I had a song stuck in my head. It was playing on a loop through most of the afternoon. I input the lyrics into a search box and found out that the primary refrain of my song was a movie: Yidl mitn Fidl or Yiddle with his Fiddle. According to the National Center for Jewish Cinema, Yidl mitn Fidl was “the most commercially successful musical in the history of the Yiddish cinema.” The story about a penniless father and daughter who become traveling musicians has songs, but not the song stuck in my head. There is a clip of “Yidl mitn Fidl” from the movie on the Jewish Women’s Archive and also a version by the Klezmer Quartett Heidelberg:

A cursory search of the internets found “Yiddle on your Fiddle play some Ragtime” by Irving Berlin.

 

This was also not the song stuck in my head. When I went home last night, I searched through our newly organized record collection for the song. I knew I had heard it in the house, on our little multi-function record machine. I was unsuccessful. Then, while watching Sense and Sensibility I had a brainstorm and went to our CD cabinet. I found Music From the Yiddish Radio Project and on it was Yidl mitn Fidl by the Barry sisters, and Eureka! That was it, so I share it with you. Enjoy!