Yale Strom & Hot Pstromi
City of the Future – Yiddish Songs from the Former Soviet Union (ARC Music EUCD 2617)
Yale Strom is a “pre-jazz klezmer revivalist,” that is, an ethnomusicologist specializing in and promoting Eastern European Jewish secular music from before the time that it assimilated American jazz. Where better to research that music than the archives of the former Soviet Union, where decadent American jazz was actively discouraged by the all-pervasive government?
From the press release, “City of the Future contains songs from Birobidzhan, the Jewish Autonomous Region located on the Amur River in the 1930s at a time when Yiddish culture was thriving …” It is a happy sort of folk music, requiring the players to use their instruments to specifically evoke human expressions of emotion, from tears to laughter, rather than broad interpretation of feelings as in most other genres.
It is a beautiful recording, as one would expect of ARC, though perhaps a bit marred by the songs being compelled to extol all the virtues of the Soviet Union, about which we are more than dubious today.
In general, it contains an element of conflict between the hopes of Jewish communities that the experiment of Soviet communism would actually relieve them of the centuries of horror and misery they had experienced under the czars and the subtle influence of a micromanaging government on their subject matter.
Klezmer is a celebratory music, best for village joys such as weddings and births. Hammering such title themes as “Red Army,” “The Song of the Collective Farmer,” “Factory Song” and “Girls Sewing at the Machines” into klezmer … somewhat damages the mold. Those of us who do not speak Yiddish can probably enjoy the record more for hearing the music rather than the lyrical narratives.
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Author: Arthur Shuey
Arthur has been reviewing music for publications since 1976 and began focusing almost exclusively on world music in 2012.
His musical background includes past presidencies of the Cape Fear Musicians Association and Blues Society of the Lower Cape Fear, founding membership in nine other blues societies, service on 17 music festival planning committees, two decades of teaching harmonica to individuals and groups, operating a small recording studio and performing solo and in combos for 30 years.
Arthur has written professionally since 1975, pieces ranging from short fiction to travel articles, humor to poetry, mainly for local and regional entertainment media. His blog,” Shuey’s World,” is featured at www.accesswilmington.com.
