Sounds

In the 1937 Polish film, Piętro wyżej (One Floor Up) the foxtrot “Sex Appeal” was performed by the unforgettable Eugeniusz Bodo impersonating (in drag) none other than Mae West. As an actress renowned for her overt sexuality and risqué wit, West…

Aaron Hekelman, better known by his stage name Albert Harris, wrote and recorded “The Forgotten Little Street” in 1944, while the Nazis were completing the final chapter in the annihilation of Polish Jewry. Forced as a Jew to seek refuge in Soviet…

This favorite song was written for the 1938 movie Zapomniana melodia (The Forgotten Melody), in which it was originally sung by Helena Grossówna and Jadwiga Andrzejewska. In this lighthearted romantic musical comedy we hear this song when the…

Mania Piwnik met Zanvel Goldberg in 1937, while he was on a spring break from his military service. When they met for their first date, the took a long walk to the Julianów Park, located north of the Jewish quarter. In this recording excerpt, they…

The text of this song, satirizing the dismal living conditions in low-income rentals, would be readily understood by the inhabitants of impoverished working-class districts in any of Poland’s small or big cities. But the conditions it lampooned were…