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Episode 0299: Javier Sinay on Argentinian Journalist Pinie Katz and the Murders of Moises Ville by Yiddish Book Center

Aaron Bendich is the twenty-seven-year-old behind “Borscht Beat,” a new Yiddish music show on WJFF Radio Catskill, the public radio station for the Catskills and Northeast Pennsylvania. He tells us how his latest radio show was inspired by his grandfather Max Bendich, who was the son of Jewish immigrants from present-day Ukraine and had a lifelong interest in Yiddish and American folk music. Aaron also talks about his growing collection of Yiddish and Jewish LPs and other media that he curates for his work. Episode 0298 April 30, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Translator, actor, and producer Caraid O’Brien joins us from her editing room where she’s putting the finishing touches on her radio drama production of Sholem Asch's play "The Dead Man", which she translated from the Yiddish. The haunting WWI drama takes place in the rubble of a decimated synagogue in Poland directly after the war. Dealing with dislocation, madness, and death, the surviving Jewish community must decide how to rebuild their lives, maintaining hope for a prosperous, new future. The radio drama will air Sunday, April 25, at 7pm EDT, giving audiences the opportunity to hear this work in its first-ever complete English translation. The production is presented by the Yiddish Book Center as part of Carnegie Hall’s Voices of Hope Festival examining art created amidst times of crisis and human tragedy. Episode 0297 April 23, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Motl Didner, associate art director of the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (NYTF), and NYTF literary manager Sabina Brukner talk with The Shmooze about their upcoming Yiddish Women Playwrights Festival, which gives women playwrights center stage at the NYTF. The festival kicks off with Chava Rosenfarb’s The Bird of the Ghetto, which chronicles the attempted Vilna Ghetto uprising and the tragic story of Jewish resistance leader Itsik Vitenberg, commander of the United Partisan Organization. The virtual reading is produced by Didner, who notes, "As we commemorate the 78th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising [on April 19, 1943], the true story behind The Bird of the Ghetto is a moving testament to the bravery and resilience of the Jewish resistance during the Holocaust." Episode 0296 April 15, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Judy Batalion is the author of the recently released The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters in Hitler’s Ghettos, which illuminates the extraordinary history and accomplishments of brave Jewish women who became resistance fighters—a group of unknown heroes whose exploits have never been chronicled in full until now. She joins The Shmooze to talk about the amazing story behind the book, which began with the discovery of a Yiddish memoir. Episode 0295 April 8, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

The Shmooze visits with the multitalented Eleanor Reissa, a Tony-nominated director, Broadway actress, prize-winning playwright, soon-to-be published author, artistic director of the world’s oldest Yiddish theater company, and a singer who has performed in nearly every major venue around the world. The daughter of Holocaust survivors, Eleanor is a captivating storyteller in both English and Yiddish. She chats with us about her work and latest projects. Episode 0294 April 1, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

On the phone with "The Shmooze" this week, Amanda (Miryem-Khaye) Seigel talks with us about her work as a Yiddish singer, songwriter, actor, recording artist, and research librarian specializing in Yiddish language and culture at the New York Public Library. Among other things, Amanda tells us about how she came to Yiddish and about "Yidforsh," the Yiddish research Facebook group she launched to help promote research and scholarship on Yiddish topics and connect Yiddish researchers to resources and opportunities. Episode 0293 March 19, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Rabbi Avram Mlotek joins "The Shmooze" to talk about the history of the Third Seder, a long-standing Yiddish cultural tradition. Avram lets us in on what's on the bill for this year's virtual Third Seder--from Yiddish day school students from Melbourne, Australia, who will sing the Four Questions to performances by Michael Alpert, Sarah Gordon, Daniel Kahn, Steve Skybell, and many more. The event, "The Third Seder: A Yiddish Celebration," co-sponsored by the Yiddish Book Center, will stream live on Facebook on March 21 at 2pm (EDT). Episode 0292 March 13, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

This week's guest, Henry Sapoznik, is an award-winning producer, musicologist and performer, and writer in the fields of traditional and popular Yiddish and American music and culture. His latest project is the ongoing research about the so-called "shvartze khazonim," the African American cantors of the 1920s and '30s. We speak with Henry about Black Jewish cantor Thomas LaRue Jones, a much-beloved singer of traditional Yiddish songs and cantorial liturgy on the stage and radio and on record, and the recent effort to raise funds for a headstone for LaRue's unmarked grave. Episode 0291 March 6, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

We invited Yiddish Book Center Translation Fellow Matthew Johnson onto "The Shmooze" to tell us about his recent discovery of the Yiddish writer Moyshe-Leyb Halpern's unfinished poetry. While doing research for his dissertation on the relationship between German- and Yiddish-language literature, Matthew uncovered a surprising find in YIVO's Halpern collection. He shares what's to be gleaned by the handwritten notes and marginalia found on the documents he discovered in archival boxes of Halpern's papers. Episode 0290 February 24, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

This week we visit with Esther Cohen, a longtime leader of labor culture in New York City and one of the organizers of a March 25 memorial to the women who died in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire that took place on March 25, 1911, after a fire broke out on the 8th floor of the factory, causing the death of 146 garment workers, many of them young Italian and Jewish immigrant women. Esther tells the story of how the fire became a rallying cry for the international labor movement that continues to fight for social justice for all, and we also learn, in conversation, about the work of the Remember the Triangle Fire Coalition. Episode 0289 February 18, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Performance and Jewish studies scholar Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett joins us for a lively and informative conversation about her work as the Ronald S. Lauder Chief Curator of the Core Exhibition at POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews. As part of this work, she will be moderating "Meet the Family," an upcoming series of virtual conversations with the descendants of distinguished Polish Jews, which accompanies the museum's new Legacy Gallery. In conversation, we learn about what drew Barbara to her museum work and her work as a cultural anthropologist, ethnographer, and folklorist. And she shares the story of her collaboration with her father, "The Called Me Mayer July: Painted Memories of a Jewish Childhood in Poland Before the Holocaust"--a unique blend of memoir, oral history, and artistic interpretation that is at once a labor of love, a tribute to a distinctive imagination, and a brilliant portrait of life in one Jewish hometown. Episode 0288 February 4, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massach

Writer and Yiddish translator Ellen Cassedy talks with The Shmooze about the new documentary "9to5: The Story of a Movement" and her role in the feminist labor movement at the center of this story. In conversation, she tells us about being inspired to activism by her Jewish immigrant grandfather's story of hearing the feminist labor union leader Rose Schneiderman--who is credited with coining the phrase “Bread and Roses"--orating in Union Square in NYC, around 1912, about the struggles of garment workers. Ellen describes the female garment workers as "our spiritual grandmothers," noting of herself and the female office workers that were part of this movement, "We saw ourselves as carrying on their legacy." Episode 0287 January 29, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Hankus Netsky visits with The Shmooze to chat about "40 Years in Yiddishland: The Yiddish Book Center Celebrates the Klezmer Conservatory Band," a special, upcoming virtual public program celebrating two of the major players in the flourishing international Yiddish cultural resurgence, the KCB and the Yiddish Book Center, each of whom marked their fortieth anniversaries in 2020. Hankus talks about his beginnings in music and ethnomusicology, the 1980s, the early days of Yiddish activism, and the upcoming program, which celebrates the history of the KCB with, among other things, exciting video concert footage from over the years and a lively conversation between Hankus and Center founder and president, Aaron Lansky. Learn more and register for the special program, which airs Sunday, January 24 at 2pm EST https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_DayizEJ1TxyKDUPqV8fVrQ Episode 0286 January 21, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Co-editor Rachel Rubinstein talks with The Shmooze about "Teaching Jewish American Literature," a newly published collection of essays she co-edited with Roberta Rosenberg. The collection of essays addresses how to teach questions of personal identity and national boundaries. These questions can engage students in literature, writing, or religion; at Jewish, Christian, or secular schools; and in or outside the United States. The contributors offer varied perspectives on classic texts such as "Yekl," "Bread Givers," and "Goodbye, Columbus," along with approaches to interdisciplinary topics including humor, graphic novels, and musical theater. Episode 0285 January 12, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

This week we visit with author Rachel Rojanski to talk about her recently published "Yiddish in Israel: A History." The book tells the compelling and lesser-known story of the history of Yiddish language and culture in Israel, challenging commonly held views and offering a radical new interpretation of the interaction between Yiddish and Israeli Hebrew cultures. Episode 0284 January 7, 2021 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

This week we're joined by Joanna Church, director of collections and exhibits at the Jewish Museum of Maryland, to talk about the newly opened exhibit "Jews In Space: Members of the Tribe in Orbit." We learn about the ways in which outer space has inspired Jewish artists, writers, comedians, and thinkers, both religious and secular, to boldly imagine realms beyond our Earth. And Joanna talks about a few of the surprising items included in the exhibit--from the first dreidel in space to a monumental stack of science fiction magazines. Episode 0283 December 16, 2020 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Kenneth Turan, film critic for the "Los Angeles Times" and NPR, visits with "The Shmooze" to talk about the newly released "The Jewish Soul: Classics of Yiddish Cinema" (Blu-ray). Our conversation considers the ten classic films that make up this collection and the many ways that they both touch on and represent aspects of Yiddish culture. As it happened, the conversation was recorded on the 100th anniversary of the first performance of "The Dybbuk"--possibly the timeless star of this collection. Episode 0282 December 11, 2020 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Acclaimed Yiddish actor Shane Baker, recipient of the 2020 Adrienne Cooper Dreaming in Yiddish Award, has brought Yiddish theater, classes, and cultural events to every continent—including Antarctica!—through his work as director of the Congress for Jewish Culture, a Yiddishist organization based in New York. He chats with "The Shmooze" about his work both on and off the Yiddish stage. Episode 0281 December 2, 2020 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

London-based singer Clara Kanter, the great-great-granddaughter of Yiddish writer Sholem Asch, and composer Alastair White visit with The Shmooze to talk about "The Drowning Shore," their newly released cantata, which threads together Asch's classic 1907 play "God of Vengeance" with an original Scots-English text. The piece, a 14-minute video monodrama scored for 'a mezzo-soprano in a screen,' is written and composed by Alastair and performed by Clara. The two collaborators talk with us about how they came to make this stunning work. Episode 0280 November 24, 2020 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts