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.


 
 

INTRAVENOUS KLEZMER

by Bert Stratton

Have you read any good klezmer liner notes lately?

Probably not.

How about some bad notes? . . .

“The drummer has appeared in duo and trip [sic] settings.”

“This is what happens when Rumshinsky’s Theatre Bulgar is feed [sic] through Quincy Jones talking about Count Basie.”

“One[sic] the other side of the hall, a zedeh and bobe will spin in skeletal outlines the remembered steps of a tantz (dance) that their parents taught them …”

***

Here is the solution.  Hire Klezmer Guy Ink to write your liner notes.

If you submit to Klezmer Guy Ink, please follow these guidelines:

1. Don’t name your tunes.  We’ll do that.   Your first cut will be “Klezmer Lovin’,” “Hymie’s Town,” or “Romanian Shock #1.”  We’ll decide.

2. Don’t name your album.  We do that.  The choices: Intravenous Klezmer, 13 Jewish Hummingbirds and Black Curly Hair.  We pick.

3. We hire world-class musicians to punch up your sound. Our stable includes Frank London, Lorin Sklamberg and Eric Carmen (of the Raspberries).

4. We’ll come up with a pseudonym for a musician in your band.  This makes your album mysterious and more marketable.   Choices: M. Rogue Gemini, Hy Lowe and Jewboy Fuller.  We pick.

5. Your bio is tweaked.  Even if you’re a nebbish from Long Island, you visited your grandmother in Brooklyn at least once, right?  You’re from Brooklyn.

6. We’ll get you impressive music-school credentials.  We work with the Broadway School of Music.*

For your CD cover, we use red.  Why not?

Give Klezmer Guy Ink a call.  Some of our clients have been somewhat satisfied.
—-
*Broadway School of Music, 5415 Broadway Avenue, Cleveland.
—
A version of this post appeared in Zeek, the online “Jewish journal of thought and culture,” on December 21, 2010.

shareEmail this to someoneShare on FacebookTweet about this on Twitter

2 comments

1 Kenny G { 11.03.11 at 8:58 am }

The illustration looks just like the late Bob Segal, the local character who died a few years ago. One thing he used to do was clown acts at parties and fairs. Anybody remember him?

2 Bert { 11.03.11 at 1:25 pm }

I remember Bob. He was into the “philosophy of comedy,” a lecture he once gave. (He was Bojo the Clown. Thanks, Kenny G., for pointing that out.)

I didn’t know he had died. Sorry to hear that.

Leave a Comment