The newest album by Geoff  Berner, ’Victory Party’ to be released on March 8, 2011, is a joy.  It goes far beyond what most consider Jewish music (ie. Fiddler on the Roof).  Though cinematic in scope (think: Loreena Mckennitt), Mr. Berner knows how to bring down the tempo and simplify the instrumentation as the song ‘Mayn Rue Platz’ illustrates to telling effect.  There is a good vocal mix here from Geoff’s occasional punk(tuations) to an angelic sounding female.  Hide the Manischewitz, send the kids to bed, pull out that Bushmills Irish Whiskey, it’s a night to savour.  

Klezmer (from Wiki) (Yiddish כליזמר ,pl כליזמר,כליזמרים ,from Hebrew כלי זמר – vessels of music ) is a musical tradition of the Ashkenazic Jews of Eastern Europe. Played by professional musicians called klezmorim, the genre consists largely of dance tunes and instrumental display pieces for weddings and other celebrations. Although the genre has its origins in Eastern Europe, the particular form now known as klezmer developed in the United States in the milieu of Yiddish-speaking Jewish immigrants who arrived between 1880 and 1924.

Compared to most other European folk music styles, very little is known about the history of klezmer music, and much of what is said about it must be seen as conjecture.

The term klezmer comes from a combination of Hebrew words– kley, meaning instrument, and zemer, meaning song; leading to k’li zemer כְּלִי זֶמֶר, literally “vessels of song” = “musical instrument“).

Originally, klezmer referred to musical instruments, and was later extended to refer to musicians themselves. It gradually came to refer to the musician; from the 16th to 18th centuries older terms such as leyts (clown) gave way.^[3] It was not until the mid-to-late 20th Century that the word was used to identify a musical genre. Early 20th Century recordings and writings most often refer to the style as “Yiddish” music, although it is also sometimes called Freilech music (Yiddish, literally “Happy music”).