Klezmerfest, St. Petersburg

On Wednesday I attended a concert in St. Petersburg which was part of "Klezmerfest," a celebration of the Jewish folk music that is Klezmer and a forum and workshop for Klezmer musicians from different countries. I've always really liked the fiddle-like violin, the improvisation, and the soulful clarinet in Klezmer music and the recent "hipness factor" that this music has earned in places like New York and Warsaw made me curious to hear what klezmer musicians were doing here now. I was also curious what kind of crowd would show up. It turned out the crowd was mostly elderly Jewish folk, but a good amount of non-Russian tourists showed up, as well as some student-aged people. But there were no hipsters! A few of the musicians, however, specifically those from New York and England who I met when I ventured backstage at intermission, had a bit of that sort of geeky hipster Jew feel that many of my friends at Harvard snd Stuyvesant epitomized. The New Yorker is the one at the synthesizer in the first photo. He is attempting to integrate "hip-hop" with "klezmer" - I'd say his attempt was unsuccesful.The most amazing part of this experience was that Sergo Bengilsdorf, the journalist/music professor/Yiddish star whom I lived with in Kishinev was there! I had no idea he was going to be there and when I heard him being introduced by the MC I almost jumped out of my seat. I thought I'd never see him again. Suddently all of my Kishinev memories came back. It was as if my trip had come full circle. I remembered Sergo lovingly feeding his cat Lucya tiny bits of cow liver he cut up for her in the kitchen. I remembered him and his wife listening to his Yiddish-language radioshow (which every Jew in Kishinev knew about and every Yiddish-speaker listened to). Sergo and his wife welcomed me, a total stranger, as if I were their granddaughter. And it was so good to feel at home in a place so foreign as Kishinev and so cold. I cannot express what it was about this couple. They just radiated with love, devotion, and happiness - and projected these feelings onto eachother, onto their narod, and onto me. Of all the wonderful people I've met on this trip, Sergo was the most amazing and inspiring. I ran upto him at intermission and he gave me the warmest, happiest hug and in his ho-ho-ho Santa Claus voice told me that he hoped (and knew somehow) he'd see me here since I had told him I'd be in Piter in mid-June. I'm so glad that I didn't decide to go to Moscow one day earlier. I could have easily missed him. That's him in the photo playing the piano and playing a little skit with his singer (beyond the frame).