“What did they sing on the streets of Warsaw in the 20s of the interwar period- a musical repertoire and its reception in the city where cultures interacted”- a lecture by Agnieszka Jeż that will be combined with an audiovisual presentation on June 11th on 19:00 at The Polish Institute in Tel Aviv: 

In English

The lecture will cover issues related to the musical life of interwar Warsaw with a special focus on Jewish artists and their huge role in creating a musical culture in the Polish capital, permanently inscribed in the canon of its most distinguished artists, valued today in Poland and abroad. Art, and especially music, was a place where Polish and Jewish culture met, their mutual influences and inspiration. The extraordinary potential of this creative borderland was reflected in the sound landscape of Warsaw, whose music was a significant element. The streets of the city resounded with a popular repertoire, beloved by the locals, coming from the loudspeakers, but above all, sung and played by street musicians. Fighting with poverty sometimes, meeting with disrespect of wealthier Varsovians, they wandered the streets and districts, selling on the streets the beauty of which crumbs still evoke longing for the past world.
It’s an extraordinary walk around the city that is no longer there, and which is still full of life and is reminiscent of words and melodies, in which you can find echoes of history, still living in its inhabitants.

Agnieszka Jeż is a musicologist and an employee of the Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw ; PhD student at the Faculty of History at the University of Warsaw ; A researcher at the Musical Life of Polish Jews in the Second Polish Republic

graphics by MARIA MICHOŃ