Klezmer & Yiddish Dance Workshops with Christina Crowder and Maia Brown

The day after their concert, Christina & The Zamlers: The Lost Klezmer Music of the An-ski Expeditions, celebrated klezmorim Maia Brown and Christina Crowder offer two interactive workshops for the local community, open to all!

Sunday, February 22nd (1:00-4:30pm)

Gallia & Ben Chud Auditorium

Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture

6184 Ash Street, Vancouver

➤   How to Get Here / Building & Accessibility Information

Free street parking and underground parking available (elevator access).

Admission: By donation, no minimum (suggested amount: $18 per person / $36 for both workshops)

• Participants can sign up for one or both workshops (90 min. each) in the registration form

• There will be a 30-minute break between workshops (light refreshments provided)

• Dance workshop is open to all ages and experience/skill levels

• Musicians: bring your own instruments!

Low-cost participation is offered with the support of the Peretz Centre, KlezWest, and Or Shalom.

Get tickets for Christina & The Zamlers: The Lost Klezmer Music of the An-ski Expeditions (part of Or Shalom's Light in Winter Concert Series), Saturday, February 21st at Or Shalom

1:00-2:30pm: Yiddish Dance

Come think about moving in a Yiddish lineage! If you are a Klezmer musician, dancer, dance-curious, or simkha celebrant, we will explore basic steps and gestures, notice the reciprocal relationship between Klezmer music and dance, and how each of our bodies like to move in this ever-changing vernacular.

Maia Brown is a Yiddish musician and dance-leader, writer, translator, visual artist and educator on unceded Duwamish, Coast Salish land in Seattle, Washington. Brown has a background in oral history and fine art, she received her Masters of Fine Arts in Interdisciplinary Arts at Goddard College. She is the founder of anti-fascist Yiddish folk-punk duo, Brivele, and wears different hats as a cultural worker in communities combining research, direct action, art, education, and celebration in the work of getting free.

3:00-4:30pm: Playing for Yiddish Dance

Exploring the Intersection Between Body Mechanics and Rhythmic Texture in Core Klezmer Dance Genres

Ever wonder what makes the best klezmer tunes so compellingly danceable? Ever experience a truncated dance set and wonder why things didn’t work out? This workshop will explore how the rhythmic textures and grooves we create in the core klezmer dance genres facilitate or block successful dance sets. We’ll take turns playing for each other and as a group, and will learn the basic movement patterns for each dance genre. Understanding these essential movement patterns will make us better accompanists for tantshoyz and simkhes!

Christina Crowder (accordion and tsimbl) has been studying and performing klezmer music and Ashkenazic dance for 30 years, beginning in Budapest, Hungary in 1993 as a founding member of Di Naye Kapelye. She is executive director of the Klezmer Institute, where she oversees the Klezmer Archive Project, the Kiselgof-Makonovetsky Digital Manuscript Project (KMDMP), and year-round programming in support of Ashkenazic expressive culture. Ashkenazic dance music is a passion along with a continued exploration of the Moldavian/Bessarabian corner of the klezmer universe.