10/18/2019 Ashland, OR — Mayn Shtetele Beltz: An Evening of Moldavian Klezmer Stories
Join “Indecent” accordionist Christina Crowder for an evening of music, singing and stories from her Fulbright field work in Romania and Moldova.
I’m currently performing in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s production of “Indecent” and have been using this “sabbatical” summer to revisit the field recordings I made with Romanian musicians who had played with and for Jews before the Holocaust, and sifting through the many pages of music from Moldavian folklore collections to create a new folio of Jewish and Jewish-Adjacent music from previously published collections.
My time in Romania from 1999-2001 and many trips since has revealed a complex interrelationship between the musical cultures of Klezmorim (professional Jewish musicians) and Lāutari (professional Gypsy musicians), who performed with each other in many places, and whose repertoires were influenced by their different clientele over the centuries: Turks, Phanariot Greeks, Romanians, Ukrainians, Russians and of course Jews.
We’ll begin the evening at 7:00pm with Shabbat blessings by Rabbi Joshua Boettiger, Temple Emek Shalom.
This lighthearted program will musically illustrate some of these connections with stories and anecdotes to go along with the tunes. We’ll open and close the program with a couple of songs, and some of the tunes might lead to dancing ….
Hosted by JoAnn Weisel. Light refreshments served.
Suggested donation $20, but ~ pay what you can. All income levels welcome. Donations above cost will support the Klezmer Institute, which is a new non-profit organization I have co-founded to support Ashkenazic Expressive Culture.
Feel free to make a contribution at the event, or because of Shabbat if you’d rather make a donation in advance, you can secure a $20 ticket here or donate directly at the Klezmer Institute Webpage. klezmerinstitute.org/support
After making your reservation, you will receive and email with the address and other important details.
