Sunday 24th March | 3pm | FREE TICKETS

Everyone welcome:)

Expect a wonderful afternoon of communal singing and insight into the unique sounds of Yiddish culture. Serendipitously, this event falls on the day of the joyous Jewish festival Purim.

Led by Polina Shephard, a composer, performer and cultural activist originally from Siberia, now living in Brighton. Having been part of the international Yiddish and Klezmer music scene for over 30 years, she works with audiences of different backgrounds and promotes building bridges and unity through singing.

A bit of Yiddish background context: Despite attempts to eradicate its existence during the Holocaust, Yiddish, the 1000-year-old language of the Jews of Eastern Europe, is flourishing, as people young and old, Jewish and non-Jewish, explore its rich cultural heritage. There's a concept in Yiddish called doikayt which translates to "hereness", the state of being here. This has been solidified into Yiddish history: Yiddish language has always gone wherever its people have gone.

Yiddish songs are hugely varied: spiritual, political (such as Bundist songs - the Jewish socialist movement founded in the late 1800s), coming from theatre and cinema. They all describe the diverse lives of Jewish people across Eastern and Central Europe and all the countries they have emigrated to – their history, hopes, memories, politics, celebrations and resistance to oppression.