Dray Tekhterlekh - Yiddish song from Cracow

A melancholic song in yiddish, about a father giving away all hes three daughters in marriage.. Written by the late Mordechai Gebirtig, and the sung by the great Bente Kahan.
All the pictures are from the US holocaust memorial museum!

Translation;
1.
When, with good luck, there arrives the day
When I marry off my youngest daughter,
I will dance and dance
A burden has been taken off my mind-
My eldest daughter is getting married
I have two more maiden daughters waiting for their turn to
be married
You bandsmen, tear at your strings!
Let everyone rejoice with us.
My joy is so great.
Only the good God can understand how great it is,
And so can those who have also given away their daughters
in marriage

2.
When I see my second daughter getting married in her white
wedding dress,
I will drink wine with joy -
What a burden off my shoulder!
You bandsmen - tear at yours strings!
My second daughter is getting married.
Now it is only my youngest one who remains in the house
I wish she would be married soon, too
Play, bandsmen play for our in-laws!
Let all poor folk share our happiness
We are having our child settled down to married life
And this child is a daughter, too

3.
Now the sounds of a third wedding are dying away
And this makes me sad and thoughtful
My youngest daughter is gone
What else is there for me to be living for?
You bandsmen, play for the bride.
All three daughters have now been given away in marriage
All our children have left us
It was hard for us to bring them up,
And without them life is even harder
Go on playing.
Let my tears run down.
Today, the last bed will be deserted

Their room will be empty
And so will their wardrobe
Oh, how desolate the life is now.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Yiddish
• cracow
• poland
• shoah
• holocaust
• kazimierz
• mordechai
• gebirtig
• bente
• kahan
• song
• jewish
• krakow
• drei
• tächterlech
• dray
• tekhterlekh
• three
• daughters
• sad
• wedding
• judaism
• klezmer
• klezmorim

[buddmar]

Wow. What a find! Gorgeous, lovely, melancholy, nostalgic and sentimental. The very soul of Yiddishkeit! Oh, thank you for posting this!

[sentofelice]

my lovery Cracow, my lovely second polish republic, where are you right now? The ww2 destroyed all the best we had. Poland is not the same anymore...

[melodyworks]

Beautiful.

[JOLEDETZ]

SWEET AND SAD MUSIC:OLD TIMES ;THANKS FOR REMEMBER Me my YOUNG YEARS WHEN MY TZEIDE USHER PLAYED HIS BEAUTIFUL SONGS

[kraksynludoli]

Your right 50 years of socialism (6 years of national socialism and 44 years of communism) destroyed what was the best in Poland Especially Variety of classes, nations and languages... Poland without its minorities (and lands where this minorities lived) is not Poland but parody of Poland

[YoureSpotOnWithThat]

Dear sento.,

Poland may not be like it was once, neither also is Miami; now a days in Siemianowice there are still magnificent forests and trees and beautiful birds including koo-koo birds; the vegetables are very delicious -served in the many lovely restaurants and the local people are so very friendly and welcoming and very mindful of the world outside Poland.

.

Nothing like Miami.

.

cheers.

[YoureSpotOnWithThat]

A great song; interesting to be at the old parents' club-house to see if and how-so, they have resolved the antimoies they sang about .

.

cheers.

[lilicroix]

schen lidl