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Badkhn
A ''badchen'' or ''badkhn'' ( yi, בּדחן) is a type of Ashkenazi Jews, Ashkenazic Jewish wedding entertainer, poet, sacred clown, and master of ceremonies originating in Eastern Europe, with a history dating back to at least the seventeenth century. The ''badchen'' was an indispensable part of the traditional Jewish wedding in Europe who guided the bride and groom through the stages of the ceremony, act as master of ceremonies, and sing to the bride, groom and in-laws with the accompaniment of klezmer musicians. They also had a traditional role on holidays such as Hanukkah or Purim. Today they are primarily found in Hasidic Judaism, Chassidic communities. History and description There is a long history of entertainers at Jewish weddings dating back to the Talmud, Talmudic era. The traditional role of the Eastern European ''badchen'' evolved from older Medieval and Early Modern Jewish wedding entertainers, such as the ''lets'' () or ''marshalik'' (), taking on a recognizable ne ...
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Solomon Smulewitz
Solomon Smulewitz ( yi, שלמה שמולעװיץ, 1868–1943), sometimes known by the anglicized name Solomon Small, was a Russian-born American Tenor, folk poet, Badchen, playwright, recording artist, and composer for the Yiddish theatre. He wrote hundreds of songs, many of which were recorded during the heydey of the Yiddish-language recording industry in 1910s and 1920s New York. Biography He was born on April 13, 1868, in Pinsk, Minsk Governorate, Russian Empire (now located in Belarus). His mother died during his birth and he was raised by a stepmother; his father Yehuda Leyb Smulewitz was a cantor. He later said that he had an extremely difficult childhood. Solomon sang in his chorus from the age of 5. When his father died seven years later Solomon went into the tailoring trade while still singing in cantorial choirs in exchange for his meals. He left to join the chorus of a traveling theater troupe and was very successful in girls' roles. After being left behind in an inn a ...
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Tanz Des Marschelik, Spassmacher (1902 Postcard)
''Tanz'' is the second recording by American guitarist Tim Sparks on the Tzadik Records label, released in 2000. The word () is Yiddish for dance, cognate to the German word with the same meaning. History After the recording of traditional Jewish music arranged for solo guitar on ''Neshamah'', producer John Zorn combined Sparks with Masada alumni Greg Cohen and Brazilian percussionist Cyro Baptista. Music critic Ben Kettlewell called the combination of Sparks, Cohen and Baptisto "a wonderful adventure into the myriad of styles of music of the Jewish Diaspora." Cohen and Baptista would reunite with Sparks for two more releases on the Tzadik label. ''Tanz'' includes four arrangements of songs by Klezmer clarinetist Naftule Brandwein. Sparks would later record '' Little Princess'', an entire album of Brandwein arrangements. Reception Writing for Allmusic, critic Sean Westergaard wrote, "Sparks comes from a classical guitar background more than a fingerpicking folky background, ...
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Mukachevo
Mukachevo ( uk, Мукачево, ; hu, Munkács; see name section) is a city in the valley of the Latorica river in Zakarpattia Oblast (province), in Western Ukraine. Serving as the administrative center of Mukachevo Raion (district), the city itself does not belong to the raion and is designated as a city of oblast significance, with the status equal to that of a separate raion. The city is a rail terminus and highway junction, and has beer, wine, tobacco, food, textile, timber, and furniture industries. During the Cold War, it was home to Mukachevo air base and a radar station. Mukachevo lies close to the borders of four neighbouring countries: Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. Today, the population is . The city is a traditional stronghold of the Rusyn language, and the population of Mukachevo is officially reported as 77.1% ethnic Ukrainian.
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Budowitz
Budowitz are a klezmer band incorporating 19th century instruments and themes from the folk music of Bessarabia, Galicia and Bukovina, into their music. Its members live in Hungary, Germany and the United States. The band is named after 19th Century accordion maker Karl Budowi who built the accordion played by Joshua Horowitz in the group. They have won a number of awards including BBC's Critics Circle award for best CD and the British Songlines Magazine's "Top of the World" award. Members who have played at various times * Christian Dawid - Clarinet * Tamas Gombai - Violin * Joshua Horowitz - Cimbalom (Tsimbl) and Accordion * Walt Mahovlich - Clarinet * Michael Winograd Michael may refer to: People * Michael (given name), a given name * Michael (surname), including a list of people with the surname Michael Given name "Michael" * Michael (archangel), ''first'' of God's archangels in the Jewish, Christian and ... - Clarinet * Steven Greenman - Violin * Lothar Lasse ...
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Kapelye
Klezmer ( yi, קלעזמער or ) is an instrumental musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for listening; these would have been played at weddings and other social functions. The musical genre incorporated elements of many other musical genres including Ottoman (especially Greek and Romanian) music, Baroque music, German and Slavic folk dances, and religious Jewish music. As the music arrived in the United States, it lost some of its traditional ritual elements and adopted elements of American big band and popular music. Among the European-born klezmers who popularized the genre in the United States in the 1910s and 1920s were Dave Tarras and Naftule Brandwein; they were followed by American-born musicians such as Max Epstein, Sid Beckerman and Ray Musiker. After the destruction of Jewish life in Eastern Europe during the Holocaus ...
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Klezmer Revival
Klezmer ( yi, קלעזמער or ) is an instrumental musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for listening; these would have been played at weddings and other social functions. The musical genre incorporated elements of many other musical genres including Ottoman Empire, Ottoman (especially Greek music, Greek and Romanian music, Romanian) music, Baroque music, German and Slavic people, Slavic folk dances, and religious Jewish music. As the music arrived in the United States, it lost some of its traditional ritual elements and adopted elements of American big band and popular music. Among the European-born klezmers who popularized the genre in the United States in the 1910s and 1920s were Dave Tarras and Naftule Brandwein; they were followed by American-born musicians such as Max Epstein, Sidney Beckerman (musician), Sid Beckerman and Ra ...
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Molly Picon
Molly Picon ( yi, מאָלי פּיקאָן; born Malka Opiekun; February 28, 1898 – April 5, 1992) was an American actress of stage, screen, radio and television, as well as a lyricist and dramatic storyteller. She began her career in Yiddish theatre and film, rising to a star, before transitioning into character roles in English-language productions. Early life Picon was born Malka Opiekun (Anglicized first to Pyekoon, later Picon) in New York City, to Polish-Jewish immigrants Clara (née Ostrow), a wardrobe mistress, and Louis Opiekun, a shirtmaker. Opiekun is a Polish language name meaning "guardian" or "caretaker". The family relocated to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, when she was three years old. Career Picon began as a child actor in the Yiddish Theatre at age six. In 1912, she debuted at the Arch Street Theatre in Philadelphia and became a star of the Yiddish Theatre District, performing in plays in the District for seven years. Picon was so popular in the 1920s, many ...
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Gus Goldstein
Gustave "Gus" Goldstein ( yi, גוסטאַװ גאָלדשטײן, 1882February 19, 1946) was a Romanian-born American Yiddish theatre actor, songwriter, vaudevillian, and recording artist. During the boom in Yiddish music recording in the 1910s and 1920s, he recorded dozens of 78-rpm discs of comedy and theatre music for Victor, Brunswick, Emerson, OKeh, and Columbia Records, collaborating with many celebrities of contemporary Jewish music such as Naftule Brandwein, Abe Schwartz, Louis Gilrod, and Clara Gold. Biography Goldstein was born in Iași, Romania on June 1, 1882 (although the Leksikon fun yidishn teater gives the year as 1884). His father, Iancu Leib Goldstein, was a house painter, and his mother was named Rebecca (Rifke) Rappaport. Gustave showed an interest in performance and songwriting from a young age, and joined an amateur Yiddish theatre troupe at thirteen. At age fifteen he ran away to Czernowitz (today Chernivtsi in Ukraine) where he supported himself by singin ...
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Frank Seiden
Frank Seiden (, ) (July 20, 1860 – May 16, 1931), who sometimes went by the stage name Professor Seiden, was a professional magician, Badchen, vaudeville entertainer, barber, and Yiddish-language recording artist of the late 1800s and early 1900s. He recorded almost 200 Wax cylinder and 78-rpm releases for Columbia, Victor, and Berliner. Biography Little is known about Seiden's early life. He was born Efraim Seiden in Galicia, Austria-Hungary on July 20, 1860. His parents were Jacob and Clara (Chaje) Seiden. He emigrated to the United States in 1877. His first decade there is poorly documented, but he married his wife Rachel in November 1883 and became a naturalized citizen in 1886. During the 1880s and 1890s he often worked as a barber, opening various shops in the Lower East Side on Ridge Street, Chrystie Street, and Willett Street. By the late 1880s Frank was increasingly known as an entertainer and magician. It is unclear when he started performing magical acts, but an 188 ...
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Eliakum Zunser
Eliakum Zunser (Eliakim Badchen, Elikum Tsunzer) (October 28, 1840 – September 22, 1913) was a Lithuanian Jewish Yiddish-language poet, songwriter, and ''badchen'' who lived out the last part of his life in the U.S. A 1905 article in ''The New York Times'' lauded him as "the father of Yiddish poetry". About a quarter of his roughly 600 songs survive. He influenced and was influenced by Brody singer Velvel Zbarzher, although it is not believed that they ever met. Born in Vilna, he grew up poor and first worked braiding lace in Kovno, where he was associated with the devout, moralistic Musar movement of Rabbi Israel Salanter. Later, he was drawn to the Haskalah, or Jewish Enlightenment, and adopted a more modern Orthodox Judaism that renounced superstition. Forcibly conscripted into the Russian Army just before his twentieth birthday, he was soon released due to Czar Alexander II's revocation of the harsh conscription law. The plight of Jewish draftees, or "cantonists" would be ...
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Broder Singer
The ''Broderzinger'' () or Broder singers, from Brody in Ukraine, were Jewish itinerant performers in Austrian Galicia, Romania, and Russia, professional or semiprofessional songwriters and performers, who from at least the early 19th century sang and danced, often in comic disguises, and who performed short one-act plays.https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0019_0_19780.html Jewish virtual library They were often '' badchonim'' (traditional wedding entertainers) and meshorerim (singers in cantors' choirs). They were among the first to publicly perform Yiddish-language songs outside of Purim plays and wedding parties, and were an important precursor to Yiddish theatre. They erected miniature stages and entertained customers in taverns, wine cellars, and restaurant gardens.Zalmen Zylbercweig, ''Leksikon fun Yidishn teater'', Book one, pp. 216-217 The first written records of the Broder singers are the remarks of Jews passing through Brody, which was a tradi ...
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Yiddish Theatre
Yiddish theatre consists of plays written and performed primarily by Jews in Yiddish, the language of the Central European Ashkenazi Jewish community. The range of Yiddish theatre is broad: operetta, musical comedy, and satiric or nostalgic revues; melodrama; naturalist drama; expressionist and modernist plays. At its height, its geographical scope was comparably broad: from the late 19th century until just before World War II, professional Yiddish theatre could be found throughout the heavily Jewish areas of Eastern and East Central Europe, but also in Berlin, London, Paris, Buenos Aires and New York City. Yiddish theatre's roots include the often satiric plays traditionally performed during religious holiday of Purim (known as Purimshpils); other masquerades such as the Dance of Death; the singing of cantors in the synagogues; Jewish secular song and dramatic improvisation; exposure to the theatre traditions of various European countries, and the Jewish literary culture that ...
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