Fun vanen? by Myrtle Street Klezmer

December 2021, gathered around a campfire working our numb fingers upon new melodies while keeping the requisite social distance and trying to stay clear of ever-shifting smoke plumes. Through many paths, we arrived on Myrtle Street to play this music together.

“Fun vanen?” (“From where?”)

Where are we from? Where is this song/ornament/lyric from? Where is Myrtle Street?

Is this the central question posed by klezmer, and maybe by all diasporic musics? The whys, whos, whats, whens – leading back to mapping, tracing, remembering, reimagining strands of “from wheres?”

As the song asks, “Fun vanen heybt zikh on a libe?” Where does love come from? In this instance, love came from Fresno, CA in the form of Jemmy Bluestein who taught me The Bluestein Family version of the song.

Tumbalalaika comes to us via Jesse’s Russian-Ukrainian grandparents who sang it to him as a lullaby. Also through Myk’s reimagination of Tumbalalaika on electric guitar, Bea teaching Tumbalalaika in children’s music classes, and my kids shouting out requests for “Tumbalalaika!” at concerts – breathing life into a fuddy old cliché.

Kolomyke arrives via the great accordionist/composer Rob Reich. One of the songs he taught me for my first klezmer gig.

I found Masâr through Rodrigo y Gabriella’s YouTube version. For a year I listened obsessively to this melody, dreaming of performing it. Eventually their cover led me to discover Palestinian oud trio, Le Trio Joubran. The traditional Palestinian music the Joubrans play carries the story of Palestine's culture, its people, and their resilience. Myrtle Street offers our version of Masâr as a wordless prayer, an invitation to personal and collective movement, and as a meditation on shared humanity and liberation.

-Jason, December 2025

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Genug shoyn mit mir tsu reydn,
(Enough already with your talking to me)

Genug shoyn mit mir tsu shmuesn
(Enough chatting with me)

Oy, fir mikh op aheym
(Take me home now)

Myrtle Street Klezmer is an ecstatic exploration into the past, present, and future of Klezmer music – the traditional celebratory music of the Jewish diaspora. Our high-energy music draws on Balkan, Greek, Arabic, Rock, and Jazz music, in addition to favorites from the classic and contemporary Klezmer repertoire.

myrtlestreetklezmer.com