The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #21098   Message #223617
Posted By: Mark Cohen
05-May-00 - 02:45 PM
Thread Name: Yiddish workers songs
Subject: RE: Yiddish workers songs
Fedele,
I found 10 songs that I think are exactly what you are looking for. They are in a book called "The Yiddish Song Book" by Jerry Silverman. Copyright 1983, Stein and Day Publishers, ISBN 0-8128-6130-2 (paperback). The book has melodies, chords, transliterated Yiddish words and Silverman's singable English translations. One of the songs is called "Hirsh Lekert", and is about a member of the Jewish Labor Bund in Vilna, who was executed in 1902. Some of the songs are from Europe and some from America. If you send me your address in a personal message (click on "Quick Links" at the top of the page, then "Send a Personal Message"), I can mail you copies of the songs. (I don't have a scanner or a music program, so I can't send them electronically.) Here are the titles:

Tsum Hemerl (To the Hammer)
Hirsh Lekert
Un Du Akerst (Oh, You Plow -- I don't know the Internationale but this sounds like some kind of anthem, including the words "Man fun arbet, oyfgevacht"--workers, unite)
Dire Gelt (Rent Money)
Bin Ich Mir a Shnayderl (I'm a Little Tailor)
Mayn Rue Plats (My Resting Place -- this is the one Chocolate Pi mentioned; it's one of my favorite songs)
Svetshop (Sweatshop)
Arbeter Froyen (Working Women -- a wonderful feminist anthem a la "Bread and Roses", and also written by a man, David Edelstadt)
In Kamf (In Struggle)
Vos Vet Zayn der Sof? (What Will Be the End?)

Thank you for your question. Now I've rediscovered this wonderful book, and have new songs to learn!

Aloha,
Mark