dos LIkht Fun Mayne Ogyn
Nell Snaidas, soprano
13. Shma Yisro’el
Benzion Miller, tenor
14. A Bisl Libe Un A Bisl Glik
Amy Goldstein, soprano
15. Dir A Nikl, Mir A Nikl
Bruce Adler, tenor

Barcelona Symphony/National Orchestra of Catalonia
16. Shloymele, Malkele
Elizabeth Shammash, mezzo-soprano
Simon Spiro, tenor

 

Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Elli Jaffe (conductor) unless otherwise stated.