THE MEMOIRS OF GLÜCKEL OF HAMELN (1999-2000) tells the story of an independent Jewish woman of the 17th Century, bringing her memoir to life in a theatrical form belonging to the streets, markets, and fairgrounds of her day — Bänkelsang, or picture recitation, with Glückel herself recounting vivid tales of survival to a 21st Century audience. Born in Hamburg in 1646 during the Thirty Years War, Glückel gave birth to twelve children before her widowhood at age 44, at which point she took over the family businesses, and began writing her memoir. Glückel’s writings portray an able, courageous, and opinionated woman prevailing in an environment of antisemitism.
The production is a collaboration between director and performer Jenny Romaine, Adrienne Cooper, the foremost interpreted of Yiddish vocal music in America, and composer Frank London, who is music director of The Klezmatics, as well conceiver/composer of Haisdic New Wave and Les Miserables Brass Band. Musical sources vary from German Jewish liturgical modes, Yiddish ballads, and the sound collages of Kurt Schwitters.
GLÜCKEL was been performed to a sold-out run at the LaMama Annex in New York City, and at the Ashkenaz Festival in Toronto, the Yiddishkayt Festival in Los Angeles, at the Jewish Theatre of New England, Newton, Mass., A Traveling Jewish Theater in Berkeley, CA, and at festivals of puppetry and new Yiddish culture in Chicago, Antwerp, Amsterdam, and at Swarthmore College.