In connection with my uncle Mordkhe Schaechter‘s (MS, 1927 – 2007) yortsayt a couple of weeks ago, I am featuring a short children‘s song, “Oy, kh‘bin gegangen eyns‟ (“Oy, I Went One”) that he sang for the collector Leybl Kahn in 1954. (see the earlier post of another song performed by him).
Mordkhe Schaechter at Yiddish Vokh, Circle Lodge, NY 1985.
Photo by Itzik Gottesman
A longer version of this cumulative song involving animals “Tsimba-rimba‟ was recorded on the CD Di grine katshke (Living Traditions 1801) in 1997 produced by Living Traditions. Lorin Sklamberg is the lead singer and according to the notes, he learned this song from “Inna Slavskaya, a Soviet immigrant singer now living in Berlin, Germany. Inna learned the song from her mother‟.
Unfortunately, MS only sings three verses because, as he says later in the recording for Kahn, he only wanted to make sure he got the melodies down before he forgot them, and wasn‘t concerned with the words.
It is possible that in a 1953-54 issue of Der seminarist, a journal of the Yidisher lerer-seminar in NYC, he printed all the words. I hope to find the issue and if the words are found, we will add them to the blog.
S’iz a kinderlidl vos ikh hob fartseykhnt fin a froy fin zlotshev, mizrekh-galitsye.
It’s a children’s song that I recorded from a woman from Zlotshev, Eastern Galicia (Today, in Ukraine – Zolochiv).
Oy, ikh bin gegangen ayns, far vuz zhe nisht keyn tsvay?
ikh hob gezeyn a hin. Vi azoy zhe makht di hin?
dun de de dundun makht di hin.
Oy, I went one, so why not two?
I saw a chicken. What sound does a chicken make?
Dundedundun makes the chicken.
Oy ikh bin gegangen tsvay, far vuz zhe nisht keyn dray?
Ikh hob gezeyn a hun, vi azoy zhe makht der hun?
kikariki makht der hun.
dun de de dundun makhe di hin.
Oy, I went two; so why not three?
I saw a rooster; What sound does a rooster make?
Kikariki makes the rooster.
Dundedundn makes the chicken.
Oy, ikh bin gegangen dray, far vuz zhe nisht kayn tsvay? [fir?]
ikh hob gezen a ganz, vi azoy zhe makht di ganz?
SPOKEN un azoy vayter, un azoy vayter.
Oy, I went three, so what not two?
I saw a goose. What sound does the goose make?
SPOKEN etc. etc.
A print version of Bay der fintsterer nakht can be found in I. L. Cahan “Shtudyes vegn yidisher folksshafung” YIVO, 1952, NY, in an article given the title for this volume “Peyrushim af 24 lider” that his student at the YIVO institute in Vilna, Shmuel-Zanvil Pipe, had prepared for publication. This article consisted of Cahan’s comments on Yiddish songs that Pipe had collected in his hometown of Sanok [in Yiddish "Sunik/Sonik"], Galicia. Pipe had collected a version of “Bay der fintserer nakht” in 1934 from a singer who said it was sung 30 years earlier. The song is in Cahan, 1952, page 185, and has three verses, rather than two verses and one refrain, as Lifshe Schaechter-Widman (1894-1974) (LSW) sings it.
According to interviews with LSW conducted by Prof. Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, NYU, in 1972-73, the song was sung by the plagers/plogers (sufferers). The plagers were young Jewish men who were about to be inducted into the Austria-Hungarian army and wandered from town to town, usually in groups, so they would intentionally fail the draft because of their poor health. See my article “Plagers: a folkloristishe shtudye” [Plagers: a folkloristic study], Forverts, January 7th, 2010, page 4, which refers to the literature on plagers in Yiddish.
Lifshe Schaechter-Widman’s Hometown of Zvinyetchke, Bukovina, Ukraine Photo by Itzik Gottesman, 2010
In this recording of LSW made by Leybl Kahn in New York City in 1954, she clearly sings the song too high in this performance, as can be heard in the last verse.
Bay der fintsterer nakht is unusual textually – it doesn’t fall into the usual categories of men’s songs – not religious, not political, not a work song, not humorous, not nationalist. It’s partly a lament on how miserable life is, and partly a love song; topics we would usually hear in women’s songs.
Bay der fintsterer nakht lig ikh mir bayshtendik*, oy, un trakht. zayt ikh bin fin mayn heym avek. ikh ken shoyn nit kimen keyn kayn tsvek. Ver se vil nit, dertsapt mir mayn blit.
In the dark night, I lay constantly, oy, and think, since I have left my home. I cannot reach any goal. Who ever wants can bleed me.
Oy, oy, oy, oy Vi farbitert iz mir dus harts Oy, oy, oy, oy Ver ken den film mayn shmerts. Derekh ayn imgliklekher libe Imtsugeyn in di gasn aleyn, Tsu zayn fin mayn heym fartribn. Oy elnt bin ikh vi a shteyn.
Oy, oy, oy, oy How bitter is my heart. Oy, oy, oy, oy Who can feel my pain? Because of an unfortunate love, I wander the streets alone. To be driven from my home - Oy, lonely am I as a stone.
Mayn mame hot mikh gelozt shtudirn. Zi hot gevolt az fun mir zol zayn a lat Fun deym alemen hot zikh gur oysgelozt. Ikh ti mir blind arimshpatsirn. Elnt bin ekh, in na venad.
My mother allowed me to study, She wanted something to become of me [lit - she wanted me to become a respectable person] From all of this, nothing turned out. Blindly I wander around, lonely am I and homeless.
Oy, oy, oy, oy Vi farbitert iz mir mayn harts Oy, oy, oy, oy Ver ken den film mayn shmerts? un derekh a finsterer libe arimtsugeyn in di gasn aleyn, Tsu zayn fin mayn heym fartribn. Oy, elnt bin ikh vi a shteyn.
Oy, oy, oy, oy, How bitter is my heart Oy, oy, oy, oy, Who can feel my pain? Because of a dark love to wander in the streets alone. To be driven from my home - Oy lonely am I like a stone.
*bayshtendik – though I am unfamiliar with this word, my mother, Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman (LSW’s daughter), and I assume it means the same as „shtendik‟.
Di apikorsim (“The Heretics”) was the first song that Lifshe Schaechter-Widman (LSW) sang for collector Leybl Kahn in NYC in 1954. He recorded approximately 100 songs sung by LSW over the next few weeks or months. LSW is my grandmother and the child one hears in the background is my then 4-year old sister Taube. At one point during her singing, she gets up and runs after her. The spoken dialogue between LSW and Kahn is transcribed in the Yiddish text.
In Shloyme Prizament’s book Di broder zinger (Buenos-Aires, 1960), he has a version of this song with the music on pages 110-112. He writes that he wrote the words and music, and states that Pepi Litman recorded it. There is indeed a recording of Pepi Litman performing the song. This book can now be read and downloaded at the Yiddish Book Center website.
Shloyme Prizament was born in 1889 in Hibinev, Galicia and died in Buenos-Aires in 1973; his biography appears in the third volume of the “Leksikon fun yidishn teater”, pages 1873- 1876. Prizament was an amazingly prolific composer, songwriter, but I am not convinced that he wrote the song that LSW performs. The more likely scenario, in my opinion, is that he based his song on the popular current version that LSW sings.
The song itself, a maskilic song mocking the Hasidim but sung in the voice of true believers, was a common genre. However, in Apikorsim the humor is quite vulgar. In songs such as “Kum aher du filosof” the irony is much more subtle. Ruth Rubin’s book Voices of a People has a nice section on maskilic songs (chapter 10). Rubin also prints Velvl Zbarzher’s song “Moshiakh’s tsaytn” (pp. 255 – 257) which is on the same theme as di apikorsim.
A couple of comments on the words and rhymes of Apikorsim: “Daytshn” literally means “Germans”, but in the Yiddish of the 19th century, early 20th century, it referred to the Maskilim, the Jews who were assimilating and dressing like Germans – that is, as modern Europeans.
You will also hear that in the refrain which begins “Folgts daytshn…” there is no rhyme for gikh. LSW sings sheyn. The implied rhyme should be rikh – the devil, and my mother remembers LSW singing it vet ir oyszen vi a layt or oyszen vi a rikh so i put those options in brackets. The listener would have understood the implied rhyme gikh and rikh.
Di apikorsim, di voyle-yingen es vet in zey ale trasken lingen zey veln ale tsepiket vern ven zey veln shoyfer-shel-moshiakh derhern.
The heretics, those loose fellows, Their lungs will all rattle. They will burst apart, when they hear the shofar of the messiah.
Far kol-rom vet vern gehert der rebe vet lernen toyre. Di apikorsim veln faln tsu dr’erd far shrek un far moyre.
Loudly for all, it will be heard the rebbe will teach Torah. the heretics will fall to the ground, out of fear and alarm.
Folgts datshn mekh, un verts khasidemlekh gikh. Tits un a yeyder yidishe kleyder vet ir oyszen sheyn [vi a layt] [vi a rikh]/
Listen to me Germans [assimilated Jews] and become Hasidim quickly. Each of you dress in Jewish clothes, so you will appear – beautiful [vi a layt - presentable] [vi a rikh - like a demon]
“Hayda-liu-liu” was performed by Mordkhe Schaechter in 1954 in New York and was recorded by Leybl Kahn.
Mordkhe Schaechter
Mordkhe Schaechter (1927 – 2007) was a well known Yiddish linguist, grammarian, writer, master teacher and Yiddishist. He was also my uncle, my mother‘s younger brother and was born and grew up in Chernovitz, Romania. Together with my parents and my grandmother, after the war, he lived in the Displaced Persons camp of the Rothschild Hospital in Vienna, 1947 -1950. My mother Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman and Mordkhe collected folklore and historical materials among the Jews in the DP camp and sent them to YIVO in NYC. When Leybl Kahn, as a member of the I. L. Cahan Folklore Club, recorded Mordkhe‘s mother Lifshe Schaechter-Widman in NY in 1954, Mordkhe took the opportunity at one session to record for Kahn some of the children‘s folklore material he recorded in Vienna. This week is his fifth yortsayt so this blog entry is in his memory – click here to read his obituary in the New York Times.
This lullaby is popularly known in Hebrew as Numi, Numi, originally entitled ‟Shir Eres‟ [lullaby]. Many versions can be heard on Youtube such as this animated one:
Joel Engel (1868 – 1927) was the composer and Yekhil Halperin (or Heilperin) (1880 – 1942), the Hebrew lyricist. It is generally acknowledged that Engel used a Yiddish lullaby as the melody but I cannot find a recording nor a printed version of the Yiddish original. I am hoping the readers of the YSW blog will help me out on this one. The lyrics of Numi, Numi (Halperin‘s lyrics) are similar to what Schaechter sings – click here for the Hebrew words.
But since Halperin‘s words were put to Engel‘s melody in the 1920s, I am hesitant to write that Schaechter is singing the ‟original‟ Yiddish version. Perhaps enough time had passed so that Schaechter‘s version was already influenced by the Hebrew one?
I have found only one other version of Tayere Toni – in the Pipe collection “Yiddish Folksongs from Galicia” edited by Meir and Dov Noy, Jerusalem, 1971 page 118-119. There the names of the lovers are Bronye and Bernard. From the Pipe version it is clear that the song is a ballad – Bernard does indeed die in the third verse, and in the fourth verse Bronye shoots herself and they are buried together in one grave. A motif much more common in non-Yiddish ballads, rare in Yiddish ones.
From Lifshe Schaechter-Widman’s shorter version, recorded in 1954 in the Bronx by song collector Leybl Kahn, a ballad-story is implied but is left hanging, and I have to wonder did Lifshe not sing the other verses because she did not know them or because they did not appeal to her? Didn’t ring true or Jewish? The fact that she doesn’t repeat any of the lines also implies that we are dealing with a ballad, a story in song; Lifshe was more inclined to repeat lines in lyric love songs than in ballads.
Though the use of German names in Tayere Toni would lead one to believe that the song is relatively new, the beautiful melody sounds very old to me. Her singing, as always, is haunting and so complex given the relative simple melody. By the way, the great folklorist I. L. Cahan (not to be confused with Leybl Kahn) “disqualified” a song that Shmuel Zanvil Pipe had collected because the character’s name in the song was Moritz. “Moritz”, wrote Cahan, could not be part of any folksong.
But today we have to respectfully disagree with Cahan (and I think Pipe wasn’t too happy about his judgement in this case either). Jews in the Galician and Bukovinan territories of the Austro-Hungarian Empire had German names, and were no less “folky” because of it.
Pete Rushefsky adds:
Musically, Tayere Toni reinforces the conversation between Bernard and his beloved Toni with a subtle harmonic interplay in the key of Bb minor.
The first two lines of each stanzas are rendered in Bb minor and harmonized by Bb minor, F major and Bb minor: a simple I Minor – V Major – I Minor progression that effects a light waltz-like melody as Bernard attempts to woo Toni. Harmonically each of Bernard’s two lines stand on their own – there is a simplicity and purity to his love.
Toni’s answers in the stanza’s third and first half of the fourth lines contradict Bernard, and are voiced to resolve (incompletely) on the C of a dominant F major chord. Toni’s response requires the full duration of her two lines to resolve harmonically, and for a moment, a listener tuned to Jewish modal tendencies wonders if she might distance herself further from his sentiments with a full modulation to F-freygish (also known in cantorial literature as “Ahava Raba”, or “altered Phrygian” – F, Gb, A, Bb, C, Db, Eb).
But despite a rapidly ascending then descending movement in the last line that is frequently seen in freygish melodies, Toni does not reach down to the tell-tale subtonic Eb which would confirm F-freygish. Rather, at the end of the stanza, Toni’s cadence resolves back to the tonic Bb. Though there is complexity in her responses and desires, in the end, these two are fated to live and die together.
“Tayere Toni, kim aher tsi mir
Nem dir a beynkl, zets zikh anider lebn mir.”
“Tayerer Bernard, ikh ken nisht zitsn leybn dir.
Di mame vet araynkimen, un vet shrayen af mir”
“Dear Toni come over here to me,
Take a chair, and sit next to me.”
“Dear Bernard, I can’t sit next to you.
My mother will enter and will yell at you.”
“Tayere Toni, ikh ken dikh nisht fardarbn.
Zeyst dekh az ikh halt shoyn baym shtarbn.”
Tayerer Bernard, vest nokh vern gezint.
Tayerer Bernard, di bist mayn tayer kind.”
“Dear Toni, I can’t ruin you.
Can’t you see, that i am dying.”
“Dear Bernard, you will become well,
Dear Bernard, you are my dear child”.
Spoken Dialogue after the song:
LEYBL KAHN: Dos lid hot ir gehert fun vanen? Where did you hear this song?
LSW: Dos hob ikh gehert in Zvinyetchke. I heard this in Zvinyetchke.
LK: In der Bukovina. In Bukovina?
LSW: Yo, di Bukovina. Yes, Bukovina.
LK: To vi kumen azoyne nemen vi Toni un Bernard? So where do the name Toni and Bernard come from?
LSW: Bay undz hot men dokh daytshmerish gezingen. We sang, after all, Germanized Yiddish.
LK: Menshn fleygn hob azoyne nemen. People used to have such names?
LSW: Ye, avade. Yes, of course
„Shtey shoyn of tokhter mayn getraye‟ (“Wake Up My Faithful Daughter”) is the only Yiddish song I know that mentions coffee, and though I drink 3 double espressos daily, I thought I would post this song sung by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman (LSW) for a different reason: a recent interesting article on family violence and Yiddish song written by Adrienne Cooper and Sarah Gordon. Originally published in Lilith magazine, and republished on-line on the Arty Semite blog of the Forward newspaper (in four parts).
In the first song example given in that essay – „A gutn ovnt Brayne‟, the first stanza ends with „zint ikh hob dem merder derkent‟ („Since I‘ve known this murderer‟). As you can also see in the song „Shtey shoyn af tokhter mayn getraye‟, merder/murderer is apparently another way to say „wife beater‟ in Yiddish.
As for „Shtey shoyn of‟ – LSW sings the first verse beautifully, somehow getting off track in the second verse – it‘s a line too short, and the melody changes – and then again getting back on track in the third verse and ending the powerful and sad song with her emotional style.
Musically, listen to the way she ornaments so subtly with „oy‟. Textually – in three short verses with vivid imagery we have a complete, melancholy short story in the classic mother-daughter dialogue form, so common in Yiddish folksong.
I think it‘s particularly touching that the mother has the final word. Perhaps other singers or versions perform additional verses in which the daughter responds; I have not found any, and this version certainly fits into LSW‘s gloomy view of the woman‘s world; a woman recently married, no less. This recording of LSW was made by Leybl Kahn in New York City in 1954.
Oy shtey shoyn af tokhter mayn getraye
dayne lipelekh zenen dir farshmakht.
Shtey shoyn af tokhter mayn getraye
dayn kave zi shteyt shoyn fartik gemakht.
Shtey shoyn af tokhter mayn getraye
Dayn kave, zi shteyt dir fartik gemakht.
O wake up my faithful daughter,
Your lips are so pale; [literally - languished, fading]
Wake up my faith daughter,
your coffee is waiting for you, already made.
Oy mame, oy miter, vos toyg mir mayn leybn af der velt?
Az dem vos ikh hob lib ken ikh nit nemen,
mit vemen vel ikh opfirn mayn velt?
Az dem vos ikh hob lib ken ikh nit nemen,
mit vemen vel ikh opfirn mayn velt?
O mama, o mother, what good is my life in the world?
If I cannot take the one I love
with whom shall I spend my life? [literally - conduct my world]
Oy, dayne bekelekh hobn geblit vi di royte epelekh
far ayn glik hob ikh mir dus forgeshtelt.
haynt, az di bist arayn tsu dem merder in di hent aran.
af eybik hot er farimert dir dayn velt.
di bist arayn tsu dem merder in di hent arayn.
oy, af eybik hot er farimert dir di velt.
O your cheeks were blooming like the red apples,
I imagined this meant happiness.
Now, that you have fallen into that murderer‘s hands,
he has forever saddened your world.
In this week‘s entry the reader will get four Yiddish songs for the price of one. What connects them is the same melody. I am not the first to write on the popularity of this tune. The Israeli Yiddish song-researcher Meir Noy wrote an article זמר סובב עולם [The tune that circles the world] in the Israeli publication אומר, April 13, 1962. I could not find the article yet, so am not sure what he includes.
The first song and perhaps the oldest is a beggar song - Vu zenen mayne vugn un ferd? (Where are my wagon and horse?); the second song Yosele mit Blimele (Yosele and Blimele) is a typical lyrical love song. These are sung by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman (LSW, 1893 – 1974), recorded in 1954 in NYC and originate from her Bukovina repertoire that she learned in the small town of Zvinyetchke in the 1890s-early 1900s. I have found no variants of the beggar song, and one of Yosele mit blimele (Oy vey mame, in the Pipe-Noy collection, see below, page 270-71 with music). The first line as my mother remembers it sung was “Vu iz mayn vugn, vu zenen mayne ferd?” which fits better into the melody; it does indeed sound as if LSW forgot a syllable or two when she sings it here, and forces it into the melody.
In the interviews that Professor Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett of New York University recorded with LSW in the early 1970s shortly before her death, LSW said that much of her repertoire, particularly the songs about life‘s difficulties, was learned from the older, married women in town, while the younger unmarried women taught her the hopeful love songs. Vu zenen mayne vugn un ferd would fall into the category taught by the married women (vayber) while Yosele mit blimele would be a typical song performed during the Sabbath afternoon walks that the unmarried girls took into the woods. In terms of style, the beggar song is sung slower and more mournful, while the love song is more playful.
LSW sings other versions of Yosele mit blimele including a second verse:
Az du vest kumen, tsum dokter bay der tir, zolst im gebn a vink, azoy vi ikh tsu dir. Zolst im gebn a tuler in der hant. Vet er shoyn visn vus mit dir iz genant
When you come to the doctor’s door, you should give him a wink, like I give to you. you should give him a dollar in his hand; so he will know what embarrased you.
A verse which implies an abortion! But in such a light-hearted song it seems quite incongruous.
The third song - In a kleynem shtibele (In a Small Room) - is sung by Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman (born 1920) and was recorded May 13th 2011 (last week) in the Bronx. She learned this song in one of her afternoon Yiddish classes in Chernovitz, (then Romania) either at the Morgnroit school (Socialist Bundist) or the Yidisher shulfareyn, a Yiddish cultural group, in the 1920s, early 1930s. Basically the same version was collected by the folklorists Shmuel-Zanvil Pipe and his brother Oyzer Pipe in their hometown of Sanok (in yiddish- Sunik), Galicia, then Poland. Dov and Meir Noy published the Pipe brothers collection in Israel (Folklore Research Studies , Vol. 2, Jerusalem 1971), and a copy of that version is attached with the music. See the footnote to the song by Dov and Meir Noy (p. 326) for other songs with this melody, and the reference to Meir Noy‘s article mentioned above.
In a kleynem shtibele is a worker‘s song, text written by the writer and ethnographer A. Litvin (pseudonym of Shmuel Hurvits 1863 – 1943) and the complete original text (Di neyterkes) can be found in M. Bassin‘s Antologye: Finf hundert yor yidishe poezye, volume one 258-259, NY 1917.
The fourth song with the same melody is In shtetl Nikolayev (In the Town of Nikolayev). The Freedman Jewish Sound Archive has information on three recordings: a version by David Medoff (1923); Kapelye (the album „Future and Past‟, sung by Michael Alpert); and the German group Aufwind (from the album „Awek di junge jorn‟). We have included a link to the Medoff performance. See Mark Slobin and Richard Spotwood‘s article on Medoff (David Medoff: A Case Study in Interethnic Popular Culture in American Music, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Autumn, 1985), pp. 261-276.
AUDIO RECORDINGS:
Song 1:Vu zenen mayne vugn un ferd? (Where are my wagon and horse?). Performance by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman, recorded in 1954 by Leybl Kahn.
Song 2:Yosele mit Blimele(Yosele and Blimele). Performance by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman, recorded in 1954 by Leybl Kahn.
Song 3:In a kleynem shtibele (In a Small Room). Performance by Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, recorded May 12, 2011 by Itzik Gottesman.
Song 4: In shtetl Nikolayev (In the Town of Nikolayev). Performance by David Medoff, recorded 1923.
TEXTS AND TRANSLATIONS
Song 1:Vu zenen mayne vugn un ferd? (Where are my wagon and horse?). Performance by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman, recorded in 1954 by Leybl Kahn.
Vu zenen mayne vugn un ferd?
Az ikh bin aroysgefurn, hot getsitert himl un erd.
Hant bin ikh urem; shtey ikh ba der tir.
Kimen tsu geyn di sholtikes un lakhn (up?) fin mir.
Where are my wagon and horse?
When I first drove out, heaven and earth shook.
Now that I am poor, I stand at the door.
So the scoundrels come by to mock me.
Vi iz mayn tsiring vus ikh hob gebrakht fin vin?
Vus mayn vab un kinder zenen gegongen ongetin?
Hant az ikh bin urem, shtey ikh far der tir.
Kimen tsu geyn di sholtikes un lakhn up (?) fin mir.
Where is the jewelry that I had brought from Vienna?
That was worn by my wife and children.
Now that I am poor, I stand by the door.
So the scoundrels come by to mock me. Song 2:Yosele mit Blimele(Yosele and Blimele). Performance by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman, recorded in 1954 by Leybl Kahn.
Yosele mit Blimele zey zitsn af a bank.
Oy vey Blimele, ikh bin azoy krank.
Kh‘hob aza krenk, ikh shem zikh oystsuzugn,
Der dokter hot mir geheysn khasene-hobn.
Yosele and Blimele are sitting on a bench.
Oh dear Blimele, I am so very ill.
I have an illness, I am embarrased to reveal -
The doctor ordered me to get married.
Khasene hobn – es geyt dir nor in deym.
Khasene hobn – ken men glaykh ven (?) me vil aleyn.
Khasene hobn – darf men hubn gelt.
Ken men opfirn a sheyne velt.
Getting married – is all you can think of.
Getting married is easy if you want to do by ourselves.
Getting married – you need money for that,
and then you can have a beautiful world.
Yingelekh un meydelekh hot shoyn nisht keyn moyre.
Khasene hubn – es shteyt dokh in der toyre.
As der shnader shnadt – shnadt er mit der mode
un az der rebe vil a vab, meygn mir avode.
Boys and girls, you no longer have to fear.
Getting married – It says so in the Torah.
When the tailor tailors, he cuts according to the fashion
and if the Rebbe wants a wife, then we may too of course.
Song 3:In a kleynem shtibele (In a Small Room). Performance by Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, recorded May 12, 2011 by Itzik Gottesman.
In a kleynem shtibele, bay a langn tish. Zitsn dortn meydelekh un dreyen mit di fis. Zey dreyen di mashindelekh fun fri biz nakht Un azoy vern tutsnvayz hemdelekh gemakht.
In a small room, at a long table, There sit girls and turn with their feet. They turn the machines from early to night. And thus by the dozens, shirts are produced. Girls, so small, tell me why are you pale?
Meydelekh ir kleninke, zogt vos zent ir blas? Hemdelekh ir vaysinke, zogt vos zent ir nas? Meydelekh un hemdelekh, zey reydn nisht keyn vort. Nor di mashindelekh zey geyen imer fort.
Shirts so white, tell me why are you wet? Girls and shirts, they do not speak a word. But the machines, they keep going forever.
Song 4: In shtetl Nikolayev (In the Town of Nikolayev). Performance by David Medoff, recorded 1923.
Transliterated lyrics courtesy of the German klezmer band Aufwind may be found on the Zemerl website by clicking here.
This week’s Yiddish Song of the Week is a performance of the opening verse of Mayn lomp vert farloshn (My Lamp is Being Extinguished), a very old death ballad, by Lifshe Schaechter-Widman (LSW). The recording was made as part of the Leybl Kahn recordings of LSW, done in New York City in 1954. Schaechter-Widman was born and raised in Zvinyetchke, Bukovina; for more information on the singer, see previous posts.
The only other recording I know of this ballad is to be found on accompanying DVD to the publication Unser Rebbe, unser Stalin by Elvira Grozinger and Susi Hudak-Lazic, Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden, 2008. This important publication consists of the field recordings of the Soviet ethnomusicologists Sofia Magid and, to a lesser degree, of Moishe Beregovski. The transcription of the words to the song (which is fragmentary), the transcribed melody and comments on text and melody can be found on pages 226 – 230. But a fuller textual transcription done by Beregovski or someone in his research team can be found on pages 539-540.
The singers were a blind mother and daughter, Rivke Verbitskeya, 52 and Esther Verbitskeya 25. Both were members of a Soviet worker’s cooperative (ARTEL) for the blind in Shpole, Ukraine, recorded by Beregovski in 1940 in Kiev (let’s call it the “Kiev Variant”). Their performance, singing the melody together with no harmony, is fascinating. It’s not the kind of song one would usually sing as a duet, but considering that they are blind and have probably sung it together many times to accompany their work or pass the time, it is understandable.
A variant is also printed (without music) in Pinkes (S. Niger, ed.) 1912/13, page 410. in the collection of Khaye Fayn from Podbroze, Vilne region (“Podbroze Variant”)
Another variant can be found in Beregovski’s collection and in S. Z. Pipe’s collection (with music!) of Galician folksongs edited by Dov and Meir Noy, Yidishe folkslider fun Galitsye (Volume 2, Folklore Research Center Studies, Jerusalem, 1971). p. 101 and notes on variants p. 29 (“Galicia Variant”).
Pipe’s collected songs always seem to be the closest to LSW’s Yiddish folksongs from Bukovina, and I think one can safely say that central/eastern Galicia and Bukovina could be considered the same territory in terms of folklore (no great surprise really, since they were both Austria-Hungary before the first World War).
So we have the music to three different variants; a rare treat for an old ballad. Musically the Galicia Variant connects the Kiev Variant to the Bukovina one.
Schaechter-Widman sings it slower and more emotionally (as is her traditional style) than the Verbitskeyas in Kiev and slower than is indicated in Pipe’s collection.
But textually speaking, the richest material on this song can be found in Noyekh Prilutski’s 2nd volume of Yidishe folkslider, Warsaw, 1913, pages 26 – 41, with many long variants from Warsaw and other Polish towns – Tomashov, Srotsk. The song, in classic ballad form, is aways a dialogue usually between the dying person and the angel of death.
The line “mayn lomp vert farloshn” or “der lomp vert farloshn” appears in all of them except one, though it doesn’t always start the ballad.
How old is this ballad? As I might have written before, the only way we can judge this is to look at the variants and see where they were recorded, and in this case, the area covered of where the song was performed is very large – from the Vilna area, to Warsaw to Ukraine , Galilcia and Bukovina. So, as regards the ballad’s age I would say early 19th century, late 18th century.
[Please note: the English transliteration follows the dialect of the Yiddish more closely than the Yiddish-alphabet version]
Mayn lomp vert farloshn
un ikh hob keyn gits nokh nit genosn,
un ikh miz shoyn geyn fin der velt.
Ver vet rakhmunes hubn af mayne kleyne kinderlekh?
Un ver vet zey hitn fin der kelt?
My lamp is being extinguished
and I have not yet had any pleasure to derive,
and I must already leave this world.
Who will have pity on my small little children?
Who will protect them from the cold?
I never thought I would thank Google Books in this blog, but the website has opened up tremendous possibilities for the Yiddish folksong researcher. In addition to having access to song collections, one can type in a search word in Yiddish and find it in dozens or hundreds of works. The Harvard Library and its unique Leo Wiener Collection, which is full of 19th century Yiddish folk literature, is being made available on the site.
And so I was able to look at Yitskhok-Yoel Linetski‘s work Der beyzer marshelik (1869) for the first time in its entirety. One of the poems is called „Di mode‟ (“Fashion;” “mode” has two syllables) and I immediately identified it as the source of a song my grandmother Lifshe Schaechter-Widman [LSW] sang called „Di mode.”
Linetski (1839 – 1915) was one of the earliest maskilic (“enlightened”) Yiddish writers, and his novel Dos Poylishe yingl (1868) later called “Dos khsidishe yingl‟ was the first bestseller of modern Yiddish literature.
Yitskhok-Yoel Linetski
Linetski’s life story was amazing. He was raised in a strict Hasidic home in Vinnitsa, and when he was suspected of reading “forbidden” literature, he was married off at age fourteen to a twelve-year old girl. But then he convinced his young wife of his path, so they forced him to divorce her and marry a “deaf, half-idiotic woman” (see Zalmen Reizen‘s Leksikon fun der yidisher literatur). That didn‘t work either and when they tried to throw him into the river, he escaped to Odessa.
To analyze how Linetski‘s text was folklorized in LSW‘s version, recorded in 1954 by Leybl Kahn in New York City, is a longer essay. But as an example, compare Linetski‘s original refrain:
Oy a ruekh in der mode a leyd. Vos zi hot af der velt a nets farshpreyt!
Oh, the devil take the fashion, what a pain, That spread a net over the world.
with LSW‘s refrain:
Oy, nor di mode aleyn, nor di mode aleyn, hot far undz umglik gebrengt.
Oh, only the fashion alone, only the fashion alone has brought us misfortune.
Only in the last refrain does she sing “the devil take the fashion,” which I believe works better dramatically. Usually the “folk process” improves the longer, wordy maskilic poetry.
Other songs that originate from the work Beyzer marshelik are Dos redl performed by (Israel Srul) Freed on Ruth Rubin‘s field recording collection “Jewish Life: The Old Country” and recently recorded as the title track of klezmer violinist Jake Shulman-Ment‘s CD A Wheel/A redele, sung by Benjy Fox-Rosen. LSW also sang a version of Dos vigele with the opening line „Shlis shoyn mayn kind dayne oygn…‟ which will be posted on this blog at some point.
In LSW‘s performance of Di mode you get to hear her sing a more upbeat song, with a great melody. The traditional aspects of LSW‘s singing (the ornamentaion in particular) are applied to a more modern song, and the synthesis works wonderfully.
The biography of the singer Lifshe Schaechter-Widman [LSW] (1893 – 1973) who grew up in Zvinyace/Zvinyetchke, Bukovina (then part of Austria-Hungary), is given in the very first post of The Yiddish Song of the Week. This week’s song is also taken from the 1954 recordings of her made by Leybl Kahn in NYC.
Formally, “Az es shtarbt nor up dus ershte vaybele” (“As Soon as the First Wife Dies”) could be considered a classic ballad. The first three verses set the stage for the dialogue between the children and their father. As a narrative though, the last verse, which is sung by the father, leaves no resolution to the hopeless situation at all.
The melody in ballads almost always stays the same for all the verses. However, in this song the melody changes for the dialogue verses, becoming more dramatic, as does Lifshe’s moving, mournful singing.
Ethnographically, the song depicts the poverty of the families at this time; even a piece of bread and butter was considered a delicacy. In her memoirs Durkhgelebt a velt LSW writes of her own cruel stepfather who would not allow her to eat bread with butter. Her mother, Taube, turned the buttered side of the bread over when the stepfather entered so he would not see it.
Please note: The dialect of the singer is more accurately reflected in the transliteration than in the Yiddish.
Az es shtarbt nor up dus ershte vaybele
Koym hot men zi bagrubn.
heybn di shadkhunim arim dem yingn man,
arim zekh tsi yugn.
As soon as the first wife dies,
and has barely been buried.
The matchmakers start chasing
the young man.
Redt men im a vaybele,
iz zi bay im mies (?)/ or perhaps [iz du bay im menies - he finds obstacles, objections]
Redt men im a meydele,
iz zi tsiker zis.
When they try to match him with an older woman
He finds her ugly.
When they try to match hm with a girl,
He finds her sugar sweet.
Zi nemt di kinder tsvugn,
zi rayst zey oys di hor.
Zey loyfn tsum tatn, veynen un klogn.
Er tit zey nokh mer shlogn.
She starts to comb for lice
and pulls out their hair;
They run to their father, crying and moaning,
He beats them even more.
Oy futer, oy futer.
Vi iz indzer miter? Vi iz indzer miter?
Vus zi flegt indz budn,
in milekh un in piter.
Oh father, oh father.
Where is our mother?
Who used to bathe us
in milk and butter.
Oy kinder, oy kinder
Broyt mit piter vet ir esn.
Nor in ayer mamen,
mizt ir shoyn fargesn.
Oh children, oh children,
Bread and butter you will eat.
But your mother
you must now forget.
Oy futer, oy futer,
Broyt mit zalts veln mir esn,
in undzer miter‘s kushere neshome,
kenen mir nit fargesn.
Oh father, oh father
Bread and salt we will eat.
But our mother‘s kosher [pure] soul,
we will never forget.
Oy kinder, oy kinder
Az di shtif-mame vet aykh shlogn,
zolt ir nit kimen tsu mir
mit veynen un klogen.
Oh children, oh children
When the stepmother beats you,
Don‘t come to me,
with moans and cries.
