Real Music & Real Estate . . .

Yiddishe Cup’s bandleader, Bert Stratton, is Klezmer Guy.
 

He knows about the band biz and – check this out – the real estate biz, too.
 

You may not care about the real estate biz. Hey, you may not care about the band biz. (See you.)
 

This is a blog with a gamy twist. It features tenants with snakes and skunks, and musicians with smoked fish in their pockets.
 

Stratton has written op-eds for the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post.


 
 

NEAR MISSES

by Bert Stratton

Here are some gigs Yiddishe Cup, back in the day, almost played:

The Shrine to American Music, Vermillion, North Dakota
New York Mills (Minn.) Regional Cultural Center
Southern Cross International Music Festival, Brisbane, Australia
Austin (Tex.) JCC Israel Independence Day celebration
Klezmer Festival, Fuerth, Germany
Jewish Music Festival, Jackson Hole, Wyoming

All of them were close calls. Maybe we came in second. Second is a bear. For example, 30 clarinetists audition for the Kansas City Symphony and 29 clarinetists add “finalist” to their resumes.

Yidd Cup played Texas three times, Florida four times, and Missouri nine times. We’ve played abroad twice: New York City and Windsor, Ontario. The NYC gig was at the Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts, and the Canada gig was the Windsor JCC.

Chanukah in Jackson Hole, WY. That was the subject line of an email I got. A Chabad rabbi in Wyoming asked Yiddishe Cup about doing a three-day Chanukah bash at three ski hotels. I immediately called the rabbi, gave him a price, and he seemed OK with it. I told the Yiddishe Cup musicians the Wyoming gig was 49 percent likely.

Yidd Cup’s singer said, “Forty-nine percent? That means you think it’s not going to happen.” (49% is where optimism meets realism.)

We didn’t get the gig. We didn’t get any of the gigs, but it was fun thinking about them. That Australia gig, in particular, was a cool gig.

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6 comments

1 Ken Goldberg { 12.04.19 at 10:04 am }

Bert, forget those losers and concentrate on venues who would really appreciate what you have to offer. I suggest you contact:
St. Elias Melkite Greek Catholic Church in Brooklyn (OH) for their annual September festival;
St. Vladimir Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral for their annual July festival;
Carnegie Hall, New York;
the Palais Garnier (“Paris Opera House”); and
the Wiener Musikverein, Vienna

2 don friedman { 12.04.19 at 11:01 am }

I remember running miles through airports to make connections (Chicago, Cincinnati, Atlanta, etc.) Bert, you never told me you had to be an athlete to be in the band.

3 marc adler { 12.04.19 at 2:40 pm }

But have you played Rhode Island and Massachusetts?

4 Bert Stratton { 12.05.19 at 9:11 am }

Hey, Marc Adler, we played a wedding in Boston. And we played a wedding in Conn., which equals two Rhode Islands.

5 Dave Rowe { 12.11.19 at 8:30 pm }

I guess Wilie Nelson didn’t ever get back to you about Farm Aid; he’s a fan.

6 Irwin Weinberger { 02.14.20 at 2:50 am }

Oy! The gigs that got away. If only…..
That’s alright. There’s plenty more where those came from in our future. What about Bernie Sanders or Michael Bloomberg’s inaugural bash?

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