Jeanette Lewicki will present her research of pre-war Yiddish culture and songs collected by ethnographer Ruth Rubin, including archival recordings of Ashkenazi refugees from the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York City. This presentation is part of KlezCalifornia’s program, Tam: Tastes of Yiddish Culture.

Prime Time Club is a monthly gathering with lunch and interesting guest speakers for congregants and guests 65 (or getting there) and older. $10 lunch fee; presentation only, free.

The Ruth Rubin Legacy highlights the renowned vocalist and scholar's collection of over 1,900 Yiddish songs performed by some of the most extraordinary traditional singers of the 20th century, including Rubin herself. The 78rpm acetate discs, reel-to-reel tapes and cassettes recorded by Rubin between 1946 and the 1970s are in the process of being painstakingly re-assembled and are made truly accessible here for the first time. Ruth Rubin's entire life's work can be found on this site: field recordings, lectures, concerts, radio interviews, videos, manuscripts and published materials.

Jeanette Lewicki performs & teaches in concert halls, recording studios, dreams & subways around the world. She has recorded seven CDs with groups such as San Francisco Klezmer Experience and her own band, the Gonifs. Jeanette spent three years in New York, where she was commissioned to arrange the Yiddish children’s songs of Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman. Her other projects include a CD with Bessarabian singer Arkady Gendler, which critic Ari Davidow calls “a perfect example of how you record the music of older musicians whose knowledge and songs you wish to preserve.” As a faculty member of Yiddish Summer Weimar 2006, she worked with a new generation of Yiddish songwriters in an innovative program run by her teacher, Alan Bern (music director of the band Brave Old World). Ms. Lewicki currently lives, teaches, sings and plays in San Francisco, CA.

KlezCalifornia has developed and tested twenty-six 45- to 75-minute lesson plans, and made over a hundred presentations to students in thirty schools and camps. Students have fun, while engaging with Yiddish culture as it enriches North American Jewish life today, and learning about its origins (and the family origins of many students) in Eastern Europe.