Adrienne Cooper, Yiddish Singer, Is Dead
Adrienne Cooper, a fourth-generation Yiddish singer and music teacher who was instrumental in the contemporary revival of klezmer music, died December 25.
Cooper performed the world over, sharing the stage with and recording alongside The Klezmatics, Alicia Svigals, So-Called, and Michael Winograd, among many other prominent musicians. She was also co-creator of various Yiddish-English musicals, including “The Memoir of Gluckl of Hameln” and “Songs From the Kitchen.”
In addition, Cooper was the Workmen’s Circle/Arbeter Ring’s external affairs officer for cultural programming, and had worked previously at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, where she was the assistant director.
Read a tribute to Cooper by Prof. Jeffrey Shandler of Rutgers University
Among the honors she received for her music and activism were KlezKanada’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and Jews for Racial and Economic Justice’s Risk Taker Award. Cooper’s daughter, Sarah Mina Gordon, is the vocalist for the band Yiddish Princess.
Read a Forward review Cooper’s most recent album, “Enchanted” here.
Read a series of pieces that Cooper and Gordon penned on Yiddish songs of family violence here.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and the protests on college campuses.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.