A special symposium will take place on Sunday, April 6, 2014 at 11:AM at the YIVO Institue for Jewish Research, 13 W. 16th Street, New York, New York 10011. Phone number: 212-246-6080

The Chair for the event is Mark Slobin, Wesleyan University
Admission: General – $10 | YIVO members, seniors and students – $7 Tickets: 212.868.4444

Accordionist and Klezmatic member Lorin Sklamburg will participate in a roundtable discussion sponsored by the YIVO Institute for Jewish research in NYC. See photo.

Around 1900, East European Jews became acutely aware of the impact of modernization and urbanization on their culture: on their songs, their tales, and customs. They set in motion a wide range of projects and institutions to gather, archive, and study fading folklore. YIVO was a pioneer in this push, along with a galaxy of Polish and Russian (later Soviet) activists. Today, with the loss of the original population and the huge demographic and cultural shifts of world Jewry, the surviving archives both preserve and channel a rising tide of interest, even a hunger, for what’s called “Yiddish” music and folklore.

This symposium brings together archivists, scholars and performers to discuss the history and creation of Yiddish folk music archives, and the future of the study and performance of Yiddish song today. What is the role of Jewish music archives in fostering new scholarship and Yiddish music?

The event is dedicated to the memory of Chana Mlotek, YIVO’s Music Archivist from 1978 until her recent passing at age 91 in 2013. This program is made possible with the generous support of the Mlotek family. It is co-sponsored by the American Society for Jewish Music.

The symposium consists of:
Panel 1: Jewish Music Archives: Structuring a Passion for Folksong

In the Beginning Were Ginzburg and Marek: A Brief History of Yiddish Folksong Collecting with Robert Rothstein, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

“Hobn Mir A Nigndl”: The Songs Our Israeli Grandchildren Don’t Sing
Yiddish Song Collections at the National Library of Israel as a Source for Research with Gila Flam, National Library of Israel

Rediscovering Yiddish Folk Songs in Ukraine: History, Archival Access and Future with Lyudmila Sholokhova, YIVO Institute

Songs of Generations: Contributions of Chana Mlotek with
Mark Slobin, Wesleyan University

Performance and Presentation of Materials from the Ruth Rubin Archive at YIVO

‎זאָג מיר, מײַן שוועסטער
Zog mir, mayn shvester/Tell Me, My Sister: Working with the Ruth Rubin Archive with Lorin Sklamberg, The Klezmatics, YIVO Institute

Panel 2: Passing the Torch: Archives and Activism in the 21st Century

Roundtable discussion with: Mark Slobin, Wesleyan University (Moderator); Mark Kligman, Hebrew Union College, Columbia University; Ethel Raim, Center for Traditional Music and Dance; and Lorin Sklamberg, The Klezmatics, YIVO Institute.

Mark Slobin is the Winslow-Kaplan Professor of Music at Wesleyan University and the author or editor of many books, on Afghanistan and Central Asia, eastern European Jewish music, and ethnomusicology theory, two of which have received the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award: Fiddler on the Move: Exploring the Klezmer World (Oxford University Press) and Tenement Songs: Popular Music of the Jewish Immigrants (University of Illinois Press). He has been President of the Society for Ethnomusicology and the Society for Asian Music.