According to
Miller, he had met G. as a chorister in Warsaw's
"Elizeum" Theatre, and that he had studied in
the Warsaw conservatory.
In 1920 in Warsaw
there was published G.'s first large collection
"Gezang un shpil," fifty compositions with the
texts of Moshe Broderzon and Itzhak Katzenelson.
These were sung and became popular in the
Yiddish shuls in Europe, and in the American
lands. Especially known and popular were his
creations: "Marsh-lid," "Tsipele" (recorded by
Masha Benia), "Feld-arbet" and "Blumen."
G. wrote the music
for Itzhak Katzenelson's operetta [not opera,
but noted everywhere] "Fatima" (staged in
Warsaw's "Kaminski" Theatre, and on 11 November
1920 by Maurice Schwartz in New York's "Irving
Place" Theatre.
Around 1921 N.
traveled to Berlin, where he studied in the
"High School of Music," and he became choral
conductor in the large Berlin synagogue and
later in Leipzig.
According to Gelbart,
Glatstein had created in Germany many important
musical works, which had been praised in the
Yiddish musical world, among them: "Khurbn" and
"Shulamis," which were published in New York by
Joseph P. Katz's Musical Publishing House (later
"Metro Music Company").
When Hitler came to
power in Germany, G. in 1939, as a Polish
citizen, was sent away from Germany, and
arriving in Warsaw, he had in a conversation in
"Haynt," stating that he had composed the music
for the play "The Travels of Benjamin III,"
which the Yiddish "Kultur-bund" had staged in
German with great success in Germany.
Di, who had known G.,
recalled that he also had written papers about
music in the Yiddish press and periodicals.
During the Second
World War, G. remained in Warsaw. Michael
Gelbart received a letter from him (15
September 1939), in which he wrote: "Be yourself
and take pity on me and bring me over to
America."
In the "Lerer Yizkor
Book" it was written: "When in the ghetto the
Yiddish theatre became renewed, in the specially
renovated "Skala" Theatre, Israel Glatstein was
the musical director. He remained in Warsaw and
was killed there among all the Jews".
Jonat Turkow writes:
"During the last [Second World] war, he was very
active in Warsaw's ghetto, where he had
organized the first revelers chorus. Glatstein
was killed in one of the German concentration
camps."
In Itzhak
Katzenelson's "Khtbim akhrunim," it was written
that in the Warsaw ghetto, G. wrote a
composition for Katzenelson's song "Aroys iz a
yid oyf der gas."
M. E.
from Julius Miller.
-
"Lexicon of the New Yiddish
Literature," Vol. II, New York, 1958, pp.
262-63.
-
Israel Glatstein -- Dos
yidishe kultur-lebn in yetstigen deytshland,
"Haynt," Warsaw, 11 January 1939.
-
Itzhak Katzenelson -- "Khtbim
akhrunim," Israel, 1948.
-
Jonas Turkow -- "Farloshene
shtern," Buenos Aires, 1953, Vol. II, pp.
148-49.
-
"Lerer Yizkor Book," New
York, 1954, pp. 101-103.
-
Emanuel Ringelbaum -- "Khtbim
fun ghetto," Warsaw, Vol. II, 1963, p. 205.
