אַ גמר חתימה טובֿה! און אַ גוט געבענטשט יאָר!

Highlights:

• Rabbi Itzik-Boruch Teitelbaum (Monroe, NY), known as Der Pshiskher Rov, with a vort for erev Yom Kippur. We reached him by phone at his home in Monroe on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024

• Interviews with Israelis about Oct. 7, one year on.

  • Avremi Zaks the host and producer of the weekly Israeli Yiddish radio program "Kan Yidish." He also teaches Yiddish. He was born in Israel and lives in Jerusalem with his wife and children. We reached him by phone in Jerusalem on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024.
  • Daniel Galay is a composer, playwright, Yiddish activist, educator, and writer, and Chairman of Leyvik House Yiddish Cultural Center in Tel Aviv. We reached him by phone in Tel Aviv on October 8, 2024. Additional info online: https://www.leyvik.com
  • Miriam Trinh is the editor-in-chief of Afn Shvel, teaching Yiddish language and literature at Hebrew University and online platforms like Workers Circle and YIVO. She has written for the Yiddish Forward (Forverts), including the interview with Tzili Venkert described on our show and a recent article published post-show, "לכּבֿוד יום-הזכּרון זאָל דער געדענק־פּלאַקאַט פֿון קיבוץ בארי נישט לאָזן פֿאַרגעסן." Trinh moved to Israel after high school and resides in Jerusalem with her family. We reached her by phone in Jerusalem on October 9, 2024.

• Greetings on behalf of the American Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants of Greater Boston, featuring members Tania Lefman (Treasurer), Mary Ehrlich, Rosalie Reszelbach and Miriam Modricamin.

• Greeting from Dovid Braun, co-host. Recorded Oct. 2, 2024, by phone.

• Greetings from Eli Dovek ז״ל, late proprietor of our sponsor Israel Bookshop, Brookline, MA.

• Greeting from Lillian (Leye) Leavitt, co-host. Recorded Sept. 25, 2024, by phone.

Music:

• Cantor Joseph Shapiro: B'Rosh Hashona
• Leibele Waldman: Der naier yuhr
• Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz

Air date: October 9, 2024

אַ כּ‫תיבֿה וחתימה טובֿה!

Highlights:

• Avrom Novershtern (Israel) Professor Emeritus of Yiddish Literature, Hebrew University, Jerusalem. We reached him by phone on Friday, Sept. 27, 2024.
• Eli Sharfstein (Israel) writer and poet. We reached him by phone in Greece, where he was stranded due to cancelations of flights to Israel, on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024.
• Rabbi Itzik-Boruch Teitelbaum (Monroe, NY), known as Der Pshiskher Rov. We reached him by phone at his home in Monroe on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024.
• Greetings on behalf of the American Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants of Greater Boston, featuring members Tania Lefman (Treasurer), Mary Ehrlich, Rosalie Reszelbach and Miriam Modricamin.
• Greeting from Dovid Braun, co-host. Recorded Oct. 2, 2024, by phone.
• Greetings from Eli Dovek ז״ל, late proprietor of our sponsor Israel Bookshop, Brookline, MA.
• Greeting from Sholem Beinfeld, co-host. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024, by phone.
• Greeting from Lillian (Leye) Leavitt, co-host. Recorded Sept. 25, 2024, by phone.
• Greetings on behalf of the League for Yiddish / די ייִדיש-ליגע by Gitl Schaechter-Viswanath, Board Chair. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024.
• Greetings on behalf of the Hebrew Actors Foundation and CYCO Yiddish Book Center by Hy Wolfe. Recorded via Zoom Sept. 18, 2024.

Music: (Partial List)

• Cantor Joseph Shapiro: B'Rosh Hashona
• Malavsky Family: Kevah Kures
• Sholom Katz: Zochreinu L'Chayim
• Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz

Air date: October 2, 2024

This week, greetings for Rosh Hashona from friends, participants, and sponsors of The Yiddish Voice / דאָס ייִדישע קול, combined with a poetry reading by Richard Fein and Sholem Beinfeld.

אַ גוט, געבענטשט יאָר אַלע אונדזערע צוהערער - לשנה טובֿה

Highlights:

• Author and translator Richard J. Fein (Yiddish name: Ruvn-Yankev), along with his friend, collaborator, and regular Yiddish Voice cohost Sholem Beinfeld, read from Fein's book The Full Pomegranate: Poems of Avrom Sutzkever (SUNY Press, 2019), which features Sutzkever's poems in their original Yiddish along with Fein's English translations. Avrom Sutzkever (1913–2010) is widely regarded as one of the greatest Yiddish poets of the 20th century. Richard J. Fein is Professor Emeritus of English at the State University of New York at New Paltz and the author, editor, and translator of many books, including With Everything We’ve Got: A Personal Anthology of Yiddish Poetry. Sholem Beinfeld is Professor Emeritus of History at Washington University in St. Louis, and is perhaps best known as Co-Editor-in-Chief of the Comprehensive Yiddish-English Dictionary (Arumnemik Yidish-English Verterbukh), as well as a translator of Yiddish texts and creator of new subtitles for classic Yiddish movies. For further information on Fein's book The Full Pomegranate, see the publisher's web site: http://www.sunypress.edu/p-6690-the-full-pomegranate.aspx We recorded this at Fein's home in Cambridge, MA, on Sept. 20, 2024.
• Greetings on behalf of the American Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants of Greater Boston, featuring members Tania Lefman (Treasurer), Mary Ehrlich, Rosalie Reszelbach and Miriam Modricamin.
• Greetings from Eli Dovek ז״ל, late proprietor of our sponsor Israel Bookshop, Brookline, MA.
• Greeting from Sholem Beinfeld, co-host. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024, by phone.
• Greeting from Lillian (Leye) Leavitt, co-host. Recorded Sept. 25, 2024, by phone.
• Greetings on behalf of the League for Yiddish / די ייִדיש-ליגע by Gitl Schaechter-Viswanath, Board Chair. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024.
• Greetings on behalf of the Hebrew Actors Foundation and CYCO Yiddish Book Center by Hy Wolfe. Recorded via Zoom Sept. 18, 2024.

Music:

• Cantor Joseph Shapiro: B'Rosh Hashona
• Malavsky Family: Kevah Kures
• Sholom Katz: Zochreinu L'Chayim
• Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz

Air date: September 25, 2024

This week, greetings for Rosh Hashona from friends, participants, and sponsors of The Yiddish Voice / דאָס ייִדישע קול, combined with an exciting new interviews with Rabbi Moshe Waldoks and Holocaust survivor Henry Slucki.

אַ גוט, געבענטשט יאָר אַלע אונדזערע צוהערער לשנה טובֿה

Highlights:

• Interview with Rabbi Moshe Waldoks, whose biographical one-man show "You Can Live If They Let You" recently debuted in Boston, amid much acclaim (including a Boston Globe feature article) to sold-out audiences. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024, by phone. Info on Moshe Waldoks on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moshe_Waldoks
• Interview with Henry Slucki, a Holocaust survivor, professor of psychology at USC, cultural and political activist. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024, via Zoom.
• Greetings on behalf of the American Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants of Greater Boston, featuring members Tania Lefman (Treasurer), Mary Ehrlich, Rosalie Reszelbach, and Miriam Modricamin.
• Greetings from Eli Dovek ז״ל, late proprietor of our sponsor Israel Bookshop, Brookline, MA.
• Greeting from Sholem Beinfeld, co-host. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024, by phone.
• Greetings on behalf of the League for Yiddish / די ייִדיש-ליגע by Gitl Schaechter-Viswanath, Board Chair. Recorded Sept. 18, 2024.
• Greetings on behalf of the Hebrew Actors Foundation and CYCO Yiddish Book Center by Hy Wolfe. Recorded via Zoom Sept. 18, 2024.

Music:

• Cantor Simcha Koussevitzky: Zochreinu L'Chayim
• Pesachke Burstein: Men ken leben nor men lozt nit (Composer: Joseph Rumshinsky)
• Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz

Air date: September 18, 2024

This week, interviews with Perl Teitelbaum and Hy Wolfe. We spoke with them in person at 2024 Yugntruf Yidish-Vokh in Copake, NY, on Aug. 21, 2024.

• Paula (Perl) Teitelbaum is a Yiddish language at Arbeter Ring, Yivo Institute, and elsewhere. She talked about a new technique she's been using for teaching Yiddish by watching films. A Yiddish singer who has performed on several album, she also shared memories of creating the popular song Vaserl along with co-writer Rukhl Schaechter.

• Hy Wolfe is a Yiddish singer and actor, as well as an activist involved in managing several important Yiddish organizations: Hebrew Actors Foundation, Sholem Aleichem Culture Center, and CYCO Yiddish Book Center. He talked about those organizations, and also shared some personal memories from his career on the Yiddish stage.

• Music:

  • Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz
  • Philip (Fayvl) Yucht, Shifee Lovitt: Vaserl וואַסערל (Arrangement by Andy Statman and his ensemble)
  • Meilech Kohn: Mein Held מײַן העלד

Air Date: August 21, 2024

This week, an interview with Dovid Braun, talking about the Yivo Bard Zumer-Program and a few related matters. Dovid serves as Academic Director for the summer program, which recently concluded, and year-round as Yivo's Academic Director for Yiddish. And we hear from our archive (1995) Miriam Libenson on Tisha B'Ov , which falls this year on the night of Monday, Aug. 12.

• Music:
  • Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz

Air Date: August 7, 2024

This week, Arieh Hecht, a patient advocate in Los Angeles, talks about his life as a child of Holocaust survivors originally from Transylvania (Hungary during WWII) and his work as a patient advocate. We spoke with Arieh in person in Los Angeles on July 4, 2024. We begin with a report from the Yivo-Bard Zumer-Program by Nokhem Lerner, who's been a Yiddish teacher there the past two years. We reached Nokhem by phone in the New York area on July 29, 2024.

• Music:
  • Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz
  • Outro instrumental music: Itzhak Perlman, Dov Seltzer, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra: Afn Veg Shteyt A Boym

Air Date: July 31, 2024

Highlights: Mark ("Marek") Gaysinskiy reports from the Yivo-Bard Zumer-Program; Pnina Sharf, a resident of Los Angeles and a Holocaust survivor from Poland, talks about her life experiences; from Boston's Yiddish past: a performance by the late Cantor Gregor Shelkan, performing a song about what will happen when Meshiekh (the Messiah) comes (recorded in 1999 at the Cantorial concert in honor of Cantor Simon Kandler).

• Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz

Air Date: July 17, 2024