Yiddish Radio Project Store

Yiddish Radio Project

The Yiddish Radio Project series is now available as a two-CD or two-tape set. The collection is hosted by NPR's Scott Simon and features all ten Yiddish Radio Project stories, plus four bonus tracks. A beautiful twenty-page booklet with historic photos and an essay by Henry Sapoznik about the making of the project is also included.

Buy your copy today at the NPR Shop or Amazon.com. You can also phone your order in to the NPR Shop by calling (888) 677-3472 Monday through Sunday, 7 a.m. - 3 a.m. EST. For wholesale orders, please contact Highbridge Audio at (800) 755-8532.

Music from the Yiddish Radio Project

This soundtrack is a musical voyage to the wonderful, and sometimes strange, Yiddish radio universe of the 1930s to '50s. The CD includes songs by the "Yiddish Melodies in Swing" Orchestra, the dueling clarinetists Dave Tarras and Naftule Brandwein, and Seymour Rexite, the Frank Sinatra of Yiddish radio, universally adored for his Yiddish versions of "Surrey with a Fringe on Top" and "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." Also featured on the CD are the unforgettable commercial jingles of Joe and Paul Clothiers, Manischewitz Matzo, and many more. The liner notes include an essay about Yiddish radio by pre-eminent ethnomusicologist and series co-producer Henry Sapoznik.

Buy your copy today online from the NPR Shop or Amazon.com. You can also phone your order in to the NPR Shop by calling (888) 677-3472 Monday through Sunday, 7 a.m.-3 a.m. EST. For wholesale orders, please contact Shanachie Records at (800) 497-1043.

The Yiddish Radio Project T-Shirt

Swoosh-schmoosh. Get your patented Yiddish Radio Project transmitter logo long-sleeve T-shirt right here. They may not have Michael Jordan's endorsement, but it's just a matter of time. The Yiddish Radio Project T-shirt: elegant enough for work, comfortable enough for play, mysterious enough for the Lower East Side lounge. 100% cotton.

The Yiddish Radio Project Poster

These classic posters commemorating the Yiddish Radio Project: Live! tour were printed and designed by the legendary Hatch Show Prints -- one of the oldest working letterpress print shops in America. The Hatch aesthetic, which reaches back to turn-of-the-century advertisements for vaudeville, circus and minstrel shows, captures the spirit and texture of Yiddish radio's heydays. These posters are printed the old-fashioned way, wood blocks and acid-burned photographic plates, so no two posters are exactly alike. The posters are 11 X 22 inches, and printed on heavy-weight cardboard stock.

The Jewish Giant

A 1999 Sound Portraits documentary about Edie Carmel, "The Jewish Giant." Eddie was normal sized until he became a teenager, when he began to grow uncontrollably (to the height, ultimately, of 8'9", according to The Guiness Book of World Records). As an adult, the only work he could find involved exploiting his freakishness, starring in B-grade monster movies (The Brain that Wouldn't Die) and recording two records ("The Happy Giant" and "The Good Monster"). He was billed in the Ringling Brothers Circus at Madison Square Garden as "The Tallest Man on Earth." The Jewish Giant is a story of suffering, of not fitting in, of the body betraying itself, and of the bizarre life-twists that can subsume a family. It's a story about what it's like to be a regular person looking at the world from inside a not-so-regular body.

Klezmer by Henry Sapoznik

For the first time, Yiddish music scholar Henry Sapoznik traces the complete history of this vital musical tradition from the Eastern European Jewish musicians who brought with them a rich tradition of band music known as klezmer (from the Yiddish word for 'musician'); to the influences of the dance bands and swing bands of the 1920s and 1930s; to the 1970s, when a new group of young Jewish musicians rediscovered this music; and through today's rebirth as world music. Winner of the 2000 ARSC Book Award for Excellence in Music Scholarship and the 2000 ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for Excellence in Music Scholarship.

The New Joys of Yiddish by Leo Rosten

More than a quarter of a century ago, Leo Rosten published the first comprehensive and hilariously entertaining lexicon of the colorful and deeply expressive language of Yiddish. Said "to give body and soul to the Yiddish language," The Joys of Yiddish went on to become an indispensable tool for writers, journalists, politicians, and students, as well as a perennial bestseller for three decades.

Tanz! Dave Tarras & Sam Musiker

An historical landmark album that's one of the greatest Klezmer records ever recorded! In 1955, when Tanz! was recorded at Columbia¹s 30th Street Studios in New York, its senior clarinetist, Dave Tarras, was at the height of his powers. And the arrangements before him, Sam Musiker's juxtaposition of traditional klezmer with modern swing, were the most challenging of his career. With its foreshadowing of melodic elements, powerful, dynamic playing and precise attention to interesting voicings, Tanz! displays a thematic coherence years ahead of its time. Digitally remastered from the original analog source tapes, this CD is simply one of the greatest klezmer records ever issued.

The Klezmer King Abe Schwartz

Composer, fiddler, and bandleader Abe Schwartz (1881-1963) defined the modern American klezmer ensemble. Working in the arena of mid-1920s recording, the young immigrant tuned the still primitive sound of Jewish music to a more sophisticated pitch. If outstanding soloists like Naftule Brandwein and Dave Tarras shared the spotlight of the klezmer revival, it was because Abe Schwartz was the man who gave them their start.

From Avenue A to the Great White Way: Various Artists

At the turn of the 20th century in New York City, Yiddish theater came of age in the playhouses of the Lower East Side, a hotbed of singers and musicians, composers and playwrights, cantors and comics who entertained hungry audiences of newly-arrived immigrants. This creative surge was captured by Columbia Records, whose catalog chronicled Menashe Skulnik, Peisachke Burstein, Molly Picon, Yoselle Rosenblatt, Nellie Casman, David Medoff, Fannie Brice, Eddie Cantor, Sophie Tucker, Al Jolson, Cab Calloway, Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa, and even Xavier Cugat & Abbe Lane.

More Sound Portraits documentaries are available in the Sound Portraits store.