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Big Band Bonanaza:

Yiddish Twist Orchestra

+ Homerton Jazz Orchestra + Cambridge Groove Orchestra

Saturday Nov 23

Emmanuel United Reformed Church

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Time: 4:00-7:00pm

Tickets: £12 / £10 students /£6 under 18s

Unreserved seating available

 

Come and party like it's 1959 with three Big Bands!

4:00 – 4:30pm  Homerton Jazz Orchestra 
4:45 – 5:15pm  Cambridge Groove Orchestra
5:30 – 6:45pm  Yiddish Twist Orchestra

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IT IS ALWAYS THE SEAM ON YOUR TROUSERS THAT ATTRACTS THE MOST DIRT”…

 

…said Alf Wax, the great Whitechapel tailor, and back in late 1950s London the same was undoubtedly true for music – it was the seam of the big band and rock’n’roll eras that produced what sounds now like the dirtiest, most deliriously danceable music of all: a delirious mix of West Indian Calypso, mambo, surf guitar, classic Yiddish songs and English beat rhythms that they called ‘der shvitz’.

 

The Yiddish Twist Orchestra is a London-based big band reinventing the sound of the Jewish Twist, or der shvitz. The joke is that after causing a sensation in London’s east end, der shvitz crossed the Atlantic to become the Twist. And maybe it’s no joke. The eight-piece band features piano and Hammond organ, clarinet and horn section. The vocals are taken by larger-than-life Natty Bo (of Ska Cubano) and liberally sprinkled with Yiddish humour. 

 

Here’s a band who are free of pretensions though the overriding good humour and sense of fun in no way detract from the fine playing and smart arrangements on offer and Natty Bo certainly knows how to put over a song. Let’s Yiddish twist!

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