A Night in the Old Marketplace
Singer's Warsaw Festival

A Night in the Old Marketplace is a multi-media theatrical concert based on the phantasmagorical Yiddish classic Bay Nakht afn altn Mark written by I. L. Peretz, probably the most important and innovative Yiddish theater writer. The show is s a mash-up of psychedelic klezmer, Kurt Weill, and folk tunes from the Old Country gone electric, with Exclaim! magazine writing enthusiastically that “the thing is just dripping with incredible talent—it’s man’s arguments with himself, with others, with God, and with everyone all at once, all swirling and dancing together.” All About Jazz magazine called it “a remarkable achievement well worth the attention of fans of klezmer, jazz and all other types of music” and concluding, “it doesn’t get any better than this.”

Born in Zamość in 1851, Isaac Leib Peretz had lived and worked in Warsaw since 1888. In 1951 the street where he lived in the Warsaw district of Wola was named after him.  

Written in 1907, Bay Nakht afn altn Mark is a legendary work and the first modern Yiddish play. It is a ghost story and a love story – at once comic, cosmic, hallucinogenic, and heartbreaking. It tells the story of the Badkhn, a traditional Jewish wedding jester, who over the course of one long night challenges God’s authority by attempting to resuscitate the dead and bring on the end of days.

Conceived and directed by Alexandra Aron, composed by Grammy winner and Klezmatics’ giant Frank London with lyrics and text by Glen Berger this multi-media concert reflects the off-kilter cabaret of Kurt Weill and Tom Waits, mixing Jewish, jazz and world beats this playful and darkly humorous ‘shtetl ghost story’. 

Five singers perform roles intended for scores of people with a live band and a narrator who serves as a guide for the audience through the Badkhn’s long, twisted night, connecting the story between each number. It is an absurdly funny, dark night of mischief and mysticism. 

The project has been performed all over the world (Milan, Copenhagen, Warsaw, Toronto, Sao Paulo) where we've invited guest luminaries to read the narration in the local language.