Music

NEW YORK, NY March 07, 2008 —FRANK LONDON: A NIGHT IN THE OLD MARKETPLACE
A jazz, world beat, downtown Jewish folk opera

Merkin Hall
at Kaufman Center, 129 W. 67th Street
(between Broadway and Amsterdam)
» Tickets
» New Sounds Live 2007-2008 Concert Season

What happens when you fool with nature, concocting an unholy brew of Edgar Allen Poe, Kurt Weill, Tom Waits, and John Zorn? You get Frank London’s acclaimed folk opera, A Night in the Old Marketplace, based on the 1907 Yiddish play by I.L. Peretz. The extraordinary score mixes folk, jazz, classical, rock and world music beats. Conceived and directed by Alexandra Aron, with music by Frank London and book and lyrics from Glen Berger, the show is a 90-minute musical re-imagining of I.L. Peretz's sprawling 1907 Yiddish drama Bay Nakht afn Altn Mark. The supernatural tale -- which includes among its characters a wandering bear, dancing zombies, drowning brides, and drunken musicians and a ghoulish gargoyle -- is set entirely in the marketplace of a rural village.

This concert will be taped from the stage for later broadcast on New Sounds.


A NIGHT IN THE OLD MARKETPLACE CAST AND CREW:
Cast: David Wall – Badkhn | Lorin Sklamberg – Nosn | Steven Hrycelak – Recluse |
Charlotte Cohn – Gargoyle | Melinda Blake – Sheyndele | Glen Berger – Narrator
Musicians: Frank London – trumpet, keys | Art Bailey – accordion, piano | Brandon Seabrook – guitars, banjo | Ron Caswell - tuba, bass | Aaron Alexander – drums
Lighting by Solomon Weisbard; Animations by Tine Kindermann with Mor Erlich; Additional costumes by Levi Okunov; I.L. Peretz read in Yiddish by Mina Bern

Frank London
is a member of the Klezmatics, Hasidic New Wave, has performed with John Zorn, LL Cool J, Itzhak Perlman, Mel Torme, Lester Bowie’s Brass Fantasy, LaMonte Young, They Might Be Giants, David Byrne, Jane Siberry, Ben Folds 5, Mark Ribot, Maurice El Medioni and Gal Costa, and is featured on over 100 cds. His own recordings include "Invocations" (cantorial music); Frank London’s Klezmer Brass Allstars "Di Shikere Kapelye and Brotherhood of Brass"; "Nigunim and the Zmiros Project" (Jewish mystical songs, with Klezmatics vocalist Lorin Sklamberg); "The Debt" (film and theater music); "The Shekhina Big Band"; the soundtrack to "The Shvitz": the soundtrack to Perl Gluck's "The Divahn" and four releases with the Hasidic New Wave. His projects include the folk-opera A NIGHT IN THE OLD MARKETPLACE, "Davenen" for Pilobolus and the Klezmatics, Great Small Works' The Memoirs of Gluckel of Hameln" and Min Tanaka's "Romance." He composed music for John Sayles' "The Brother From Another Planet," and "Men With Guns," Yvonne Rainer's "Murder and Murder," the Czech-American Marionette Theater’s "Golem" and Tamar Rogoff's "Ivye Project."

When he's not composing, the tireless London is also one of the busiest trumpeters around. He can be heard, for example, on the self-titled release by the Brooklyn-based band Gachupin, a group of about a dozen jazz, rock and Latin players who together produce a winning mix of danceable, groove-oriented world beats. Take a dose of African-style guitar, add some AfroBrazilian rhythms and some Miles-esque electric funk and stir. He was music director for David Byrne and Robert Wilson’s "The Knee Plays," collaborated with Palestinian violinist Simon Shaheen, taught Jewish music in Canada, Crimea and the Catskills, and produced CD’s for Gypsy Ledgend Esma Redzepova, and Algerian Pianist Maurice el Medioni. He has been featured on HBO’s "Sex and the City," at the North Sea Jazz Festival and the Lincoln Center Summer Festival, and was a co-founder of Les Miserables Brass Band and the Klezmer Conservatory Band.

A Night in the Old Marketplace band

features the hottest, most versatile and exciting players on the new Jewish music scene. Drummer Aaron Alexander released his thrash punk Jewish Jazz recording Midrash Mish Mosh on Tzadik records, and is London's bandmate in the Hasidic New Wave and the Klezmer Brass Allstars. Ron Caswell is tuba player for everyone in New York City, playing at Lincoln Center and in Balkan (Romashka), rock (The Knobs), klezmer (Kleztrophbix) and other groups. Art Bailey and Brandon Seabrook are both alumni of the Klezmer Conservatory Band (as is London). Bailey leads his Orkestra Popilar and is a salsa and jazz virtuoso. Seabrook is the hottest guitarist on the scene, toured and recorded with Paul Brody's Sadawi and the Klezmer Conservatory Band, influenced by John Bonham, Morton Feldman, Bjork and The Minutemen.

Additional Resources:
» Frank London
» The Klezmatics
» Klezmer Brass All-Stars
» Hasidic New Wave
» A Night in the Old Marketplace MySpace
» New Sounds Live 2007-2008 Concert Season
» Merkin Hall