Lives in the Yiddish Theatre
SHORT BIOGRAPHIES OF THOSE INVOLVED IN THE Yiddish THEATRE
aS DESCRIBED IN zALMEN zYLBERCWEIG'S "lEKSIKON FUN YIDISHN TEATER"

1931-1969
 

Saul Brandes


B. was born circa 1866 in Tarnopol, Galicia, to poor parents -- small merchants. He had a beautiful alto voice, and he sung with the important cantors of Galicia, as well as with Nisan Belzer. He was a chorus singer with Gimpel, where he also later performed as a "singing lover" in Goldfaden's operettas. B. left the stage and became a cantor in Bohemia, then he returned to the stage, and he performed with Axelrad in Czernowitz and also in the provincial troupes in Galicia, Austria and Hungary.

B. possessed a great tenor voice, and in 1892, during the Chicago Exposition, he came to Chicago as a German duet singer, and soon thereafter traveled back to Galicia.

In 1905 Thomashefsky brought him to his People's Theatre, and b. performed as "Absalom" together with Rosa Karp as "Shulamit". In 1906 B. became engaged to Aged in vaudeville, where he performed as a star in the one-act operettas, which were staged there. B. performed in several other vaudeville houses, then in Gabel's Third Street Theatre.

B. had a disability: one of his hands was paralyzed, but all the time his voice was splendid as the vaudeville houses had existed, and it was not severe on his imperfection at the time. However, when there came the change in the status of the vaudeville houses and in his voice, B. had to leave the stage, and again he became a cantor.

In March 1929 B. passed away in New York. One of his sons is an actor on the English stage.


M. E. from Meir Shehr, Sholem Perlmutter, Rosa Karp and Y. Shargel.

  • M. Myodonik -- Meyne teater zikhroynes, "Der shtern", Minsk, 2-3, 1926.


 

 

 

 


 

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Adapted from the original Yiddish text found within the  "Lexicon of the Yiddish Theatre" by Zalmen Zylbercweig, Volume 1,  page 238.
 

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