Klezmer and Cantorial Connections: A Concert Presented by the Museum at Eldridge Street

Recorded: Sunday, October 22, 3pm
Find all upcoming programs and events at https://www.eldridgestreet.org/events.

The Museum at Eldridge Street is proud to have hosted the debut collaboration between foremost klezmer violinist Jake Shulman-Ment and virtuoso cantor Yoel Kohn.

About the Musicians:

Yoel Kohn is a cantor, a musical leader who guides Jewish congregations in prayer, from a Chassidic background in the Satmar community in Brooklyn. After growing up in a family of cantors and serving as a cantor for over a decade, he became heavily involved in the revival of "Golden Age" cantorial music with his friend and frequent collaborator, Jeremiah Lockwood.

Jeremiah Lockwood is a scholar, singer, guitarist, and composer. He holds a Ph.D. from Stanford University in Education and Jewish Studies, where his dissertation fieldwork focused on young Chassidic cantors in Brooklyn. He is currently a Fellow at the Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His musical career began with years of playing guitar with blues musician Carolina Slim and in synagogue singing with his grandfather, Cantor Jacob Konigsberg.

Lockwood is the founder and frontman of The Sway Machinery, a group whose music "The New Yorker" described as "unclassifiable and uplifting." Lockwood has recorded 14 albums, toured internationally, and been the recipient of numerous academic honors, including the Salo Baron New Voices in Jewish Studies Award and the YIVO Kremen Memorial Fellowship in East European Arts, Music, and Theater.

Jake Shulman-Ment was born in New York City and is "considered one of the finest klezmer fiddlers on the planet" (Jon Kalish, NPR). He tours and records internationally as a soloist and with Midwood, Daniel Kahn, Frank London, Di Naye Kapelye, Joey Weisenberg, and Duncan Sheik. He was featured in Csaba Bereczki's full-length documentary film "Soul Exodus", and performed on-screen in HBO's "Succession" and Martin Scorsese's "The Irishman." A widely sought-out teacher of the klezmer fiddle tradition, Shulman-Ment has been a faculty member of KlezKamp, KlezKanada, Klezmer Paris, the Krakow Jewish Culture Festival, Yiddish Summer Weimar, Fiddle Tunes, Yiddish New York, and other festivals throughout the globe. He collected, studied, performed, and documented traditional music in Romania as a Fulbright scholar and has lived and traveled in Hungary and Greece, learning traditional violin styles. In 2018 he received the prestigious NYSCA/NYFA Fellowship in Folk/Traditional Arts. Shulman-Ment's debut solo album, "A Redele" (A Wheel) (Oriente Musik, 2012), was nominated for the German Record Critics' Award. His new group, Midwood, released its first album, "Out of the Narrows" (Chant Records), in May 2018.

Raffi Boden is a New York-based cellist, composer, and educator known for his lush tone, groovy bass lines, and versatility in a variety of genres. Equally at home in both classical and klezmer, Boden has performed internationally in Europe and South America, locally in Carnegie Hall, and with members of the New York Philharmonic. He is a member of the klezmer band Mamaliga, with whom he has performed and been a guest artist at Yiddish New York, Yiddish Summer Weimar, and KlezKanada. Their debut album of original klezmer compositions, "Dos Gildn Bletl" (2021), was hailed as "virtuosic and vibrant." Boden was recently in the Juilliard production of "Indecent", for which he worked with composer and music director Lisa Gutkin to compose a cello part for the band. He is also a member of the six-piece chamber-jazz ensemble Simone Baron & Arco Belo. Boden holds degrees from the Juilliard School (MM) and Oberlin College & Conservatory (BM, BA).