National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (Folksbiene) — led by Zalmen Mlotek, Artistic Director, and Dominick Balletta, Executive Director — continues to bring the stage to global audiences when Folksbiene LIVE! features “Zalmen Mlotek’s Living Room Concert” on Wednesday, April 22 at 7:00 p.m.
Folksbiene LIVE! is an online celebration of Yiddish culture, featuring live-streamed theater, American Jewish performers, concerts, lectures, talks, and other events. The programming—which can be viewed at nytf.org — launched in mid-March to entertain, engage, and inspire as cultural and arts venues closed and audiences stayed indoors amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The Tony Award-nominated and Drama Desk Award-winning Folksbiene —i n residence at the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust in Battery Park City — is the longest consecutively producing theatre in the U.S. and the world’s oldest continuously operating Yiddish theatre company.
Each episode is broadcast live on NYTF’s Facebook page here.
Folksbiene LIVE! took a break during Passover and returns by popular demand with Zalmen Mlotek’s Living Room Concert, kicking-off a regularly scheduled episode each week on Wednesdays at 7:00 PM. Stay tuned by subscribing to NYTF’s newsletter and catch up on past episodes at nytf.org/live.
Zalmen Mlotek is an internationally recognized authority on Yiddish folk and theater music as well as a leading figure in the Jewish theatre and concert worlds. For the past 20 years, he has been the Artistic Director and conductor at Folksbiene. He brought Yiddish-Klezmer music to Broadway and Off-Broadway stages with the Tony-nominated “Those Were the Days” and Drama Desk-nominated Amerike – “The Golden Land.” He serves as Music Director for most Folksbiene productions, including the recent “New York Times Critics’ Pick,” “The Sorceress,” and Drama Desk-nominated musical, “The Golden Bride.
His music can be heard in over two-dozen recordings and films, and he has taught and performed all over the world, working with countless singers. His vision brought the critically acclaimed award-winning “Fiddler on the Roof” in Yiddish (“Fidler Afn Dakh”), directed by Joel Grey, for which he served as music director, to New York City. He will serve as musical supervisor for the International and National tour, which opens in Sydney and Melbourne in September 2020.
And, coming up on Wednesday, April 29, at 7:00 p.m., is Yiddish Blues in Berlin, presented by Daniel Kahn.
The Detroit-born and Berlin-based Kahn has toured the world as a singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, translator, and teacher. He originated the role of Pertshik in National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene’s “Fiddler on the Roof” in Yiddish (“Fidler afn Dakh”), which features his translation of the lost Bock/Harnick song “Any Day Now.” He also was Yosl in Folksbiene’s acclaimed remount of “Amerike – The Golden Land,” and played Biff in New Yiddish Rep’s “Death of a Salesman” in Yiddish. At Berlin’s Gorki Theater, he has worked as a composer, director, playwright, actor, and music curator. In 2016, the Ashkenaz Foundation named him the inaugural Theodore Bikel Artist-in-Residence. In 2018, he received the Chane and Joseph Mlotek Award for Yiddish Continuity. His music projects include his award-winning klezmer punk band The Painted Bird, The Internationale, The Brothers Nazaroff, The Disorientalists, Bulat Blues, and Semer Ensemble.
About the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene
Now celebrating its 105th season, Tony Award-nominated and Drama Desk Award-winning National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (NYTF) is the longest consecutively producing theatre in the U.S. and the world’s oldest continuously operating Yiddish theatre company. NYTF, which presented the award-winning Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish, directed by Joel Grey, to sold-out audiences before it moved to Off-Broadway uptown, is in residence at the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Zalmen Mlotek and Executive Director Dominick Balletta, NYTF is dedicated to creating a living legacy through the arts, connecting generations and bridging communities. NYTF aims to bring history to life by reviving and restoring lost and forgotten work, commissioning new work, and adapting pre-existing work for the 21st Century. Serving a diverse audience comprised of performing arts patrons, cultural enthusiasts, Yiddish-language aficionados, and the general public, the company presents plays, musicals, concerts, lectures, interactive educational workshops, and community-building activities in English and Yiddish, with English and Russian supertitles accompanying performances. NYTF provides access to a century-old cultural legacy and inspires the imaginations of the next generation to contribute to this valuable body of work. Learn more at www.nytf.org.
