The National Yiddish Theatre, ‘Folksbiene’, will present a unique concert event celebrating the folk legend and actor Theodore Bikel in anticipation of his 90th birthday in May 2014. “Miracle of Miracles: A Chanukah Extravaganza” takes place at Symphony Space, 2537 Broadway, New York, on Monday December 2nd, 7.30 PM.
Featured in the all-star cast are the beloved Emmy-winning actor Fyvush Finkel, klezmer giant Frank London, the Russian concert phenomenon Psoy Korolenko and the Broadway actors Joanne Borts (‘Once’) and Elmore James, among many others. Accordionist Lauren Brody will play in the orchestra.
Lauren Brody is an alumna of the pioneering klezmer revival band Kapelye, with whom she toured and recorded for over a decade, and is also a Yiddish singer well known for her unique old-world sound. Lauren leads a parallel life as a performer of the traditional music of Bulgaria and the Balkans, and has won a series of grants to conduct groundbreaking research in Bulgaria on early commercial folk music recordings.
Lauren Brody, born in New York City, has been involved with music since early childhood. A classically trained pianist, she received a B.A. in music from the City University of New York, and pursued a Master’s Degree in Music before changing course to devote herself to the restoration and tuning of pianos.
Lauren Brody’s study of traditional accordion styles brings her in contact with traditions from throughout Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean. Her two specialties are Yiddish and Balkan music.
She first became aware of Bulgarian music as a teenager, and was so deeply impressed with what she heard that, in 1969, she made her solo first trip to Bulgaria. That initial trip sparked a life-long interest and commitment to the music and the culture, despite the fact that Lauren has no Bulgarian ancestry. In 1971, during the Communist era in Bulgaria, when visitors from the West were not welcome in the region, it is remarkable that she received a stipend from the Bulgarian government to do post-graduate study in Bulgarian folk music at the State Music Conservatory in Sofia.
During this period that she was first introduced to old 78rpm recordings of Bulgarian folk music which became a subject of great future interest for Lauren. In 1990, she received a grant from the Fulbright Foundation to research the commercial recording industry in Bulgaria from 1900-1950. It was the the pioneer study on the subject, as most Bulgarian scholarship in the field of ethnomusicology was devoted to field research. The notion that commercial recordings were a valid avenue of inquiry did not have much traction among Bulgarian scholars at the time.
Despite this skepticism, colleagues at the Institute of Music in Sofia were quite helpful to Lauren in the pursuit of her research goals. The results of that research are presented on a CD she reissued on the Yazoo label entitled “Song of the Crooked Dance”. A monograph in both English and Bulgarian is planned for the the near future.
Lauren said, “I have a lifelong interest in the music of the Balkans, and in the preservation and dissemination of recordings from the 78 rpm era. I have started a comparative study of accordion styles in Romania, Serbia, Macedonia, Bulgaria, and Greece, and will be launching a blog ‘Lauren Brody’s Accordion Bytes’ soon.”
In addition to her research activities, Lauren has been an active performer and teacher of Bulgarian folk music and singing. She appears on two CDs as vocalist and keyboard player with the Yuri Yunakov Ensemble, and has been teaching at seminars since the early 1970s. She leads a dual life as a klezmer musician, and has been a member of Kapelye and Mikveh, with whom she has appeared in films, recorded and toured extensively through the U.S., Canada and Europe.
Theodore Bikel, the Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning actor, folk singer and political activist, will make a special appearance supported by the Frank London-led Folksbiene Klezmorim Orchestra.
Vienna-born Bikel earned a best supporting actor Oscar nomination in 1958 for ‘The Defiant Ones’. He had major roles in ‘The Blue Angel’, ‘My Fair Lady’, and ‘The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming’. He also created the role of Baron von Trapp in the original production of ‘A Sound of Music’ on Broadway.
He has played Tevye in ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ over 2000 times on Broadway and elsewhere, beginning in 1967. A world-renowned folk singer, social activist and spokesman for liberal Jewish causes, he also was a former president of Actors’ Equity.
