Who’s going to be inducted into the next Rock Hall class, and who isn’t.<\/p>\n
Mr. Stress is in the first inductee class of the Cleveland Blues Society’s Hall of Fame.\u00a0 That’s a new place.\u00a0 Doesn’t even have a building.\u00a0 (Stress is a terrific harmonica player.)<\/p>\n
The National Cleveland-style Polka Hall of Fame has a building.\u00a0 It’s in the old Euclid, Ohio, city hall.\u00a0 Frankie Yankovic was the man in Slovenian\/Cleveland-style polka.<\/p>\n
Yiddishe Cup has a polka pedigree – a small one.<\/strong><\/span> The DJ on the radio show “Polka Changed My Life Today” plays our “Tsena, Tsena” recording regularly.\u00a0 “Tsena, Tsena” isn’t polka, but it is upbeat and major key.\u00a0 Some polka aficionados clamor for “happy music,” and “Tsena, Tsena” fits the bill.<\/p>\n Generally, Jews aren’t big on “happy.”\u00a0 For example, recently Yiddishe Cup performed “A Hard Day’s Night” in Yiddish (A Shvere<\/em> Togedike Nakht<\/em>) but sang the “I feel all right” line in English.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because you can’t say “I feel all right” in Yiddish.\u00a0 No such thing.\u00a0 (Also, Gerry Tenney <\/a>wrote the Yiddish lyrics that way.)<\/p>\n [Another acknowledgment: Plain Dealer<\/em> music critic Donald Rosenberg pointed out the “I feel all right” paradox to me.]<\/p>\n My point here . . . When\u00a0 is Cleveland going to get a Challah Fame?<\/p>\n I have the beginnings of one in my basement. <\/strong><\/span> I have a plywood cut-out\/statue of Dave Tarras<\/a>, the great klez clarinetist.\u00a0 Must be 10-feet tall.\u00a0 Irwin Weinberger<\/a>, Yiddishe Cup’s vocalist, made it.\u00a0 Irwin is also an art teacher.\u00a0 Irwin’s Tarras cut-out folds in half at the waist.<\/p>\n Tarras (left), a giant of the clarinet, and Klezmer Guy <\/p><\/div>\n We used the Tarras statue as a stage prop <\/strong><\/span>at our Chautauqua Institution gig.\u00a0 That was one complicated deal; I brought a rechargeable drill to screw Tarras’ halves together.\u00a0 And I reinforced his back with metal channel strips.<\/p>\n The first class of inductees at The Challah will be some dead old guys, like Tarras and Brandwein<\/a>, plus for post-ceremony partying needs, some living old guys: Danny Rubenstein<\/a> and Ray Musiker<\/a>.<\/p>\n For personal reasons, the museum’s second<\/span> <\/strong><\/span>cut-out\/statue will be Willie Epstein <\/a>(1919-1999), the klezmer trumpeter from Florida and New York.\u00a0 In 1997 Willie came\u00a0 to Cleveland for the local premiere of the Epstein Brothers documentary A Tickle in the Heart<\/em>, <\/em>and my band played prior to the movie.\u00a0 Willie was impressed with Yiddishe Cup’s trombonist, Steve Ostrow<\/a>.\u00a0 Willie cornered me in the hall and said, “You mind if I call your trombone player later.\u00a0 I’d like to take him on our tour of South Africa.”<\/p>\n That was class: asking me \u2014 the bandleader \u2014 <\/strong><\/span>if Willie could raid my band.\u00a0 Most music contractors would have just raided, no questions asked.<\/p>\n Willie never called.<\/p>\n![\"Tarras](\"http:\/\/www.yiddishecup.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/bert-w-tarras-2-300x281.jpg\" "\\"Tarras")