phone: 917-326-9659
email: yiddishnewyork@gmail.com
web page: www.yiddishnewyork.com
concerts: https://www.yiddishnewyork.com/2024-concerts-films-special-events/
all the programs: https://yiddishnewyork2024.sched.com/
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WHAT DO NY’s JEWS DO DURING CHRISTMAS?
Yiddish New York — the nation’s largest festival of Yiddish music, culture and language — returns December 21-26, 2024! Learn and celebrate together — In-person at Hebrew Union College or online on Zoom!
NEW YORK CITY,
NOVEMBER 13, 2024
Yiddish New York (YNY), the nation’s largest workshop/festival celebrating Yiddish language and culture — including its signature music, klezmer — is proud to announce its return for its ninth year, taking place from Saturday evening, December 21 to Thursday, December 26th, 2024. The 2024 festival will be held in a hybrid format, with programs presented online as well as on-site at the Hebrew Union College near Washington Square Park.
Our centerpiece program, the Adrienne Cooper Dreaming in Yiddish Concert & Award on Wednesday, December 25, 2024 at Hebrew Union College will honor Deborah Strauss, a violinist/educator beloved by the Yiddish arts and culture world (more on this below).
YNY 2023 will feature dozens of the leading performers and scholars of Yiddish culture, including:
- Cellist/composer Lori Goldston – commissioned by YNY and the 14th Street Y to write & perform a new score to the 1925 Yiddish silent film Jewish Luck.
- Pioneering folklorist Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett (POLIN Museum, Warsaw)
- Grammy-nominated producer/musician Henry Sapoznik.
- Legendary folksinger and NEA National Heritage Fellow Ethel Raim (Co-Founder of the Center for Traditional Music and Dance, and leader of the famed folk revival ensemble The Pennywhistlers)
- Acclaimed actor and songwriter Daniel Kahn
- Klezmer scholar Walter Zev Feldman
- Celebrated violinists Deborah Strauss & Jake Shulman-Ment
- Innovating klezmer clarinetist and composer Michael Winograd
- Accordionist and Digital Humanities Project Innovator Christina Crowder
- Fulbright scholar and violinist Zoë Aqua
- Cultural Organizer, Dancer, and Scholar Avia Moore (Artistic Director of KlezKanada)
- Extraordinary visual artists Tine Kinderman & Debby Ugoretz
- Yiddish singer, composer and filmmaker Josh Waletzky
- Internationally acclaimed multi-instrumentalist Ilya Shneyveys
- Yiddish educators Asya Vaisman Schulman, Miriam Isaacs, and Nikolai “Kolya” Borodulin
- Acclaimed klezmer tsimbl (hammered dulcimer) player Pete Rushefsky (Center for Traditional Music and Dance)
- OBIE-award winning theater producer Jenny Romaine
- Singer, multi-instrumentalist and NEA National Heritage Fellow Michael Alpert.
Amazing concerts including: World Premiere of Lori Goldston’s new soundtrack to the 1925 Soviet-Yiddish film Jewish Luck, a Yiddish theater tribute to the cross-dressing star Pepi Littman, a new folktale brought to life by a large crankie – a massive, elaborately animated scroll cranked by hand, a concert by legendary klezmer violinist Alicia Svigals (a founder of the Grammy-winning Klezmatics), concerts by up-and-coming YIddish songwriters, singers, instrumentalists and more.
Yiddish New York was founded in 2015 in response to the closure, after 30 years, of KlezKamp, which had been the world’s longest-running Yiddish arts program. YNY annually draws 3000 people of all ages and backgrounds for its daytime workshops, evening concerts, dance parties, theater performances, and more.
“Yiddish New York is the place for people who want to celebrate Jewishness, and find refuge from the Christmas season, through Yiddish culture and klezmer music. The community and connection to culture is deeply real and all the more needed in our too-often isolated current world,” says trombonist and composer Dan Blacksberg.
“I’ve met some of my closest friends through the New York klezmer and Yiddish scene,” says 27-year-old Esther, a participant of the festival. “This community is a huge part of my identity, and I love that Yiddish New York is helping to keep our traditions alive.”
Each day, YNY participants can take advantage of a full schedule of workshops in Yiddish language, klezmer music, theater, and more, plus a wide variety of performances, lectures, and films presenting many of the leading figures in Yiddish culture today. Evening programs feature an eclectic series of online concerts and theater performances.
2024 program offerings include:
- Concerts featuring the world’s leading Yiddish music artists.
- Lectures by leading scholars of Yiddish history, literature and culture
- Yiddish language instruction (beginner, intermediate, advanced)
- Klezmer music lessons and ensembles (for all instrumentalists)
- Annual Adrienne Cooper Memorial Dreaming in Yiddish Concert & Award
- Yiddish vocals/singing workshops
- Folk dance workshops led by internationally renowned dance instructors
- Kids and family programming
- The world’s largest annual Yiddish Film Festival
- Creative activism combining arts, politics and community organizing
YNY welcomes individuals of all ages, backgrounds, and levels of Yiddish (no prior Yiddish required!). Special programs for kids and teens are led by leading educators and performers.
Event passes are available at www.yiddishnewyork.com. YNY also has scholarships and work-study options available to students and participants with financial need.
Partner Organizations: The Center for Traditional Music and Dance (fiscal sponsor), The Museum of Jewish Heritage, The Workers Circle, The 14th Street Y, The Forward, The Center for Jewish History, The Sholem Aleichem Cultural Center, The Educational Alliance, The Museum At Eldridge Street, The National Museum of American Jewish History, The New York Klezmer Series, The Town and Village Synagogue, The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, The Stanton Street Shul, The Workers Circle, The Forward Newspapers, The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, The Yiddish Book Center, The League for Yiddish, Yiddishkayt, Klezmer Institute, The New York Jewish Guide, The Yiddish Arts and Academics Association of North America (YAAANA), JewishWorldLife.com, New York State Council on the Arts, The New York Jewish Parenting Guide, and Austrian Cultural Forum New York. International partners: Institut Européen des Musiques Juives (Paris), Instituto da Musica Judaica Brasil, KlezKanada (Quebec), The Ashkenaz Festival (Toronto)).
Yiddish New York is grateful for support from Marinus and Minna B. Koster Foundation, the Atran Foundation, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Con Edison, the Adrienne Cooper Fund for Dreaming in Yiddish, the Yiddish Artists & Friends– Actors Club, Itsik (Jonathan) Sunshine, Nan Bases, Frances & Mitchell Harris, Ellie Schweber, Nicola Bird, Seth Weisberg and Nicola Bird. Promotional support provided in part by Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer and NYC & Company Foundation.
About Yiddish New York:
Yiddish New York celebrates and engages with East European Jewish (and other Jewish and co-territorial) traditions to foster new creativity, building bridges across borders – a culture under construction! Drawing inspiration from the historic cultural riches of the city, Yiddish New York is an intergenerational gathering featuring daily workshops and a broad spectrum of performances and programming. Yiddish New York evenings feature concerts, dance parties, and jam sessions at clubs and other venues around this vibrant neighborhood.
Press interested in interviews by phone or email – please contact 917-326-9659 or email yiddishnewyork@gmail.com.
About Deborah Strauss, 2024 Adrienne Cooper Dreaming in Yiddish Awardee:
Raised in a traditional home filled with European cantorial music, family melodies, Ashkenazic liturgy, Hasidic nigunim, and Jewish art song, Deb Strauss’ childhood paved the way to a deep and compelling connection to klezmer and Yiddish music. Strauss has forged a style grounded in tradition, yet uniquely her own.
She has been fortunate to have been guided by and collaborated with Yiddish music luminaries including Michael Alpert, Kurt Bjorling, Josh Waletzky, Andreas Schmitges, Sveta Kundish, Alan Bern, and German folk fiddle star Vivian Zeller. Strauss was a member of the Chicago Klezmer Ensemble, the Voices of Ashkenaz Project, the Klezmer Conservatory Band, and was featured in the film ‘Itzhak Perlman: In the Fiddler’s House’. The Strauss-Warschauer Duo (with her husband, Cantor Jeff Warschauer) has been performing, recording, and teaching worldwide for nearly 30 years.
A highly regarded Yiddish dancer and an award-winning educator, Strauss has served as Education Director of Reconstructionist Congregation Kehilat Shalom, and is the Yiddish Culture Organizer for the new Arbeter Ring/ Workers Circle Sixty Plus initiative. As both a performer and teacher, Strauss is a mainstay at the Jewish Culture Festival in Krakow, KlezKanada , Yiddish Summer Weimar, and Trip to Yiddishland. She is co-coordinator of the instrumental program at Yiddish New York and, with Alan Bern, the co-author of Universal Edition’s Klezmer Duets for Violin and Accordion.
The annual Adrienne Cooper Dreaming in Yiddish Award was created to support artists and scholars as they embark on, in Adrienne’s words, “the boundless, utterly unexpected adventure of working in Yiddish.” Each year we honor Adrienne’s memory by gathering musicians, artists, activists, Yiddishists and friends in celebration of the world that she helped create and grow. Previous awardees: Jenny Romaine, Michael Wex, Joshua Dolgin, Irena Klepfisz, Shura Lipovsky, Yefim “Fima” Chorny & Suzanna Ghergus, Nikolai “Kolya” Borodulin, Shane Baker, Jeffrey Shandler, Rokhl Kafrissen and Daniel Kahn. Adrienne Cooper (1946-2011) was a renowned Yiddish singer, activist, teacher and community leader.
Images:
Press Images available here. Promotional images available here.
