From Avenue A to the Great White Way: Yiddish & American Popular Songs From 1914-1950

Disc 1
1	Voyl Iz Der Mammen / Alexander Olshanetsky & His Orchestra Mother Is Good 2:55
2	In Shtedtele Nikolayev / David Medoff In the Town of Nikolayev 3:22
3	Ihr Megt Gleybn Oder Neyn / Molly Picon previously unreleased / You Can Believe It or Not 3:44
4	V'hakohanim / Yoselle Rosenblatt The High Priest 4:01
5	Huliet, Huliet Kinderlach / Abe Moskowitz Play, Play Little Children 3:13
6	Whoopee / Peisachke Burstein 3:12
7	Inzer Rebin' Vunder / Dora Bowshower Our Rabbi's Wonder 3:09
8	A Brief Finem Chosid Tsum Rebin / Seymour Rechtzeit A Letter From a Hasid to His Rabbi 3:29
9	Sha, Sha Der Rebi Geht / Morris Goldstein Shh, Shh, the Rabbi's Coming 3:09
10	Vu Zenen Meine Zieben Gute Yohr? / Nellie Casman Where Are My Seven Good Years? 3:16
11	Gevald! Di Bananas / David Medoff Help! The Bananas 2:42
12	Hot Dogs / Molly Picon 2:53
13	Dos Yiddel Fun Der South / Irv Grossman The Jew from the South 2:56
14	Dem Pastuchel's Chulem / Abe Schwartz's Orchestra The Shepherd's Dream 2:51
15	Gevalt! Di Nerven / Jacob Zanger Help! My Nerves 2:55
16	Mayer! / Annie Lubin 3:03
17	Mit 40 Yohr Tzurick / Menasha Skulnik Forty Years Ago 3:05
18	Yes Sir, Zi Iz May Kale / Peisachke Burstein Yes Sir, She Is My Bride 2:55
19	Vie Iz Dos Gessele (Where Is the Little Street?) / Abe Moskowitz 3:22
20	Vos Gevehn Iz Nishtu / Nellie Casman What Was Is No More 3:23
21	Beigelach / Peisachke Burstein Rolls 3:16
22	Who'll Buy My Bublitchki? / Emery Deutsch & His Orchestra 2:39
23	Zaynin Mir Chasidimlach / Jewish Art Quartet previously unreleased / We Are Hasidim 2:11
24	Bei Mir Bist Du Schon / Belle Baker To Me You Are So Beautiful 2:25
25	Roumania, Roumania / Aaron Lebedeff 3:09
Disc 2
1	What Am I Gonna Do? / Irving Berlin previously unreleased 3:26
2	I Don't Know Whether to Do It or Not / Fanny Brice 3:05
3	Palesteena / Eddie Cantor 2:35
4	Rose of the Volga / Sophie Tucker previously unreleased 3:04
5	Tomorow Is Another Day / Al Jolson previously unreleased 3:15
6	Hooray for Baby and Me / Al Jolson previously unreleased 2:52
7	That's Yiddisha Jazz / Julian Rose 3:48
8	The Sheik of Avenue B / Frank Crumit 2:41
9	When Nathan Was Married to Rose of Washington Square / Willie Howard 2:59
10	Since Henry Ford Apologized to Me / The Happiness Boys 3:09
11	Yiddisha Charleston / Nathan Glantz & His Orchestra 2:52
12	Yosel / Nellie Casman 3:09
13	Joseph, Joseph / Russ Morgan & His Orchestra 2:24
14	Der Shtiller Bulgar / Abe Schwartz's Orchestra The Quiet Bulgar 3:06
15	And the Angels Sing / Mildred Bailey & Her Orchestra 2:53
16	Den Nayem Sher / Seymour Rechtzeit previously unreleased / The New Sher 0:33
17	The Wedding Samba / Xavier Cugat & His Orchestra 2:58
18	The Super-Special Picture of the Year / Yacht Club Boys 2:57
19	Mischa-Yascha-Toscha-Sascha / The Funnyboners previously unreleased 3:18
20	Egyptian Ella / Ted Lewis & His Band 3:23
21	Matzoh Balls / Slim Gaillard & His Flat Foot Floogee Boys 2:36
22	Utt-Da-Zay / Cab Calloway & His Orchestra That's the Way 2:55
23	A Bee Gezindt / Mildred Bailey 2:58
24	My Little Cousin / Benny Goodman & His Orchestra 3:18
25	Jungle Madness / Gene Krupa & His Orchestra previously unreleased 2:51

Barnes & Noble

In one fell swoop, Sony's Legacy archives have corrected a grave injustice, making available a treasure trove of turn-of-the-century Jewish music heretofore enjoyed only by those endowed with 78 rpm phonographs. The bustling activity in New York's Yiddish theater district, the Lower East Side, birthed some of the finest voices, actors, and writers of the early 20th century, from cantor Yossele Rosenblatt to singer Eddie Cantor and songwriters Sholom Secunda and Irving Berlin. Two discs and 50 tracks capture the music's breadth, from the sublime -- Rosenblatt's heavenly hit "V'Hakohanim" -- to the ridiculous -- David Medoff's answer-song "Gevald! Di Bananas" -- with wonders and novelties in between. To novices, this may have all the makings of a trip to Grandma's house minus the ruggelach, but the range of musical expression here is revelatory, as the busy songsmiths dashed off Yiddish rejoinders to popular American songs and catchphrases such as "Yes, Sir, She's My Baby" and "The Sheik of Araby" (which became "The Sheik of Avenue B"). There was also a vogue for troubling anthems of self-deprecation in the "Hebe songs," a particularly Jewish kind of minstrelsy, documented here as well. But Jewish success in America was mirrored in the music, too, as crossover songs and performers contributed to the Yiddishizing of American entertainment. The second disc revels in such flush material, including the megahit "Bie Mir Bist Du Schon" and the raft of Yiddish-inspired jazz and Broadway hits, from Benny Goodman's "And the Angels Sing" (after an Abe Schwartz klezmer number) to Cab Calloway's Jewish-jiving "Utt-Da-Zay (That's the Way)" to Xavier Cugat's "The Wedding Samba." Those who haven't heard this music in decades will be thrilled by the selection and fidelity, while those who grew up hearing about Eddie Cantor, Fanny Brice, Al Jolson, and Belle Baker will be able to at last appreciate this chapter in American Jewish experience. Yiddish translations would have been nice, but whaddya want -- everything? Mark Schwartz

All Music Guide

This carefully selected and sequenced compilation of music from the Sony Music vaults traces the influence of Jewish theater music on American popular music. Over half of it consists of songs sung in Yiddish; the rest display the impact of such songs on the mainstream in the first half of the 20th century. Yiddish stars like David Medoff, Molly Picon, Peisachke Burstein, and Abe Moskowitz have several selections early on, and some of them show that the intermingling of the Yiddish theater and Tin Pan Alley was not a one-way street. Burstein's "Whoopee" comments on the popular 1920s song "Makin' Whoopee," which had been introduced by Eddie Cantor in the Broadway musical Whoopee, while Medoff's "Gevald! Di Bananas (Help! The Bananas)" is a comic gloss on "Yes! We Have No Bananas." The 1930s hit "Bei Mir Bist Du Schon (To Me You Are So Beautiful)" was famously adapted from a Yiddish theater song; it is presented here in a cover version by Belle Baker that competed with the most popular one by the Andrews Sisters. The second disc tends more toward English lyrics and performers who looked beyond Jewish audiences. Particularly notable are two previously unreleased recordings by Al Jolson that seem only barely relevant. (Jolson was Jewish, but more removed than such peers as Cantor and Fanny Brice from the influence of Yiddish music.) By the end of the disc, there are examples of Yiddish-styled songs from swing bands like those led by Benny Goodman (whose clarinet, in this context, is highly reminiscent of klezmer music) and Gene Krupa. Still, the influence is clear, for instance, as "Der Shtiller Bulgar (The Quiet Bulgar)" can be recognized as the source for the swing era hit "And the Angels Sing." The album is a historical document that is also highly listenable. William Ruhlmann