Herman Yablokoff

Herman Yablokoff [Hayim Yablonik] (1903–1981)

Yiddish songwriter, lyricist, actor, playwright, director, and producer Herman Yablokoff was born in Grodno, Russian Poland (now Belarus), where he sang as a boy chorister in the choir of Cantor (Reb) Yoshe Slonimer at the age of ten. 

He began playing children’s roles in local Yiddish theater when he was twelve, and at seventeen he left home to tour Lithuania and Poland with an acting troupe. 

In 1924, after four years with the Kovner Fareynikte Trup (United Troupe of Kovno) and travels through Germany and Holland, he emigrated to America and began playing on stages in Toronto, Montreal, and Los Angeles before settling in New York. Yablokoff became one of the most pervasive personalities of the Second Avenue theater world during the heyday of American Yiddish theater in the 1930s and 1940s. 


One of the many major musical shows he wrote, directed, and produced was Der payatz (The Clown), which catapulted him to even wider fame under that sobriquet. He further popularized that role on his weekly Yiddish radio program of the same name. 

Papirosn (Cigarettes), from his play with the same title, is probably his most enduring song. Most likely an adapta-tion of a European folk melody to his own melodramatic lyrics, it is still sung today. The tune of his song Shvayg mayn harts (Be Still, My Heart) became popular in English as Nature Boy when it was allegedly appropriated by a Hindu mystic in California who dabbled in songwriting. According to Yablokoff’s own account, the plagiarist had claimed to have “heard the tune in the mist of the California mountains,” but legal proceedings resulted in a substantial monetary settlement. 

Yablokoff went on tour to Israel, Scandinavia, Europe, Cuba, and South America, and he frequently played opposite his wife, the equally well known Yiddish actress and singer Bella Meisel. But his most important trip was his seven-month tour of displaced persons (DP) camps in Germany, Austria, and Italy following the end of the Second World War, where he gave more than 100 performances for 180,000 homeless Jewish refugees from the Holocaust. He received the United States Army Certificate of Merit for that endeavor. In one of those camps he discovered his niece, who turned out to be the only survivor among all his European family. 

Yablokoff was first accepted into the Hebrew Actors Union in 1931 and went on to serve as its president for a number of terms after 1945. He was also president of the Yiddish Theatrical Alliance as well as chairman of the Yiddish National Theater in New York. Later in his life, reflecting upon his career, Yablokoff remarked that the Yiddish theater had constituted "a religious experience, a movement of the soul."

Milken Archive

[78RPM]

Mein Weisse Blum (Herman Yablokoff - Janet Fleischman) Herman Yablokoff Melodie 1050 A

Mein Weisse Blum (Herman Yablokoff - Janet Fleischman) Herman Yablokoff Sun 1050 A 1947

Odesa Mame (Zusman Segalowitch - Herman Yablokoff) Herman Yablokoff Melodie 1054 B

Odesa Mame (Zusman Segalowitch - Herman Yablokoff) Herman Yablokoff Sun 1054 1947

Papirossen (Herman Yablokoff) Hyman Adler A Sultan Recording 1001A 1946

Papirossen (Herman Yablokoff) Herman Yablokoff Melodie 1050 B

Papirossen (Herman Yablokoff) Herman Yablokoff Sun 1050 B 1947

Sigaryot (Ephraim Dror - Herman Yablokoff) Hilda Dulitzkaja Shirenu SSS1498X

[33RPM]

Lekhaim (Herman Yablokoff - Jerry Bock) The Barry Sisters Mainstream MRL 393 1973

Mame (Herman Yablokoff - Jerry Herman) The Barry Sisters Mainstream MRL 393 1973

Папиросы	papirosn
Herman Yablokoff
Холодная ночь.Всюду туманная темнота. Стоит грустный мальчик и смотрит по сторонам. Лишь стена защищает его от дождя. В руке он держит кошёлку. В его глазах немая мольба: У меня нет уже сил бродить по улице Голодным, оборваным, мокрым от дождя. С расвета я брожу и никто не дал заработать. Все смеются и издеваются надо мной. Купите же папиросы, Сухие не залитые дождем. Купите дешево ,честное слово. Купите сжальтесь надо мной. Спасите сироту от смерти. Купите замечательные спички, Этим вы поддержите жизнь сироты Тщетны мои крики и беготня, Никто не хочет у меня купить, Я умру медленной смертью на улице, как собака Мой отец потерял на войне руки, Моя мать не смогла выдержать горя, Загнавшее ее в могилу. Я остался на свете Несчастным и одиноким как камень. Чтобы поесть, я собираю крошки на старом рынке. Жесткая скамейка в холодном парке служит мне постелью. И еще полицейские избивают меня тяжелыми плетьми, И мои мольбы и плач не помогают. У меня была родная сестренка С ней вместе мы блуждали целый год. С ней мне было намного легче. Когда я смотрел на нее, притуплялся голод. Неожиданно она ослабла и серьезно заболела. На холодной скамейке в парке она умерла на моих руках. С ее смертью я потерял все. Так пусть же смерть придет и ко мне.	a kalte nacht a nebeldike fintster umetum shteyt a yingele fartroyert un kukt sich arum fun regn shitst im nor a want a kosikl halt er in hant un sayne oigen betn jedn shtum: ich hob shoyn nit keyn koyech mer arumtsugeyn in gas hungerik and opgerisn, fun dem regn nas ich shlep arum sich fun baginen keiner git nit zu fardinen ale lachn machn fun mir shpas kupitye koyft zhe koyft zhe papirosn trukene fun regn nit fargosn koyft zhe, bilik benemones koyft un hot oyf mir rakhmones ratevet fun hunger mikh atsind kupitye koyft zhe, shevebelakh antikn dermit ver ir a yosiml derkvikn umsist mayn shrayen un main loifn keiner wil bai mir nit koifn - oisgein welich musn wi a hunt mayn tate in milchome hot farloyrn sayne hent mayn mame hot di zores mer oishaltn nit gekent yung in keywer zi getribn bin ich oif der welt farblibn umgliklach un elnt vi a shteyn breklech klayb ich oif zum esn oif dem altn mark a harte bank is mayn geleger in dem kaltn park in dertsu di poitsyantn shlogn mich mit shwerdn, kantn, s'helft nit mayn bet, mayn geveyn ich hob gehat a shvesterl, a kind fun der natur mit mir tsuzamen sich geshlept hot si a gantsn yor, mit ir geven is mir fil gringer leichter wern flegt der hinger wen ich fleg a kukt on nor oif ir. mit a mol govern is si shwach un seyer krank oif mayne hent geshtorbn si, oif a gassn bank. un az ich hob si farloyrn hob ich alts shion ongeworn sol der toit schoin kumn oich zu mir

aidishemame

Last update 05-06-2023