Wholesale Klezmer Band Klezmer Band from Colrain, MA

Bring your family and guests together in an unforgettable celebration. The Wholesale Klezmer Band's joyful, lively, traditional klezmer music and Yiddish song brings the depth and meaning of Jewish musical traditions to your celebrations and community events. We bring a Yiddishe neshome, Jewish soul, to weddings, bar/bat mitzvah celebrations, anniversaries, concerts, synagogue dedications, school programs and more. We've played for hundreds of Bar/Bat Mitzvah celebrations and weddings. We offer dance-leading and often guide families in incorporating wedding traditions before and after the chuppah for a celebration meaningful to the family and guests. We'll send you a link to our Guide to Jewish Weddings or Bar & Bat Mitzvah Guide. We'll include in the mix songs & dance tunes that represent all sides of the family, such as Spanish, Finnish, Irish, Russian, Ladino and more. Our concerts have been featured in NYC, Boston, Saratoga Springs, the Berkshires, Burlington, Springfield, Hartford, Fort Wayne and many places in between. They include original, folk and Yiddish theater songs interspersed with instrumental music, and may include a whole dance set after the intermission. Songs are presented with translation and explanations of the lyrics and cultural concepts. Yiddish children's songs and Hebrew holiday songs are part of our repertoire. A recent addition to our repertoire is Sabbath services using klezmer tunes fitted to prayers, for a lively, traditional-style service. The band features vocalist Yosl Kurland, a contemporary composer of Yiddish songs, Yiddish teacher and wedding badkhn (singer/jester). Instrumentalists are Aaron Bousel, accordion; Joanna Morse, violin; Peggy Davis, flute; Brian Bender, trombone and guest musicians Margot Leverett, clarinet and Rafe Wolman, violin. Band members have background in music of other cultures, languages and genres, so don't hesitate to ask if you have interest in other musical traditions. If you'd like to add jazz or a DJ after the band plays, just ask. Peggy is also a calligrapher and designs wedding invitations, ketubot (marriage contracts) for celebrations. We have an extensive menu of offerings for residencies, including khazones (cantorial singing) for services, lecture/discussions & stand-alone classes on the Yiddish language, Eastern European Jewish culture, workshops on klezmer music for instrumentalists, Yiddish song, children's activities, Hebrew lettering, Holocaust history and songs. Descriptions of past residencies will be sent on request. The Wholesale Klezmer Band has performed in the Celebration of Folk Music for the 100th Anniversary of Carnegie Hall, hosted by Pete Seeger, at the inaugural parade for Pres. Bill Clinton, the Old Songs Festival, Bread & Roses Festival in Lowell, MA, Beacon Sloop Festival, Klezmerquerqe Festival.