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Dear Pete,
The subject of the famous photo of the Faust family came up recently and the
result was that someone forwarded to me a message by you off the Jewish music
mailing list.
I don't know the whole context of the discussion, but I have some information
about this photo - if you think this is news to anyone there, please forward
it on to the list:
A few years ago I met a woman who lives in Highland Park, Illinois who is the
granddaughter of the younger fiddle player in the photo. She has an original
copy of this photo handed down to her as a family keepsake. On the back of
the photo are written the names of the people and their relationship.
The two seated fiddlers are (L to R) Moses Faust, leader, and his
brother-in-law, Wolf Schwartz
The standing figures are: Mordkhe-Shmiel (son of Moses), an unnamed cousin,
Yankl (son) Alter Brandwein - badkhn, Itzik-Hersh (son) and David (son).
David had a son named Max who died in 1982 and it was Max's daughter, Annette
whom I met and who has the photo. Annette explained to me that her name is
derived from the name Tanya: Tanya -> Antoinette -> Annette.
In a similar vein:
A few years ago I met a woman who lived just half a block from me here in
Evanston whose grandfather is in another famous photo of klezmorim. This
photo appears, among other places, in the notes to the CD Klezmer Pioneers on
the center spread. The younger trumpet player, 3rd from left, is named
Benjamin Frank (1857-1916) and my neighbor was his granddaughter. As before,
she had an original copy of this photo which showed much more than the
portion reproduced in the Forverts and preserved at YIVO. Above the
musicians is a bevy of children gathered on a balcony of the building in the
background. She had a later photo of her grandfather which was unmistakably
the same person, now with a grey beard. it is interesting that thephoto was
printed in the Forverts in 1923 when Ben Frank was already dead. The man in
the photo looks no older than 40, maybe significantly younger, and since he
was born in 1857 the photo is clearly considerably older than its publication
date in the Forverts . The caption says that it's from "Russia" but the
granddaughter was more specific, saying that it was taken in Lithuania. This
gibes with the information tha Zev Feldman got from an old Lithuanian klezmer
he met in Israel that large Jewish brass-bands were typical in Lithuania.
Kurt Bjorling
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