Joseph Rumshinsky
Encyclopedia
Joseph Rumshinsky Jewish composer born near Vilna in Lithuania (then part of Russian Poland). Rumshinsky - with Sholom Secunda, Alexander Olshanetsky
, and Abraham Ellstein
- is considered one of the "big four" of American Yiddish theater.
His mother taught singing to local singers and badkhonim
(wedding entertainers). Rumshinsky was sent as a child to study with a chazn. At the age of eight he was called "Yoshke der notn-freser" (a fresser is somebody who gobbles voraciously) at the music school where he studied piano. He traveled until 1894 with various Hazzan
s. It was in Grodne that he first saw Yiddish theater (Abraham Goldfaden
's operetta Shulamis); he then joined the chorus of Kaminska's traveling troup until his voice changed in 1896, at which point he became choir director for a chazn named Rabinovitch. His first composition was a piano waltz which became very popular in Vilna, where it was published.
In 1897 he became choir director for Borisov's Russian opera/operetta; in 1888 he conducted a full production of Goldfaden's Bar Kokhba. In 1899, in Lódz, he was hired as conductor of the new Hazomir Choral Society, studying and arranging folksongs as well as Haydn, Handel, and Mendelsohn oratorios. He studied with the Polish musician Henryk Meltzer and at the Warsaw Conservatory. In 1903 he left for London to avoid conscription in the czar's army.
In London he met the New Yorker Charles Tsunzer (Charles Zunser, the son of the folk bard Eliakum Zunser
), who convinced him to emigrate to the United States in 1904. Blocked by the union from working in the theater, he taught piano and wrote compositions including a funeral march commemorating the Kishinev pogrom
. 1905-1906 he was director at Boston's Hope Theater.
He married the actress Sabiba Laksher (Sabrina Laxer) - their son Maury was a pianist and composer as well. He then returned to New York, where he was still unable to work in theater. He was finally hired, in 1907, as director at Brooklyn's Lyric Theater, and a year later was taken on as conductor and comoposer at the Windsor Theater thanks to dramatic actor Jacob Adler
.
(Sholem Perlmutter wrote:
In 1912 Boaz Young
(husband of famous actress Clara Young
) wrote that when Rumshinsky/Shor's Di Amerikanerin - Dos Meydl fun der vest (The American girl - the maiden from the west) played in Warsaw, "Rumshinsky's music was so successful that not only Jews but also Poles sang it. It was sung in all the cabarets."
He worked at the Royal Theater and Joseph Edelstein's People's theater. At the time, many American yiddish productions were deemed shund (trash) "that encompassed a world of cheap pulp fiction, common periodicals, and other coarse diversions." Rumshinsky tried to steer Yiddish musical entertainment away from what he called "elevated vaudeville" toward his own vision of a new American genre of Yiddish light operetta. In 1916 he joined with Boris Thomashefsky
and worked as composer and conductor at the National Theater, scoring comedies and melodramas. His Tsubrokhene fidl (Broken Fiddle) boasted a full-sized dance corps and a full pit orchestra with two dozen musicians (most productions had previously used a small dance band or wedding band). (When he first added harp, oboe, and bassoon to his orchestrations, actors called him "crazy Wagner."
In 1919 he moved to the Kessler Second Avenue Theater. In 1923 Rumshinsky introduced Molly Picon
to Second Avenue in a production of Yankele. Molly Picon, her husband Jacob (Yankl) Kalich, and Rumshinsky were called "the Three Musketeers of the East Side" in a 1931 New York Times article.
Rumshinsky wrote many dozens of shows over the course of four decades. Beginning in the 1930s, he also worked in radio, becoming music director of the only Yiddish program broadcast on a nationwide network, The Jewish Hour, sponsored by the Yiddish daily newspaper Der Tog. He worked from 1946–49 at Maurice Schwartz’s Yiddish Art Theater, scoring Hershele ostropoler, Isaac Leib Peretz's Dray matones, and Shalom Aleichem
's Blondzhende shtern.
In 1940 he collected his writings, published in The Forward
, adding new articles and memoirs, and published them in Tog as Epizodn fun mayn lebn (Episodes from My life). The collection was published in book form in 1944 under the title Klangen fun mayn lebn.
Rumshinsky also composed liturgical pieces. In 1926 he conducted the more than 100-voice chorus of the Jewish Ministers Cantors Association (the Hazzanim Farband Chor) in his biblically based cantata, Oz yashir. In the 1940s Rumshinsky completed an opera in Hebrew, Ruth, which has not been performed or recorded to this day. His final show, Wedding March, was in the midst of its run at the time of his death.
Alexander Olshanetsky
Alexander Olshanetsky was a Jewish-American composer, conductor, and violinist of Russian Jewish descent. He was a major figure within the Yiddish theatre scene in New York City from the mid 1920s until his death in 1946.-Life and career:...
, and Abraham Ellstein
Abraham Ellstein
Abraham "Abe" Ellstein was an American composer for Yiddish entertainments. Along with Shalom Secunda, Joseph Rumshinsky, and Alexander Olshanetsky, Ellstein was one of the "big four" composers of his era in New York City's Second Avenue Yiddish theatre scene...
- is considered one of the "big four" of American Yiddish theater.
His mother taught singing to local singers and badkhonim
Badchen
A badchen or badkhn is a Jewish comedian with scholarly overtones who entertained guests at weddings among the Ashkenazim of Eastern Europe...
(wedding entertainers). Rumshinsky was sent as a child to study with a chazn. At the age of eight he was called "Yoshke der notn-freser" (a fresser is somebody who gobbles voraciously) at the music school where he studied piano. He traveled until 1894 with various Hazzan
Hazzan
A hazzan or chazzan is a Jewish cantor, a musician trained in the vocal arts who helps lead the congregation in songful prayer.There are many rules relating to how a cantor should lead services, but the idea of a cantor as a paid professional does not exist in classical rabbinic sources...
s. It was in Grodne that he first saw Yiddish theater (Abraham Goldfaden
Abraham Goldfaden
Abraham Goldfaden ; was an Russian-born Jewish poet, playwright, stage director and actor in the languages Yiddish and Hebrew, author of some 40 plays.Goldfaden is considered the father of the Jewish modern theatre.In 1876 he founded in...
's operetta Shulamis); he then joined the chorus of Kaminska's traveling troup until his voice changed in 1896, at which point he became choir director for a chazn named Rabinovitch. His first composition was a piano waltz which became very popular in Vilna, where it was published.
In 1897 he became choir director for Borisov's Russian opera/operetta; in 1888 he conducted a full production of Goldfaden's Bar Kokhba. In 1899, in Lódz, he was hired as conductor of the new Hazomir Choral Society, studying and arranging folksongs as well as Haydn, Handel, and Mendelsohn oratorios. He studied with the Polish musician Henryk Meltzer and at the Warsaw Conservatory. In 1903 he left for London to avoid conscription in the czar's army.
In London he met the New Yorker Charles Tsunzer (Charles Zunser, the son of the folk bard Eliakum Zunser
Eliakum Zunser
Eliakum Zunser , was a Lithuanian Jewish Yiddish-language poet, songwriter, and badchen who lived out the last part of his life in U.S.. A 1905 article in the New York Times lauded him as "the father of Yiddish poetry". About a quarter of his roughly 600 songs survive...
), who convinced him to emigrate to the United States in 1904. Blocked by the union from working in the theater, he taught piano and wrote compositions including a funeral march commemorating the Kishinev pogrom
Kishinev pogrom
The Kishinev pogrom was an anti-Jewish riot that took place in Chişinău, then the capital of the Bessarabia province of the Russian Empire on April 6-7, 1903.-First pogrom:...
. 1905-1906 he was director at Boston's Hope Theater.
He married the actress Sabiba Laksher (Sabrina Laxer) - their son Maury was a pianist and composer as well. He then returned to New York, where he was still unable to work in theater. He was finally hired, in 1907, as director at Brooklyn's Lyric Theater, and a year later was taken on as conductor and comoposer at the Windsor Theater thanks to dramatic actor Jacob Adler
Jacob Pavlovich Adler
Jacob Pavlovich Adler , born Yankev P. Adler, was a Jewish actor and star of Yiddish theater, first in Odessa, and later in London and New York City....
.
(Sholem Perlmutter wrote:
In 1912 Boaz Young
Boaz Young
Boaz Yungvits , aka Bernard Young was a Polish actor.-Biography:Young learned Russian, Polish, and German in childhood after studying and learning Hebrew with the Yanover Rav...
(husband of famous actress Clara Young
Clara Young (Yiddish theater)
Clara Young was a Yiddish theatrical actor. Born to parents who loved the stage she spent her early years in a home that housed rehearsals of traveling Yiddish theater troups...
) wrote that when Rumshinsky/Shor's Di Amerikanerin - Dos Meydl fun der vest (The American girl - the maiden from the west) played in Warsaw, "Rumshinsky's music was so successful that not only Jews but also Poles sang it. It was sung in all the cabarets."
He worked at the Royal Theater and Joseph Edelstein's People's theater. At the time, many American yiddish productions were deemed shund (trash) "that encompassed a world of cheap pulp fiction, common periodicals, and other coarse diversions." Rumshinsky tried to steer Yiddish musical entertainment away from what he called "elevated vaudeville" toward his own vision of a new American genre of Yiddish light operetta. In 1916 he joined with Boris Thomashefsky
Boris Thomashefsky
Boris Thomashefsky was a Ukrainian-born Jewish singer and actor who became one of the biggest stars in Yiddish theatre; born in Tarashcha , a shtetl near Kiev, Ukraine, he emigrated to the U.S. at the age of 12 in 1881...
and worked as composer and conductor at the National Theater, scoring comedies and melodramas. His Tsubrokhene fidl (Broken Fiddle) boasted a full-sized dance corps and a full pit orchestra with two dozen musicians (most productions had previously used a small dance band or wedding band). (When he first added harp, oboe, and bassoon to his orchestrations, actors called him "crazy Wagner."
In 1919 he moved to the Kessler Second Avenue Theater. In 1923 Rumshinsky introduced Molly Picon
Molly Picon
Molly Picon was an American actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a lyricist and dramatic storyteller....
to Second Avenue in a production of Yankele. Molly Picon, her husband Jacob (Yankl) Kalich, and Rumshinsky were called "the Three Musketeers of the East Side" in a 1931 New York Times article.
Rumshinsky wrote many dozens of shows over the course of four decades. Beginning in the 1930s, he also worked in radio, becoming music director of the only Yiddish program broadcast on a nationwide network, The Jewish Hour, sponsored by the Yiddish daily newspaper Der Tog. He worked from 1946–49 at Maurice Schwartz’s Yiddish Art Theater, scoring Hershele ostropoler, Isaac Leib Peretz's Dray matones, and Shalom Aleichem
Shalom aleichem
Shalom aleikhem is a greeting version in Hebrew, literally meaning "peace be upon you". The appropriate response is "aleikhem shalom", or "upon you be peace"....
's Blondzhende shtern.
In 1940 he collected his writings, published in The Forward
The Forward
The Forward , commonly known as The Jewish Daily Forward, is a Jewish-American newspaper published in New York City. The publication began in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily issued by dissidents from the Socialist Labor Party of Daniel DeLeon...
, adding new articles and memoirs, and published them in Tog as Epizodn fun mayn lebn (Episodes from My life). The collection was published in book form in 1944 under the title Klangen fun mayn lebn.
Rumshinsky also composed liturgical pieces. In 1926 he conducted the more than 100-voice chorus of the Jewish Ministers Cantors Association (the Hazzanim Farband Chor) in his biblically based cantata, Oz yashir. In the 1940s Rumshinsky completed an opera in Hebrew, Ruth, which has not been performed or recorded to this day. His final show, Wedding March, was in the midst of its run at the time of his death.