Light in Winter!
“When you play music, you’re bringing light into the darkness” Carlos Santana
The Light in Winter Concert is starting up for the 2025-2026 season. If you have requests or would like to headline a concert this fall/winter, contact David email concerts at orshalom.ca.
A Klezmer Journey with Christina Crowder & The Zamlers
A Klezmer Journey with Christina Crowder & The Zamlers
Saturday, February 21, 2026 8pm
Dance & Instrument Workshops Sunday February 22
On Feb 21, 2026, Or Shalom’s Light in Winter Concerts, and the Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Studies will welcome Trampled Manuscripts: The Lost Klezmer Music of the An-ski Expeditions, an evening of music, history, dance and song with Christina & The Zamlers. With pieces ranging from lively freylekhs and skotchnes, to elegant mazurkas, nigunim, and soulful Jewish wedding ritual melodies, accordionist Christina Crowder and guest artists will lead us on an expedition into a treasure trove of music that was collected over a hundred years ago, but long thought to be lost.
With guests Mae Kessler (violin), Jimmy Austin (trombone), and Maia Brown (dance instructor)
It all starts in the summer of 1913. Led by Yiddish author and ethnographer S. An-sky, a group sets off to collect Jewish stories, music and artifacts in the Russian Pale of Settlement. This earnest group of strangers from St. Petersburg manage to convince musicians from various Jewish shtetls to hand over their personal manuscripts. However, the scores end up in a Kyiv archive, and are long assumed to be lost to the ravages of the twentieth century. Then, in 2017, a chance encounter in Tokyo between a Yiddish dance teacher and a musicologist leads to the unlikely release of thousands of these unique musical manuscripts. In 2021, the Klezmer Institute then launches the Kiselgof-Makonovetsky Digital Manuscript Project (KMDMP). With help from klezmer enthusiasts throughout the world, the tunes are gradually transcribed and shared online, enabling klezmer musicians and scholars to bring them back to life for audiences all over the world to enjoy.
Trampled Manuscripts embodies S. Ansky’s vision of Jewish folklore as a living “Oral Torah” of Jewish culture, inviting musicians and dancers to interpret and reimagine it for the present day and to celebrate the Jewishness encoded in these melodies with audiences around the world. The Klezmer Institute’s Executive Director Christina Crowder will present this program together with musicians Jimmy Austin, Mae Kessler, and dance leader Maia Brown.
About KMDMP:
The Kiselgof-Makonovetsky Digital Manuscript Project is an international digital humanities project connecting participants with the work of important klezmer musicians from late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries.
Christina & The Zamlers
A chance encounter in Tokyo a few years ago led to the sharing of a unique corpus of musical manuscripts from the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine previously unavailable to klezmer musicians and scholars. This concert will showcase some of the instrumental and vocal music in the corpus. We’ll explore S. An-ski’s radical vision that the folklore of the Jewish people is an oral Torah as important as the Talmud of the sages. This vision inspired the ethnographic expeditions of 1912-1914, and are the backdrop for An-ski’s most famous work, The Dybbuk. An-ski hoped that the Jewish people would become Zamlers (collectors) who would continue to engage with Ashkenazic folklore as a living, breathing legacy. We invite you to join our “community expedition” into this extraordinary discovery!
Christina Crowder
Christina Crowder (Accordion) has been studying and performing klezmer music and Ashkenazic dance for thirty years. She is executive director of the Klezmer Institute, where she oversees the Klezmer Archive Project, the Kiselgof-Makonovetsky Digital Manuscript Project (KMDMP), and year-round programming in support of Ashkenazic expressive culture.
Christina has been performing and researching Jewish music for thirty years, beginning in Budapest, Hungary in 1993 and continuing with a Fulbright grant to Romania to document Jewish music in 1999. She is Executive Director of the Klezmer Institute, which has been awarded three NEH Grants for Institute projects (2021-2025). Based in New Haven, CT, Christina has been a guest instructor in klezmer accordion and ensemble performance in the US, Canada, and Europe, and was both musical director and performer in the 2019 Oregon Shakespeare Festival and the 2020 ART Portland productions of the Broadway play “Indecent.”
Maia Brown
Maia Brown is a Yiddish musician and dance-leader, writer, translator, visual artist and educator on unceded Duwamish, Coast Salish land in Seattle, Washington. Brown has a background in oral history and fine art, she received her Masters of Fine Arts in Interdisciplinary Arts at Goddard College. She is the founder of anti-fascist Yiddish folk-punk duo, Brivele, and wears different hats as a cultural worker in communities combining research, direct action, art, education, and celebration in the work of getting free.
Mae Kessler
Mae Kessler is a violinist, cultural organizer and educator based in Olympia, Washington who is passionate about increasing local and regional opportunities to learn, share and celebrate Yiddish instrumental music and culture. With roots in the DIY and punk music scene of early 2000’s Olympia, she has performed, recorded and toured with various punk, experimental, metal and original folk groups over the years including the critically acclaimed project Cinder Well. She currently performs with klezmer trio Tzepl, the PNW version of Christina and the Zamlers, and the klezmer and Scandinavian duo Varda. She was awarded a grant from the Yiddish Book Center’s Yiddish Arts and Culture Initiative for Jewish Communities and is part of their 2025-2026 cohort, and serves locally as a board member for the Downtown Olympia Creative District.
Jimmy Austin
Jimmy Austin inherited both his first name and first trombone from his grandfather. He brings his intense, expressive, and collaborative style to a wide variety of projects around the Pacific Northwest and is particularly active in Seattle’s Yiddish music community, playing with such groups as the brass band, Shpilkis, the trio, Tzepl, and Christina and the Zamlers. In addition to performing, Jimmy organizes jam sessions, workshops, and guest artist residencies in Seattle with The Rhapsody Project and other community and heritage music organizations. In 2023, Jimmy was selected as a master artist in the Washington State Heritage Arts Apprenticeship Program. Outside of the Yiddish music scene, Jimmy is a long-time band-member of Hot Damn Scandal, from Bellingham, WA, and is a musician and assistant composer for Sara Porkalob’s award-winning musical, Dragon Lady.
Previous Light in Winter Concerts
Itamar Erez returns to Or Shalom’s Light in Winter Concert Series
Or Shalom’s Light in Winter Concert series welcomes back guitarist Itamar Erez in a solo performance at our temporary home at City view Church 4370 Sophia st. Itamar’s music dances between east and west, with pulsing rhythms and refreshing harmonies.
“Itamar Erez combines in his music an impressive artistic ability with virtuosity on both guitar and piano, creativity & mastery in a variety of musical languages…
His music is fresh and sweeping, interesting and complex. His music is fluent and full of emotion and nuance… (2014 Landau prize, judges statement)
Light in Winter: Ira Khonen Temple and Michael Winograd in Concert at the Peretz Centre
Wed, Dec 03, 2025
Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture
Playing klezmer classics and their original compositions, these staples of NYC’s vibrant klezmer and Yiddish music scene will surprise and delight you.
Time & Location
Dec 03, 2025, 8:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m.
Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture, 6184 Ash St, Vancouver, BC V5Z 3G9, Canada
Tickets and Info available from the Peretz website.
Event Description
As part of Or Shalom’s long-running Light in Winter Concert Series, the Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture and Or Shalom proudly present a special klezmer concert featuring Ira Temple and Michael Winograd, staples of NYC’s vibrant Klezmer and Yiddish music community and cultural tapestry.
Together they have played concerts, festivals, weddings and coming of age celebrations, and have just finished a year and a half run in the cast and orchestra of Cabaretat the Kit Kat Club on Broadway. They are delighted to tour the west coast this December as a duo, playing music from their new albums and more.
Clarinetist Michael Winograd lives in Brooklyn. His band, The Honorable Metnshn, has brought Klezmer and Yiddish music all over the world. He has performed and collaborated with today’s leading figures in Jewish music including Yitzak Perlman, Frank London, the Klezmatics, the Klezmer Conservatory Band and more. Michael is featured on dozens of recordings, including The Beautiful Game and Live at Madison Square Garden with Vulfpeck. His original music has appeared in television, film, theater and dance performances. His upcoming release, TANZ! Live in New York City, presents a re-creation of the iconic 1956 klezmer album TANZ!, featuring clarinetists Dave Tarras and Sam Musiker (learn more about it here).
April 26 – Hal & Annie Aqua in Concert!
Hal Aqua is a Denver, Colorado-based musician, service leader, and graphic designer. He serves as music director for B’nai Havurah, Denver’s Reconstructionist congregation; provides songleading at Temple Micah, a Reform synagogue; facilitates joyous and inclusive b’nai mitzvah ceremonies along with his wife Risa Aqua; teaches classes, workshops and seminars on Jewish world music; and leads Denver’s long-running klezmer fusion band The Lost Tribe.
Annie Aqua, a violinist since the age of four, Annie plays in a variety of bands with a focus on Klezmer and Balkan music, including The Lost Tribe and MishMish (Balkan, Klezmer, and Arabic). Annie also has a background in visual arts and runs her own calligraphy and custom wedding art studio in Denver, specializing in ketubot and commemorative art.Together this father and daughter duo presents an eclectic musical program that draws from The Lost Tribe’s repertoire of lively Klezmer tunes, stirring Yiddish social action songs, and mashups of traditional music and contemporary grooves.You can hear The Lost Tribe’s recordings at https://halaquaandthelosttribe.bandcamp.com/
March 29 Light in Winter – Illiteratty at Cityview!
Join us for the inaugural Light in Winter concert at CityView on Saturday, March 29, featuring East Vancouver’s very own Illiteratty! This eclectic folk band blends swing, European cabaret, ambient, Celtic, rockabilly, a cappella, and world music, delivering sharp lyrics and up to five-part harmonies. With a lineup that includes guitar, mandolin, violin, accordion, stand-up bass, and percussion, Illiteratty’s music is intelligent, funny, and deeply varied.
Fronted by Earle Peach, a dedicated musician, educator, and activist, Illiteratty promises a night of dynamic and thought-provoking music that’s sure to leave you energized and inspired. Don’t miss out on this lively performance!
Judelman, Lurje & Alpert – Return to Or Shalom
We really love the vibrant, energetic tunes and stories of Craig Judelman (violin/fiddle), Sasha Lurje (vocals) and Michael Alpert (guitar) and they return to Or Shalom’s beautiful sanctuary Feb 15.
As war rages on in one of the main homelands of Yiddish culture, we join together to sing the songs and tell the stories of our shared homeland. Songs of forbidden loves, boy soldiers, the wonders of nature and looming dangers, these songs of the last centuries have sadly never been less relevant. Ukraine was also the source of our most important collections of old time klezmer tunes. In this program three of the world’s most in-demand Klezmer musicians bring together this diverse repertoire to paint a picture of Jewish life in Ukraine and stand in solidarity with our friends fighting for their freedom.
Seattle’s Tzepl opens the 2025 season of the Light in Winter Concert Series
Tzepl weaves together the accordion of Laurie Andres, the trombone and tuba of Jimmy Austin, and the violin of Mae Kessler into a musical braid, simultaneously harmonious and quarrelsome. They play klezmer in a mostly traditional style, but not strictly so. Their sound combines elements of nineteenth century European string players with the brassy American style of the early twentieth century, with the accordion bridging the gap. Tzepl’s music is just as pleasant for listening as it is invigorating for dancing.
Laurie, Jimmy, and Mae first began playing together in the spring of 2023 after being invited to present this music at a workshop for youth, organized by Seattle Fiddlesticks and The Rhapsody Project. Laurie Andres plays klezmer, New England folk music, and many other kinds of traditional music. He also performs in the klezmer duo, Kesselgarden, and is a highly regarded performer for contradancing. Mae Kessler has played in original and traditional music groups for many years and developed a deep love for klezmer music after attending KlezKamp in the Catskills in 2012. Mae also plays with the Scandinavian and klezmer duo, Varda. Jimmy Austin inherited his first name and first trombone from his grandfather. He also performs in a variety of situations, including the klezmer band Shpilkis, and directs The Rhapsody Project’s Yiddish Music and Heritage programming.
Playing at Or Shalom is a great experience, in a small hall with great acoustics, with an attentive and enthusiastic audience.
Or Shalom is an East Vancouver progressive Jewish spiritual community that sponsors monthly Saturday night concerts throughout the dark winter months. Our community aims to support music from Eastern European traditions as well as music from the Middle East. The venue is small (80-120 seats) but has great acoustics, and we provide in-house audio, and a livestream of the event with high production value. We sell tickets on Eventbrite and provide guarantees to musicians as well as share ticket revenue.
Contact Or Shalom Light in Winter Concerts for more information.
Previous Light in Winter Concerts
January 20, 2024 – Jesse Waldman Trio
One of Jesse Waldman’s most cherished possessions is a cassette of his grandmother singing the Yiddish folk song Papirosen to his mother. A remnant, like the abandoned guitar discovered in his parent’s basement, drove his rock ‘n roll dreams out of the suburban sprawl of Thornhill, Ontario, and into the bars of downtown Toronto. A journey cross-country led him to mountains, ocean, and into the arms of Vancouver’s Commercial Drive music scene. Now his home of over twenty years, the West Coast continues to inspire his lush imagery, sublime melodies, and outstanding technique.
Influenced by folk and blues pioneers Townes Van Zandt, JJ Cale, and Neil Young, Jesse has toured Canada, Western US, and the UK, performing everywhere from local pubs to soft-seat theaters, appearing at major festivals including Vancouver’s Folk and International Jazz Fests, Burnaby Blues and Roots Fest and Mission Folk Fest.
“It’s a body of work born from the need, as Waldman sings, “to keep a light on in the dark,” a message that resonates now more than ever, no matter where you call home.”
Nov 2023, Queen Kong Live at Or Shalom Light in Winter
October 28, 2023 Jake Shulmen-Ment and Pete Rushefsky
March 2023 Harriet Frost & The Universal Band
February 2023, Songs of the Jewish Ukrainian Heartland, with Craig Judelman and Michael Alpert
Comments from previous performers:
“Playing Or Shalom is a beautiful experience. The audience is a real community, with a diverse range of ages and backgrounds. They clearly believe in the spiritual power of music to bring people together, heal and celebrate. And they listen! More than a gig.”
– Geoff Berner
“Or Shalom was one of the highlights of our BC tour 2018. We were amazed by the natural acoustic of the synagogue as well as the great listening and the warmth of the audience. We would play there again anytime!”
– Gabriel Paquin-Buki, Oktopus
I have played at Or Shalom a few times in the past and the experience every time was very beautiful. The audience is super attentive and listening deeply to the music, the staff is always warm and helpful, and their commitment and dedication to bring the best sound to the room is amazing!
Thank you!! – Itamar Erez
Performing at Or Shalom is a joy that I have experienced a couple of times. The performance space at Or Shalom is intimate with excellent sound. I felt the audience focus very deeply on my music which makes it such a joy to play – hope to do so again sometime soon,
– Ed Henderson
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Oktopus at Or Shalom
Previous Light in Winter Events
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Saturday, March 13, 7:30 – 9:00 pm
Traditional Middle Eastern and Flamenco Music and Songs by Emad Armoush
Fluent in Spanish, English, and Arabic, he performs a repertoire of flamenco, jazz, Arabic, Turkish and Persian music. Emad is a multi-instrumentalist and singer. He plays flamenco guitar, Oud and Ney, and sings Arabic, flamenco, and jazz.
Watch this concert on YouTube at https://youtu.be/L–zQWJM_DM
Saturday, February 13, 7:30 – 9:00 pm (Pacific)
Jazz with Andrea Superstein, Livestreamed from the Bayit
This event was live-streamed over youtube https://youtu.be/QvOQ8nxTPpQ
No live audience, but delicious music.
Saturday, December 12, 7:30 – 8:30 pm (Pacific)
Chanukah Lights in Winter Concert Featuring Noah Gotfrit and Trio – Livestreamed from the Bayit
Jazz for a Chanukah Evening with Candle Lighting.
Click the video below to watch the Livestream of the Chanukah Lights in Winter concert, with Noah Gotrit on bass and Brad Shigheta on trombone!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psQk-pvusHE&feature=youtu.be
Saturday, April 11, 2020 at 7:30 pm (Pacific)
Geoff Berner was welcomed back to the Or Shalom Light in Winter concert, now virtual! This event was live-streamed over youtube https://youtu.be/QvOQ8nxTPpQ
No live audience, but great music and entertainment. Instead of buying tickets, Geoff asked everyone to make a donation to Covid-19 Coming Together (Vancouver)
Saturday, February 8, 2020
Lebedik!
Featuring Sasha Lurje, vocals; Craig Judelman, violin, Yoni Kaston, accordion.
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| February 7, 2019 Lebedik! | March 9, 2019 Myrna Rabinowitz |
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