Mordechai Gebirtig (), born Mordecai Bertig (4 May 1877 – 4 June 1942), was an influential

Polish Jewish The history of the Jews in Poland dates back at least 1,000 years. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Jews, Jewish community in the world. Poland was a principal center of Jewish culture, because of the long pe ...

poet and songwriter of the interwar period. He was shot by Germans in the

Kraków Ghetto The Kraków Ghetto was one of five major metropolitan Nazi ghettos created by Germany in the new General Government territory during the Occupation of Poland (1939–1945), German occupation of Poland in World War II. It was established for the p ...

occupied Poland ' (Norwegian language, Norwegian: ') is a Norwegian political thriller TV series that premiered on TV 2 (Norway), TV2 on 5 October 2015. Based on an original idea by Jo Nesbø, the series is co-created with Karianne Lund and Erik Skjoldbjærg. ...

, during

the Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

. A number of his Yiddish songs are sung to this day, including '' Es brent'', ''Reyzele'', ''Moyshele Mayn Fraynd'', and ''Kinder Yorn''.

Life

Mordechai Gebirtig was born in

Kraków , officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...

under the Austrian Partition, and lived in its

Jew Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

ish working-class quarter all his life. He served for five years in the

Austro-Hungarian Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military and diplomatic alliance, it consist ...

army. Gebirtig became a renowned folk artist in

Yiddish literature Yiddish literature encompasses all those belles-lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Eu ...

and song while in Kraków. He was self-taught in music, played the shepherd's pipe, and tapped out tunes on the piano with one finger. He earned his livelihood as a furniture worker; while music and theatre were his avocations. His life ended in the Nazi shooting action carried out in the

on the infamous "Bloody Thursday" of June 4, 1942. Gebirtig belonged to the Jewish Social Democratic Party, a political party in Galicia which merged into the

Jewish Labour Bund The General Jewish Labour Bund in Lithuania, Poland and Russia (), generally called The Bund (, cognate to , ) or the Jewish Labour Bund (), was a secular Jewish socialist party initially formed in the Russian Empire and active between 1897 and 1 ...

after

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. The Bund was a Yiddishist proletarian socialist party, which called for Jewish

cultural autonomy Minority rights are the normal individual rights as applied to members of racial, ethnic, class, religious, linguistic or gender and sexual minorities, and also the collective rights accorded to any minority group. Civil-rights movements often ...

in a democratic Second Republic.

Music

From 1906 he was a member of the Jewish Amateur Troupe in Kraków. He also wrote songs and theater reviews for , the Yiddish organ of the Jewish Social-Democratic Party. It was in such an environment that Gebirtig developed, encouraged by such professional writers and Yiddishist cultural activists as Avrom Reyzen, who for a time lived and published a journal in Krakow. Gebirtig's talent was his own, but he took the language, themes, types, tone, and timbre of his pieces from his surroundings, in some measure continuing the musical tradition of the popular Galician cabaret entertainers known as the Broder singers, who in turn were beholden to the yet older and still vital tradition of the badchen's (wedding

jester A jester, also known as joker, court jester, or fool, was a member of the household of a nobleman or a monarch kept to entertain guests at the royal court. Jesters were also travelling performers who entertained common folk at fairs and town ma ...

's) improvisatory art.

Style of folk songs

He published his first collection of songs in 1920, in the

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 7 October 1918 and 6 October 1939. The state was established in the final stage of World War I ...

. It was titled ''Folkstimlekh'' ('of the folk'). His songs spread quickly even before they were published, and many people regarded them as folksongs whose author or authors were anonymous. Adopted by leading Yiddish players such as

Molly Picon Molly Picon (; 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 s ...

, Gebirtig's songs became staples of numerous regular as well as improvised theatrical productions wherever

Yiddish theatre Yiddish theatre consists of plays written and performed primarily by Jews in Yiddish, the language of the Ashkenazi Jewish community. The range of Yiddish theatre is broad: operetta, musical comedy, and satire, satiric or nostalgic revues; melodr ...

was performed. It is not an exaggeration to say that Gebirtig's songs were lovingly sung the world over.

S'brent

One of Gebirtig's best-known songs is ''" S'brent"'' ( It is Burning), written in 1938 in response to the 1936 Przytyk pogrom in the

shtetl or ( ; , ; Grammatical number#Overview, pl. ''shtetelekh'') is a Yiddish term for small towns with predominantly Ashkenazi Jews, Ashkenazi Jewish populations which Eastern European Jewry, existed in Eastern Europe before the Holocaust. The t ...

(small town) of

Przytyk Przytyk () is a town in Radom County, Masovian Voivodeship, in east-central Poland, founded in the year 1333. It is the seat of the gmina (administrative district) called Gmina Przytyk. It lies in historic Lesser Poland, approximately west of Ra ...

. Gebirtig had hoped its message, “Don't stand there, brothers, douse the fire!” would be a call to action. Kraków (Cracow) underground Jewish resistance adopted S'brent as its anthem in World War II. '' "Undzer shtetl brennt"'' was sung in the

Nazi ghettos Beginning with the invasion of Poland during World War II, the Nazi Germany, Nazi regime set up ghettos across German-occupied Europe, German-occupied Eastern Europe in order to segregate and confine Jews, and sometimes Romani people, into small ...

German-occupied Europe German-occupied Europe, or Nazi-occupied Europe, refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly military occupation, militarily occupied and civil-occupied, including puppet states, by the (armed forces) and the governmen ...

. Since then the song, in the original Yiddish and in its

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

translation titled ''"Ha-Ayyarah Bo'eret"'' (העיירה בוערת), "Our Little Town is Burning!" - hence the occasional reference to a Yiddish title, ''"Undzer Shtetl Brent!"'', continues to be widely performed in the context of

Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

commemoration.

Arbetsloze marsh

One of Gebirtig's political songs that is also still popular today is the Arbetloze marsh or Song of the Unemployed:

Publications and recordings

* . Edition Künstlertreff, Wuppertal – (gramophone record and booklet) * . Edition Künstlertreff, Wuppertal – * . Edition Künstlertreff, Wuppertal – * . Studio Hard, Warschau (CD) * 1946: . Krakau 1946 * 1949: . Farl. Dawke, Paris 1949 * 1992: . Wuppertal 1992. – * 1997: . Lerner, Tel Aviv 1997 * 2005: . Anthony Coleman, piano. Tzadik, 2005

References

External links

Officia
Mordechai Gebirtig Memorial website

Bibliography

* http://fcit.usf.edu/Holocaust/arts/musVicti.htm
Papers of Mordecai Gebirtig
at the

YIVO YIVO (, , short for ) is an organization that preserves, studies, and teaches the cultural history of Jewish life throughout Eastern Europe, Germany, and Russia as well as orthography, lexicography, and other studies related to Yiddish. Estab ...

, New York. * http://holocaustmusic.ort.org/places/ghettos/krakow/gebirtigmordechai/ * https://web.archive.org/web/20110519162239/http://www.jewish-theatre.com/visitor/article_display.aspx?articleID=1901

* http://www.klezmershack.com/bands/vanoort/fayfele/vanoort.fayfele.html ( Mariejan van Oort & Jacques Verheijen produced 'Mayn Fayfele', a musical portrait of Gebirtig, 2003.) * http://ulrich-greve.eu/free Free scores and song lyrics in Yiddish {{DEFAULTSORT:Gebirtig, Mordecai Bundists 1877 births 1942 deaths Writers from Kraków Jews from Galicia (Eastern Europe) Yiddish-language poets Jewish poets People who died in the Kraków Ghetto Polish male poets Deaths by firearm in Poland Polish civilians killed in World War II Austro-Hungarian military personnel of World War I Broder singers Yiddish-language singers of Poland General Jewish Labour Bund in Poland politicians