We've received special requests for physical CDs for our latest release "Yiddisha Follies" and have raised the money to manufacture a small batch of fully designed (by Janet and Robert) packaged commercial discs.
Ready just in time for Hanukah and good for you like Matzah Ball soup. Vy not dahlinks?!
happy to sign it on request for you or send as a good cheer gift... love, Janet
Includes unlimited streaming of Yiddisha Follies (2020 Release) (SOLD OUT)
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Yiddisha Follies features Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys performing early Yiddish flavored novelty tunes. It’s loaded with up-beat humor, pathos, hot jazz, Jewish theatre, Vaudeville and traditional Jewish Klezmer songs from the 1910’s, 20’s and 30’s.
Yiddisha Follies features 2 new joyous Jewish traditional dance instrumental horas performed by the Parlor Boys; Freilach and the medley Mezinke/Di Grine Kuzine both arranged by Parlor Boy Geoff Nudell.
Yiddisha Follies’s begins with the song Oy I Like She (in Yiddish) and is a love song about an admirer describing a shana (beautiful) lady whose hair and figure are perfect and who is tasty like carrot pudding. Many of the other songs are sung by Janet with a Yiddish accent and were originally performed as a form of self-deprecating humor in Yiddish Vaudeville and movies.
Yiddisha Follies derives its material from Jewish performers and Hollywood meets Tin Pan Alley writers like Bert Kalmar & Harry Ruby, Borscht Belt comedy acts and novelty numbers performed in movies, Everyone Says “I Love You” made famous by Chico Marx, Lambchops Do You Believe Me? Performed by Burns and Allen, Second Hand Rose made famous by Fannie Brice, The Sheik of Avenue B and Cohen Owes Me $97 by Irving Berlin,
Yiddisha Follies also features two songs in the Yiddish spirit composed in the 21st century for Janet Klein. One written by the late beloved Parlor Boy Ian Whitcomb, Shiney Shoes 2012, and the other a newer instrumental Rag written by the talented Vincent Johnson called Yiddish Follies Rag 2017.
Yiddisha Follies marks the 10th CD release by Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys since 1998. On every CD Janet has released with the band she has included one or two Yiddish novelty songs and this release includes all these earlier numbers PLUS 6 NEW SONGS.
YIDDISHA FOLLIES 6-19-20 Release Addendum
Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys have been performing rare early 20th century musical treasures since 1998.
If you've ever attended Janet’s live shows or perused one of her 9 CDs, you will have encountered Yiddish flavored novelty numbers, otherwise called “Hebrew Vaudeville” tunes, originally rendered by such stars as Fannie Brice, Molly Picon, Monroe Silver, Aaron Lebedeff, and featuring the work of composers Blanche Merrill (for Fannie Brice material) and Kalmar and Ruby (writers for much of the Marx Brothers’ theater and movie work) and Irving Berlin to name a few.
Janet has been peppering her records and her live sets with these tunes over the years delighting audiences with her first hit in this genre The Yiddish Hula Boy, (a song that she unearthed from an obscure 1938 homemade 78 rpm recording of Hilo Hattie playing with a Hawaiian backup band. This song is what she likes to call “Klezmer- Hawaiian” an unlikely hybrid, which is one of the characteristics if not the raison d’etre of this and other specialty tunes from the early 20th Century.
The storytelling in these songs has everything to do with immigrant experiences and how they find themselves in surprising situations as recent arrivals to America with its wild amalgam of melting pot mania. What results are songs that reveal of mashup of dialects, malapropisms, inside jokes and often are only “thinly veiled” references to people like Theda Bara who was really Theodosia Goodman, a tailor’s daughter from Cincinnati, but in the movies, an exotic vamp from Egypt, inspiring the song “Rebecca Came Back From Mecca”. Could it be that the “Sheik of Avenue B” was the spitting image of the kid around the corner with the brand-new second-hand Ford, who was attracting girls like he was Rudolph Valentino?
In 2005, after years of collecting and performing these tunes Janet put on a Yiddish themed show which ran for one year at the Steve Allen Theater in Hollywood and performed on the Comedy Central Stage as a Vaudeville style revue called Janet Klein & Her Borscht Belt Babies. The variety acts were headed by the grandbabies of Vaudeville performers and included granddaughter of Buster Keaton - Keaton Talmadge, grandson of character actress Zasu Pitts - John Reynolds and grandson of Rubber Legs Louie - Tom Ballatore which featured his unforgettable talking goose routine. Also included was Carl Ballantyne, who himself actually worked the Borscht Belt circuits coming up as an entertainer and Janet Klein who’s grandfather Marty Klein performed his prestidigitation act “Ten Minutes with Ten Fingers” in the 1930s and 40s. The Borscht Belt Babies show received great theatrical revues and was immortalized by a number of illustrators including a drawing by Robert Crumb– see attachment of illustrations.
Friday, November 4th (from midnight to midnight Pacific Time), Bandcamp will be donating 100% of their standard share of sales to the artists.
The music chosen for this collection ranging mostly from 1915 to 1932 reflects the landscape of the early 20th century in it’s crazy quilt complexity of entertaining expressions of love and life. We hope you’ll find that the humor in these songs stand the test of time and that what resonates is the joyous fun that we all make together while telling a good story or doing freilachs and horas to drown out the babble of any old mean-spirited ghosts.
Produced by Robert Loveless
CD Art by Janet Klein & Robert Loveless
Coeur De Jeanette LLC
copyright 2020
credits
released November 29, 2020
Yiddisha Follies Credits
1. Oy I Like She (In Yiddish) 1927 by Jacob Jacobs & Alexander Olshanetsky Yiddisha Follies
Janet Klein – Vocal, Brad Kay – Piano
2. Freilach (instrumental) Traditional (Arr. by Geoff Nudell) Yiddisha Follies
Geoff Nudell – Clarinet, Corey Gemme – Cornet, Josh Kaufman – Accordion, Piano – Brad Kay, Gareth Price – Drums, Marquis Howell – Stand Up Bass, John Reynolds – Banjo
3. Cooking Breakfast for The One I Love 1930 by Henry Tobias & Billy Rose Paradise Wobble
Janet Klein – Vocal & Ukulele, Ian Whitcomb – Ukulele & Accordion, Robert Armstrong – Hawaiian Steel Guitar, Tom Marion – Guitar, Billy Steele – Guitar, Buster Fitzpatrick – Stand Up Bass, Randy Woltz – Vibraphone & Percussion
4. “Lambchops” Do You Believe Me? 1929 by Benny Davis Put A Flavor To Love
Janet Klein – Vocal, Miles Kreuger – Vocal, Brad Kay – Piano
5. Rebecca Cam Back From Mecca 1921 by Bert Kalmar & Harry Ruby Oh!
Janet Klein-Vocal, Brad Kay-piano, Tom Marion-mandolin, Dan Weinstein-violin, trombone, sousaphone, Ian Whitcomb-accordion, Dave Jones-Bass
6. Egyptian Ella (instrumental) 1930 by Walter Doyle (Arr. by John Reynolds) Yiddisha Follies
Geoff Nudell – Clarinet & Bass Sax, Corey Gemme – Cornet, Josh Kaufman – Accordion, Piano – Brad Kay, Gareth Price – Drums, Marquis Howell – Stand Up Bass, John Reynolds – Banjo, Randy Woltz – Xylophone
7. The Sheik of Avenue B 1922 by Kalmar, Ruby, Friend & Downing Living In Sin
Janet Klein – Vocal, Bob Mitchell – Mighty Wurlitzer Organ (at Old Town Music Hall)
8. Everyone Says “I Love You” 1932 by Bert Kalmar & Harry Ruby Living In Sin
Janet Klein – Vocal, Tom Marion – Guitar
9. Cohen Owes Me $97 1915 by Irving Berlin Shanghai Shuffle
Janet- Vocal, Randy Woltz – Piano
10. Yiddish Hula Boy 1925 by Bert Carlson & Harry Decker Put A Flavor To Love
Janet Klein – Vocal, Robert Armstrong – Hawaiian Steel Guitar, Tom Marion – Guitar, Ian Whitcomb – Ukulele, Dave Jones – Stand Up Bass
11. Yiddish Follies Rag (instrumental) 2017 by Vincent Johnson Yiddisha Follies
Vincent Johnson – Piano
12. I'm A Whole Lot Wilder Than I Look 1929 by Unknown Put A Flavor To Love
Janet Klein – Vocal & Ukulele
13. I Don't Know Whether To Do It Or Not 1915 by Blanche Merrill Ready For You
Janet Klein – Vocal, Brad Kay – Piano
14. Mezinke/Di Grine Kuzine (instrumental) Traditional (Arr. by Geoff Nudell) Yiddisha Follies
Geoff Nudell – Clarinet, Corey Gemme – Cornet, Josh Kaufman – Accordion, Piano – Brad Kay, Gareth Price – Drums, Marquis Howell – Stand Up Bass, John Reynolds – Banjo
15. Shiney Shoes 2012 by Ian Whitcomb (Arr. By Randy Woltz) It’s The Girl
Janet Klein – Vocal, Ian Whitcomb – Vocal, Marquis Howell – Stand Up Bass, Corey Gemme – Cornet, Dan Levinson – Tenor Sax & Clarinet, John Reynolds – Banjo, Jonathan Stout – Drums, Randy Woltz – Piano
16. Second Hand Rose 1921 by Grant Clarke & James F. Hanley Yiddisha Follies
Janet Klein – Vocal, Randy Woltz - Piano
Produced by Robert Loveless
CD Cover Art by Janet Klein
Janet Klein and Her Parlor BoysLos Angeles, California
Janet Klein & Her Parlor Boys
MERRYMAKERS OF WHOOPEE
The enchanting
and effervescent chanteuse Janet Klein performs obscure, naughty and lovely tunes from the 1920s and 30s. The CDs are spirited and inspired renditions of early American Hot Jazz, Tin Pan Alley, Vaudeville tunes and other rare early 20th Century gems....more
California Feetwarmers are the real thing! We adore them. Josh Kaufman plays with us when I can catch him. He and his brother Justin wrote the great music for "Over the Garden Wall" I'm Miss Langtree Janet Klein and Her Parlor Boys
