RE: Odessa music

[Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky <reyzl...>]

Judy and Ari,

I don't know about this possible confusion but there are songs from 
and about this section of Odessa (called the Moldovanke in Yiddish) 
and I know one of them.  However, I don't think that you are looking 
for this one old song.   

At the phenomenal International Yiddish Festival in Amsterdam almost 
2 years ago, there was one young man from Odessa who, during one of 
the special luncheons, discussed, sang, and played music from this 
area along with a partner (on woodwinds).   I couldn't quite catch 
all the lyrics and remember feeling that his presentation was highly 
sexist and quite coarse.  (Since I was one of the few fluent Yiddish 
speakers there, I don't think others got what he was talking about.)  
I felt that here someone brought a genuine specimen from the Moldovanka 
to perform for people who could value such "authentic" material.   I 
am sorry that I don't remember his name but perhaps Jeff Warschauer 
remembers because he was also at this same luncheon.   You can 
perhaps go to the Festival's web page and ask there who this person 
was.  I am sure that Dr. Mark Slobin (mslobin (at) wesleyan(dot)edu) knows 
some of this repertoire and even perhaps, Dr. Izaly Zemtsovsky 
(zemtsov (at) socrates(dot)berkeley(dot)edu) too.   Brighton Beach is full of 
Jews
and performers from Odessa and you might be able to find this material 
if you know how to go through the grapevine.   E.g., Ethel Raim of 
the Center for Traditional Music and Dance (formerly The Ethnic Arts 
Center) which has a new web site (http://www.ctmd.org/) and Michael 
Alpert have been conducting musical research in this part of Brooklyn 
and they may be helpful.   They just had a major presentation of 
Russian Jewish culture 2 weeks ago, but I couldn't go (time conflict).
See their page http://www.ctmd.org/pages/cci.html for some info on this.


BTW, it was nice to meet you at the Klezmatics/Alberstein concert.


Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky



----------
From:  Ari Davidow[SMTP:ari (at) ivritype(dot)com]
Sent:  Thursday, October 15, 1998 10:43 AM
To:  World music from a Jewish slant.
Subject:  Re: Odessa music

>Dear Jewish Music Listers:
>I had  a bit of a stumper question yesterday and hope someone on the list
>can help. A person is looking for music he called "Jewish Music from
>Odessa", purportedly by Jewish criminals.(??)  He said it was circulating
>in Europe some time ago and would like to get a copy of this. Does anyone
>know of it and how to obtain a copy? 

It sounds more likely that the person is confusing (a) song(s) about
Benya Krik, the Jewish gangster in Isaac Babel stories, about whom
I remember hearing music in the past.

But I could be wrong....

ari

Ari Davidow
The klezmer shack: http://www.well.com/user/ari/klez/
owner: jewish-music mailing list
e-mail: ari (at) ivritype(dot)com