KlezmerQuerque 2017 Schedule of Events
BUY TICKETS NOW!!! Download Registration Form and Schedule with class descriptions
Thursday evening, February 16, 2017: 5pm-8:30pm. Special KlezmerQuerque event in partnership with ABQ Museum 3rd Thursdays. FREE evening events: The Rebbe’s Orkestra with dancing led by BRUCE BIERMAN!!
Friday evening, February 17, 2017:6:00-6:25pm. Special FREE Dance program for children with BRUCE BIERMAN! 6:30pm: Der Freylekher Shabes (Joyous Shabbat) with GUEST ARTISTS Jack, Christina & Bruce plus Cantorial Soloist Beth Cohen, Alavados Band, The Nahalat Shalom Community Klezmer Band, Rikud Yiddish dance troupe and The Rebbe's Orkestra. 6:30 -- A joyous danced & participatory old country Shabbat service (ARTISTS’ participation optional); 7:15 -- vegetarian potluck dinner; 7:45 -- brief performance by The Rebbe’s Orkestra (10 mins.) with optional dancing led/taught by Bruce; 8pm –GUEST MUSIC ARTISTS (20 mins. max.), followed by more dancing led by GUEST ARTIST BRUCE BIERMAN and Rikud Dancers to klezmer music by The Nahalat Shalom Klezmer Band.
Saturday, February 18, 2017: 10:00am-12:30pm: Shabes Koydesh Service with Hazzan Jack “Yankl” Falk.
Saturday evening Feb. 18, 2017: 7-10pm / doors @ 6:30pm BIG CONCERT & DANCE PARTY!! Concert & dance party Featuring 2 sets (approx. 7:35-8:35pm & 9-9:45pm) by GUEST MUSIC ARTISTS incl. BRUCE for dance - following the opening act of The Rebbe’s Orkestra (7-7:30pm).
Sunday, February 19, 2017: THREE 90 minute workshops in klezmer music & dance from 10am-5:30pm featuring GUEST ARTISTS--PLUS a special catered Lunch 'n Learn
Session #1 (10-11:30am) $20.00 Pick one class:
Bruce Bierman: The Joy of Yiddish Dance. Discover golden gems of the Hasidik and klezmer dance repertoire that are sure to lift your spirits and connect you to the joyous and soulful music of the Ashkenazi Jews. Made for the folk by the folk, the main dances: freylekhs, shers, shers, zhoks, and khosidls are less concerned with fancy footwork and more with painting the dance floor with swirling circles, snaking lines, contra lines and varying patterns on the dance floor that create immediate connection and massive amounts of joy and laughter. You are invited to follow the Dance Master, but encouraged to shine with your own unique individual expression. All ages and experiences welcome.
Christina Crowder: Join accordionist and ethno-musicologist Christina Crowder for a session in which she will introduce new material from her Moldavian collections. The session will explore similarities and differences in the ways that Moldavians and Jews approached and transformed very similar music to suit their own cultural purposes. Issues of accompaniment style and texture, ornamentation, and elaboration will be addressed while learning a pile of cool tunes.
Jack “Yankl” Falk: "Baym Zeydns Tish" -- Yankl shares some of his favorite nigunim and zmiros from across the chasidic world (and beyond). Learn new tunes and enrich your own tish!
Noon-2:00pm: ‘Lunch 'n Learn’ featuring Clara Byom, clarinetist & UNM graduate student in ethnomusicology: Enjoy a delicious catered ‘milkhik’ lunch (NO meat / YES:fish, eggs, dairy & lots of veggie foods) to the music of ABQ’s own Watermelon Klezmer Band: Di Kavene Kapelye. Then Clara will present "Mixing in Too Much Jewish: American Klezmer Musicians of the 1950s to 1970s" MUST BE REGISTERED BY FEBRUARY 9!!! Lecture without lunch requires a $5 minimum donation.
Session #2 (2:15-3:45pm) $20.00 pick one class:
Bruce Bierman: !Freilekh Fiesta! ---dance to groovy Latin klezmer music by the one and only Irving Fields of 'Bagels and Bongos' fame. Try the 'Havannah Negila' or the 'Mazeltov Merengue'. Basic steps, patterns and stylings of Yiddish and Latin dance will be taught and fused together in one picante mishmash.
Christina Crowder: Zhok, Slow Hora, Dobriden and the Ovoid Rhythm. This workshop session will be a deep dive into the most difficult rhythm to count, yet the easiest rhythm to feel in the klezmer/Moldavian Transitional repertoire. Both physics and metaphysics will be recklessly invoked to inspire participants to let go of rigid concepts of “three” and complicated notions of “five” in favor of a new epistemology of the Oval and the Ovoid rhythm as a guiding principle for the different styles and dance tempos within the broad category of Zsok/Slow Hora.
Jack “Yankl” Falk: "Jewish and Goyish" -- We are a people of many languages, and our song tradition reflects that. In this workshop, we'll go beyond the familiar Yiddish canon to discover the chasidic and Jewish folk songs that our Hungarian and Polish neighbors could understand Smacznego! Egeszegedre!
Session #3 (4-5:30pm) $20.00 pick one class:
Bruce Bierman: The Ecstatic Jewish Dance Experience -- Glorious Jewish World Beat and Middle East grooves are our soundtrack as the whole body gets a gentle invigorating stretch in warm-ups based on the shapes and deeper meanings of the Hebrew letters. Then, vocabulary, gestures, stylings and patterns of the Yemenite and Hasidic ecstatic dances will be shared and set into motion. Come dance your prayers for a world of sholem and salaam.
Yankl and Christina: "The Nign Inside the Nign" -- For vocalists and instrumentalists. Each one of us has a unique relationship with sacred melodies. In this workshop, we'll work together to go to the heart of Ashkenazic chant. Peel back the klezmer instrumental and find the nign at its core. For instrumentalists, the Nign workshop will help non-singers bring elements of vocal technique — and vocal thinking — into both melodic and accompaniment playing.
“Zayt Gezints” – Be well / farewells / till next year (5:30pm-5:45pm)