Re:Yiddish Dancing in Berkeley

[Susan Lerner <meydele...>]

I've been meaning to write the list about the fabulous experience I had last 
week-end at the Berkeley Jewish Music Festival, but driving back on Monday and 
then preparing for peysakh...well, you know. 

Anyway, the highlight of the week-end for me was the klezmer dance party on 
last Sunday afternoon (the Saturday night concert by Davka and Kitka was quite 
good, but I am a Yiddishist first and foremost). Kurt Bjorling of Brave Old 
World arranged the music and put the kapelye together with outstanding Bay Area 
musicians, including Stu Brotman (also from Brave Old World), Daniel Hoffman 
(Davka, SF KLezmer Experience) Jeannette Lewicki (SF KLezmer Experience), Julie 
Egger (Red Hot Totchkies) and others.  Dancing was led by Michael Alpert in 
excellent form.  Amazingly, over 300 people showed up - and they all danced!  
Due to the numbers, nothing too complex was taught, but everybody got to do a 
simple kararhod (circle dance), a patsh tantz (simple couple dance), a wild 
bulgar that I swear went on for at least 20 minutes - what a kapelye! - and an 
absolutely amazing Grand March, with 16 or more people marching abreast.  We 
learned and danced like mad for more than 3 hours.

Anyone who is thinking of sponsoring a dance party in their community should 
seriously consider duplicating this program; putting the 3/4th of Brave Old 
World team together with local musicians under Kurt's direction and having 
Michael lead/teach.

One note about the Kitka concert.  Learned that Nikolai Kaufman, the leading 
arranger for the Bulgarian Women's State Chorus has arranged a large number of 
Jewish songs he knows from his family background (both Shephardic and 
Ashkenazic) in the typical Bulgarian Women's Choral style.  Kitka sang one and 
it was lovely!

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