Festival Schedule


saturday, january 10

Richmond Yiddish Week Kickoff Concert
6:00 - 9:00 PM at Gold Lion Cafe

Featuring local klezmer bands My Son the Doctor and The Vulgar Bulgars


sunday, january 11

Yiddish Storytime
11:00am - 12:00pm at Belmont Library

Details TBA

Electric Rose: The Rosa Cohen Experience
1:00 - 3:00 pm on WRIR Richmond Independent Radio 97.3 FM

Live concert and interview on Global A Go-Go with Bill Lupoletti


monday, january 12

Yiddish Dance and Instrumental Klezmer Workshop
6:00 - 9:00 pm at Studio Two Three

Yiddish Dance is the folk dance tradition that developed in tandem with klezmer music. In this workshop led by world-class music duo Ilya Shneyveys and Cantor Sara Myerson, dance participants will learn a variety of Yiddish dance styles while instrumentalist learn to play klezmer music for dancing. Open to participants of all levels.

Ticket Link Coming Soon


tuesday, january 13

Electric Rose: The Rosa Cohen Experience
7:00 pm at Révéler in Carytown

In this immersive lo-fi performance, multi-instrumentalists Ilya Shneyveys and Cantor Sarah Myerson reimagine the obscure songs of Rosa Cohen, a Jewish immigrant from Ukraine who brought her family’s unique repertoire of Yiddish ballads, Jewish prayers and Slavic folksongs to the New World at the turn of the 20th century. With wildly electric, multi-instrumental flair, Sarah and Ilya depict Cohen’s stories of love and loss, work and immigration in bold and unexpected ways.

Ticket Link Coming Soon


wednesday, january 14

SHTTL Film Screening
6:00 - 9:00 pm at VCU

SHTTL (2022) is the story of the inhabitants of a Yiddish Ukrainian village at the border of Poland, 24 hours before the Nazi invasion known as Operation Barbarossa. In a single unflinching shot, this film – one of a few ever made with all-Yiddish dialogue – captures a day in the life of a Jewish village before its disappearance. Sponsored by the VCU Harry Lyons Chair in Judaic Studies

RSVP Required - Link Coming Soon


thursday, january 15

Workshop: The Struggle with God in Modern Yiddish Poetry
with Danny Kraft, 7:00 pm at Quarry in Carytown

It is easy to think that religious faith and religious disbelief are neat, opposing categories, and that people are either believers or atheists, either faithful or faithless to the religious traditions they have inherited. Many Yiddish poets, however, wrote from a place between and beyond these binaries, believing and disbelieving in God and Judaism at once, enacting in their poetry an ambivalent, passionate, sometimes anguished struggle with God and religion. In this session, we'll read and discuss great Yiddish poems in English translation (no knowledge of Yiddish required!) that present these complex experiences and yearnings, and we'll consider their relevance to our own spiritual journeys.

RSVP Required - Link Coming Soon



friday, january 16

Pre-Shabbos Nosh & Learn
12:00 - 1:30 pm at University of Richmond

Sponsored by the Department of History, the Humanities Center, and Jewish Studies at University of Richmond

RSVP Required - Details and Link Coming Soon