Yiddish Song of the Week: ‘Afn beys-oylem’

By Ezra Glinter July 1, 2010

Over at the An-sky Jewish Folkore Research Project, Forverts managing editor Itzik Gottesman, along with a few other contributors, has been poking through the nooks and crannies of Yiddish music and poetry on the Yiddish Song of the Week blog.

As quickly becomes clear from reading the blog, these aren’t your regular Yiddish standards. Rather, the featured melodies are generally lesser-known pieces, usually in the form of rare field recordings.

This week, Gottesman writes about “Afn beys-oylem,” (“On the Cemetery”) as sung by his grandmother, Lifshe Schaechter-Widman. The song is a version of Mikhl Gordon‘s “Di shtifmuter” (“The Stepmother”), but is an unusual example of his work. As Gottesman writes:

Mikhl Gordon, (Vilna, 1823 – Kiev, 1890) had a wonderful sense of humor (he was author of “Di bord‟ [a Maskilic song that tells of a wife who awakens to find her husband shaved his beard]). However, here he composed a moving, even shocking, portrait of the life of an orphan. Women folksingers had no problem singing this kind of song since it truly reflected the difficult times and hopelessly depressing family situations. Singing it today from a stage is another matter…

I consider this song the epitome of LSW‘s slow, mournful vocal style brimming with ornamentation. You can also hear the reach and power of her voice, which seems to float, if you will.

So a bit of a downer, maybe, but a beautiful, moving experience.

Listen to the song and read Gottesman’s whole analysis here.

Ezra Glinter is the critic-at-large of the Forward.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

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 polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO