Hailed as the contemporary Jewish “songbird of Ukraine,” Zhenya Lopatnik’s songs stir the soul and awaken memories even for those too young to remember. Heym Un Veg (Between Home and The Way) features Lopatnic with long-time collaborator Oren Neiman, an Israeli-born, New York based guitarist along with the multi-instrumentalists Ira Khonen Temple and Ivan Barenboim.
Heym Un Veg (Between Home and The Way) tells an illuminating tale, weaving Lopatnik’s original compositions with Ukrainian folk songs. The show is a theatrical journey through time with storytelling that conveys life in Ukraine and, particularly, in the Ukrainian Jewish Community. The performance threads together cultures and generations through Lopatnik’s rich repertoire of Yiddish songs and the poetry of prominent Ukrainian Yiddish Poets.
Heym Un Veg (Between Home and The Way) is presented in collaboration with The Neighborhood: An Urban Center for Jewish Life and YIVO Institute for Jewish Research
Zhenya Lopatnik
A recent emigre to New York City from Kharkiv, Ukraine, Zhenya Lopatnik is a leading voice in a new generation of Yiddish singers and songwriters emerging from the former Soviet Union. Born into an assimilated Ukrainian-Jewish family, Lopatnik only discovered Yiddish in her mid-20s, but quickly made her mark in the field. Heard once or a dozen times, Zhenya’s songs ring deeply familiar. They stir the soul and awake memories even for those who are too young to remember. And for those old enough to know, the sounds transport them to a world cut short by war and migration. Zhenya recently won the 2023 Bubbe Awards - a Brazilian based international competition for new Jewish music.
Oren Neiman
“Neiman creates intricate and tightly knit melodies…an instrumental virtuoso in his own right.” – Jakob Baekgaard All About Jazz
Oren Neiman is a Guitar/Mandolin player and composer. His compositions explore a combination of Jazz sensibility with Middle Eastern rhythms and melody. Oren’s projects and collaborations include: Recording and performing with The Oren Neiman Quartet; an ongoing collaboration with playwright Robin Goldfin most recently the play “Flawless” opening at Theater for the New City in fall 2023; The band “Sha’ar” whose current project is a reimagining of the works of Israeli composer Yedidia Admon; The energetic acoustic duo “Isra-Alien”. Oren was also the Guitar/Mandolin chair in NYTF’s award winning production of Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish.
Ira Temple
Ira Khonen Temple is a multi-instrumentalist, music director, and embedded cultural organizer living in Brooklyn, NY. Recent credits include accordionist for Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish off Broadway, and music director of Indecent at the Weston Playhouse, Great Small Works’ Muntergang and Other Cheerful Downfalls, the Aftselakhis Spectacle Committee Purimshpil, and Zoe Beloff’s Days of the Commune. Ira was a founder of the radical-traditional Yiddish music group Tsibele. Ira creates music that is a doorway between past, present and possible futures. Working with people of diverse ages and backgrounds, Ira develops new Jewish culture that is politically fresh, relevant, and un-nostalgic while building connections between languages, communities, and time periods.
Ivan Barenboim
Originally from Buenos Aires, Argentina, Iván Barenboim studied with Marcelo Moguilevsky, Marcelo Katz and Adriana de los Santos. Before moving to New York in 2006, he performed at Teatro Colon, Teatro General San Martin, Teatro Coliseo and Palais de Glace in Buenos Aires, Siemens Art Festival (Stuttgart, Germany), Fronteras Latin American Festival (London, England) and Belfast International Festival (Ulster, Ireland). In New York, Iván has performed and recorded with Roberto Rodriguez Cuban-Jewish All Stars and Masada Octet, Adam Rudolph Go: Organic Orchestra, JD Parran, Fernando Otero, Jen Shyu, Pablo Ziegler and Joan Baez in different venues and festivals, to mention a few. Since 2007, Iván has been an artist- in-residence at Central Synagogue and since 2008 part-time faculty at the Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music.