Midterm 2 Flashcards
Ellis Island
Minimal possessions; fear of police; would rather jump into water than return to Russia; complicated changes of immigration laws
Letter Songs: (5)
“Sleep My Child”, “Long Live Columbus”, “Ellis Island”, “My Green Cousin”, “Letter to Mother”
“Sleep My Child” (composer, 1 detail)
Sholom Alechem; wondrous reuniting with father who went to America
“Long Live Columbus” (1 detail)
Optimism and Pessimism
“Ellis Island” (1 detail(2))
Do you know the language? Do you know a trade?
“My Green Cousin” (1 detail)
Greenhorn worn out from factory work
“A Letter to Mother” (1 detail)
Letter FROM mother to son, who forgot mother because he acquired wealth and married. Mother dies.
HIAS (acronym; 2 functions)
Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society [ published newspapers, lobbied for fair legislation]
Landsmanshaft (3 details)
Social community; offered burial, pensions, legal protection; crazy rules: behavior, marriage, communism
Boarders
boarder at wife’s taken in to live
Nativism
Thoughts that new immigrants would degrade modern American society
Jewish Daily Forward
Only Jewish paper still existing today; made famous by the Bundt
Jacob Gordin
Artist that added realism and melodrama to Goldfaden’s work; tried to make the theatre more sophisticated
Maurice Schwartz
Created Yiddish Art Theatre; focus on classical works such as Shakespeare and Ibsen
Boris Tomashevsky (3 details)
Student of Goldfaden’s who left for U.S first. Considered founder of Yiddish theatre in U.S; constructed works by memory with improv; first success was “The Witch”
Joseph Rumshinsky (career, (3) songs)
Published but did not create “Eli, Eli”; wrote for both vaudeville and serious opera; 3 songs [ Triangle Fire; Motl the Operator]
Sholom Secunda (3 songs)
“Dona Dona”, “To Me, You’re So Handsome”, “My Green Cousin”
Alexander Olshanetsky (career, experience, 3 songs)
Had both a traditional and secular background; Russian choral master; U.S: Yiddish theatre cantorial styles; “Bar Kochba”, “Belz, Belz”, Shmaltz
“Bar Kochba”
written by Olshanetsky; banned in Russia because of insight of uprising [ history of revolt against Romans]
Abraham Ellstein [ beginnings, 4 songs, one production]
Began as accompanist to Yessele Rosenblatl; Titanic song, Molly Picon’s “Mamele, Abi Gezunt, Der Nayer Sher, Yidl Mitn Fidl”
Molly Picon
famous female Yiddish actor; reverse trouser role
The Jazz Singer
Al Jolson; blackface; mix between tradition and popular jazz singer
Yidl Mit’n Fidl
Father and daughter go as a duet performing, daughter [ molly picon] as a boy
“Mamele”
Song about a mother who is so busy taking care of children, she forgets what it means to be a woman
Yessele Rosenblatt
greatest cantorial singer
Irving Berlin
wrote many great works including “White Christmas”
Zionism
movement to reclaim state of Israel, slowest to take hold in immigrant communities because of the idealistic, not here and now. However it did serve as a kind of overall purpose, and backlash to the forced ideas of assimilation. It gave an identity Howe: how they lived
Triangle Fire
Triangle shirtwaist factory; many young women died; a notice to the poor working conditions, and a spark to the labor movement
Morris Winchevsky [political views, song, reception]
Socialist, anarchist, communist; first labor poet, joined with Cahan for “The Forward”, song “The Future”; very abstract and general, not successful because people weren’t ready for his message
David Edelshtat [background, political views, tone of poems, at least 3 poems, reception]
second labor poet, worked in harsh conditions in Russia; joined socialist movement, angry poems “In Kamf”, “Working Women”, “Awake!”, “My Testament”, great reception because he connected with his audience
Morris Rosenfield [ standing, background, 2 songs]
Best labor poet, personal connections- 10 years in sweatshops– 2 songs: “My little boy”, “My Resting Place”
Abraham Reisen [ themes, tone (3 songs)]
passionate to throw oppression; “Rampage”, “The Wall”, “War”
Terezin (Theresienstadt)
Concentration camp
Brundibár
Children’s opera formed in Terezin concentration camp
Yom Ha’Shoah
Israeli Holocaust Remembrance Day
Henry Ford
Strong anti-semitism; progressed the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion”, but also apologized; “since Henry Ford apologized to Me”
Protocols of the Elders of Zion
conspiracy that the Jewish diaspora means that Jews slowly rise the ranks of all nations and then obtain world domination
Reich Chamber of Music (Reichsmusikkammer)
Only good German music allowed; composed by Aryans, not even Debussy, who married a Jew could remain on the program.
Ghettos
poor living conditions separate places in city for Jews to live
Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
Largest single revolt by the Jewish resistance in Poland that failed eventually due to poor armament and supplies
Father Charles Coughlin
Roman Catholic; began radio program eventually anti- semitic, started the Christian Front
Christian Front
Spurred by Coughlin; targeted Jews and ideas of communism– against organized labor movements
Postville
Kosher meat packaging plant containing Latino illegal immigrants, and bad working conditions. Controversy on whether or not the plant was singled out because of anti-semitism.
Hekhsher Tzedek
Updated kosher certification including working conditions and ethics
Fusgaver
Emigration of Jews from Romania; awful conditions, early 1900’s.
Klezmer
Jewish more modern party music; hard to define. SECULAR
Mambo
general term for much latino music adapted and created in the U.S.
Catskills
proving grounds for early musicians
The Palladium
dance hall for famous music, focus on Mambo
Mambonik
A Jewish person obsessed with Mambo
East Harlem
Upper Manhattan barrio; latino harlem
Perez Prado
Famous cuban band leader known as “The King of Mambo”
Mordechai Gerbirtig [ 2 songs]
Yiddish Poet, “It’s burning”, “song of the unemployed”
Hirsh Glik
wrote anthem promoting resistance and endurance
Vaudeville style
minstrelsy; random unrelated theatre acts
WEVD
American news talk radio program; socialist, included the “Forward”
Charly and his orchestra
musical propaganda posing as Nazis and making fun of them
Aryan
blonde hair, blue eyes, german perfect race
Der Ewige Jude
The Eternal Jew: Nazi propaganda film supporting “The Protocols…”
Treblinka
Song referencing concentration camp nakedness, brothers across the world cannot feel our pain
Al Jolson
traditional Jew become famous Jazz Singer, blackface, “The Jazz Singer”
Hanns Eisler
austrian composer of GDR national anthem and film scores; exiled to U.S by Nazis, Exiled from U.S because of communism
Lin Jaldati
Well known Yiddish singer and actor; helped organize Yiddish culture festival in Germany post WWII, family knew the Franks
GDR (acro, expanse)
German Democratic Republic; East Germany under control of Soviets, except West Berlin
Doina/ Doyna
Romanian musical style/tune with free rhythm, improvisation based on stretching notes and vertical, keeping fixed melody
Bulgar
dance type from bulgaria
Naftule Brandwein
Famous Klezmer clarinetist
Howe: How they lived;
Catskills, family life, landsman shaft,belief, secularization, Zionism
Sapoznik: Yiddish Music In the New World
People preferred Yiddish theatre elements, landsman shaft–>weddings, tomashevsky, gordin etc.
