Dmitri Shostakovich, Op. 79.
From Jewish Folk Poetry, in Yiddish

From Jewish Folk Poetry, Op. 79

Music: Dmitri Shostakovich (1948)

The original folk lyrics in Yiddish was published in 1940 by Yekhezkl Dobrushin and Avrom Yuditsky. Shostakovich used the Russian version, which appeared in 1947. In turn, the lyrics for this performance was produced by Joachim Braun and published in 1989. He only slightly modified the original Yiddish texts in order to adapt them to Shostakovich’s melodies.

Soprano vocals: Eva Ben-Zvi

Alto vocals: Elena Goubina

Tenor vocals: Nikolay Kurpe

Director: Andrey Tchistiakov

Orchestra of the Bolshoi Theatre

See below a sample of the songs’ texts (right to left): Dobrushin’s original, the Russian version and Braun’s adaptation.

Video engineer: Yoel Matveyev

Illustrated by art works of Isaak Asknaziy, Marc Chagall, Issachar Ber Ryback and Anatoli Kaplan

Produced by the Heritage Projects Foundation in 2023