The Cockney Yiddish Podcast explores the unknown Yiddish popular culture of London's East End through an array of newly discovered stories and songs from the 1880s to the 1950s. Historians Nadia Valman and Vivi Lachs share their passion for the tunes and words of Jewish Londoners encountering the Cockney culture of music halls, street markets and rhyming slang. They discover a rich landscape of music and interviews from the archives and chat about hidden histories, family stories, lost connections and real and imagined places with special guests and readers including Michael Rosen, Miriam Margolyes, Alan Dein and David Schneider. Join Nadia and Vivi on their journey and hear East London’s long forgotten songs and stories brought to new life by contemporary musicians and actors.
Episodes released every Monday.
Go to our website for more information about the music and texts we discuss.
The Cockney Yiddish Podcast is written and presented by Nadia Valman and Vivi Lachs
Produced by Natalie Steed at Rhubarb Rhubarb for Queen Mary University of London Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), Grant reference AH/Z505614/1.
Big thanks to: Adam Corsini at the Jewish Museum London; Tamsin Bookey and Sanjida Alam at Tower Hamlets Local History Library and Archives; Ru Dannreuther, Silke Boettcher, Kaptan Miah and Olivia Warren at Queen Mary University of London; Ashraf Al-Hawrani, the Holocaust Survivors’ Centre, London, the Yiddish Sof-Vokh.
Podcast image: © Jeremy Richardson.
Featured music: Klezmer Klub and Katsha’nes.
Translations: Vivi Lachs and Barry Smerin.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
The Cockney Yiddish Podcast explores the unknown Yiddish popular culture of London's East End through an array of newly discovered stories and songs from the 1880s to the 1950s. Historians Nadia Valman and Vivi Lachs share their passion for the tunes and words of Jewish Londoners encountering the Cockney culture of music halls, street markets and rhyming slang. They discover a rich landscape of music and interviews from the archives and chat about hidden histories, family stories, lost connections and real and imagined places with special guests and readers including Michael Rosen, Miriam Margolyes, Alan Dein and David Schneider. Join Nadia and Vivi on their journey and hear East London’s long forgotten songs and stories brought to new life by contemporary musicians and actors.
Episodes released every Monday.
Go to our website for more information about the music and texts we discuss.
The Cockney Yiddish Podcast is written and presented by Nadia Valman and Vivi Lachs
Produced by Natalie Steed at Rhubarb Rhubarb for Queen Mary University of London Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), Grant reference AH/Z505614/1.
Big thanks to: Adam Corsini at the Jewish Museum London; Tamsin Bookey and Sanjida Alam at Tower Hamlets Local History Library and Archives; Ru Dannreuther, Silke Boettcher, Kaptan Miah and Olivia Warren at Queen Mary University of London; Ashraf Al-Hawrani, the Holocaust Survivors’ Centre, London, the Yiddish Sof-Vokh.
Podcast image: © Jeremy Richardson.
Featured music: Klezmer Klub and Katsha’nes.
Translations: Vivi Lachs and Barry Smerin.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
This episode, entirely in Yiddish, focuses on the pressures on interwar immigrant and second generation Jews to engage with English life and the particular dilemma of what to do about Christmas. We hear Katie Brown’s story of a family negotiating Hanukkah and Christmas and the street song ‘Mayn heym in Ventvort Strit’. This week’s guest, Yiddish teacher Sima Beeri describes her multilingual background and her experience of Lithuanian-Yiddish Christmas. We discuss the way English and Cockney words, like ‘kapati’ (cup of tea), creep into Yiddish texts, with participants of the UK Sof-Vokh Yiddish learners’ and speakers’ Weekend, and the Holocaust Survivors’ Centre Yiddish Group.
The episode is entirely in Yiddish. Go to our website for an English transcript.
The Cockney Yiddish Podcast is written and presented by Nadia Valman and Vivi Lachs
Produced by Natalie Steed at Rhubarb Rhubarb for Queen Mary University of London
Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council
Guest: Sima Beeri
Contributors: participants from the Yiddish Sof-vokh 2024: Joseph, Pam, Justin, Tamara, Jake, Barry, Motl, and participants of the London Holocaust Survivors Centre Yiddish group
Readers: Vivi Lachs,Sima Beeri
Featured story: Katie Brown, ‘Krismes Prezents’ (Alts in eynem, 1951)
Featured song: Raymond Kalman, ‘Mayn heym in ventvort strit’ (streetsong)
Theme music: Klezmer Klub, ‘Vaytshepl mayn vaytshepl’ (trad) and ‘Yiddisher Honga’ (trad). From the CD Whitechapel mayn Vaytshepl (Klub Records, 2009)
Podcast image: © Jeremy Richardson
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.