Concert of Music of Mordkhe Gebirtig

[Wolf Krakowski, Paula Parsky <media...>]

Mordkhe Gebirtig:  Der Zinger fun Noyt, a unique lecture/musical
program written and performed by Fraidy Katz and The Klezical Tradition
(Director, flutist and keyboard player Adrianne Greenbaum, clarinetist
Walter Mamlock, violinist Cookie Segelstein, drummer Gary Ribchinsky,
and special guest, cellist Stephen Thomas), will be presented at Pratt
Auditorium, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, MA, on November 15 at
8:00 p. m.  The program features traditional Klezmer music and
interweaves songs written by the Yiddish folk poet of Krakow (1877-1942)
with KatzÕs contemporary reflections on a 1994 visit to Poland.

        Gebirtig, a carpenter and cabinet maker, enjoys a stature in Yiddish
folksong comparable to that of Woody Guthrie in American folk music. 
GebirtigÕs songs of Jewish life, which were performed as folk music and
in the Yiddish theater, made him famous on both sides of the Atlantic. 
Although his many friends and admirers from free countries offered to
obtain exit visas for him and his family, Gebirtig chose to remain in
Poland and shared the fate of most of the Jews of his native city.  

        The concert is sponsored by the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum in
conjunction with the exhibition ÒHow to Remember? Designing the United
States memorial Holocaust Museum,Ó with support from the Horace W. 
Goldsmith Foundation, New York City, the Florence Purington Lecture
Fund, and the Inclusiveness Program, Mount Holyoke College.