Out of the Shadows: Mayrent Collection Sound Salon

August 24, 2015

Mills Music Library’s Mayrent Collection of Yiddish Recordings will be featured in a special lecture and concert Sound Salon as part of the full-day event Out of the Shadows: Rediscovering Jewish Music, Literature and Theater, from 12:20-2:00pm on Sunday, August 30, 2015. The Sound Salon takes place in Mills Hall, and is free and open to the public.

Henry Sapoznik and Sherry Mayrent
Henry Sapoznik and Sherry Mayrent

Henry Sapoznik, director of the Mayrent Institute for Yiddish Culture, will discuss and play the earliest known recordings of Jewish music, a collection of cylinder recordings first issued by the Thomas Lambert Company of Chicago starting in 1901, recently acquired by the Institute. Collection founder and Institute donor Sherry Mayrent will offer an historic overview of her collection, and explain the diversity and focus of one of the world’s great Jewish sound archives.  The Sound Salon will conclude with Mayrent (clarinet) and  Sapoznik (tenor guitar) playing selections learned from recordings in the collection.

In addition to the Sound Salon, there will be a Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society concert of music from two composers who died at Auschwitz (2:30-4:30pm, First Unitarian Meeting House, Atrium Auditorium, 900 University Bay Drive), and a two-act Cabaret Evening: “Laugh With Us,” and “Mark Nadler’s I’m a Stranger Here Myself” (7:00-10:00pm, Promenade Hall, Overture Center for the Arts, 201 State Street). Registration is required for the free events by visiting: https://us8.campaign-archive.com/?u=a43281fa3930713756a385086&id=b92ed9c524

Out of the Shadows forms part of Performing the Jewish Archive, a three-year international project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK) and directed by Dr. Stephen Muir (School of Music, University of Leeds). The project grants funding to faculty members who seek to recover and engage anew with the creative artifacts of Jewish life. UW-Madison professor Dr. Teryl Dobbs (Chair of Music Education, School of Music) is the only U.S.-based recipient of this prestigious grant, and serves as co-investigator for the international project.