Biography
Klezmer Conservatory Band
Klezmer Conservatory Band
A leading voice in the world of klezmer music and Yiddish song for more than 30 years, the Klezmer Conservatory Band continues to thrill audiences all over the world. With a repertoire ranging from Yiddish standards to rousing dance medleys and little-known gems, KCB musicians have served as important ambassadors in promoting the universal appeal of Jewish music. Over the years, the band has appeared at dozens of international music festivals in major venues across the United States, Europe, and Australia, and on ten broadcasts of A Prairie Home Companion. KCB provided the musical accompaniment for The Fool and the Flying Ship featuring Robin Williams, played an integral rode in Joel Grey’s Borscht Capades ’94, and performed the music for the much-acclaimed American Repertory Theatre production Shlemiel the First.
Since the late 1990s, Itzhak Perlman has featured KCB with In the Fiddler’s House, including performances at Wolf Trap, Great Woods, Radio City Music Hall, the Ravinia Festival, the Saratoga Music Festival, Moscow’s Barvikha Concert Hall, the Mizner
Park Amphitheatre in Boca Raton, and the Mann Music Center in Philadelphia. Recently the band rejoined Mr. Perlman as an integral part of his cantorial-Hassidic-klezmer-Yiddish folk music project, Eternal Echoes. The band is also featured in Rejoice!, a PBS Great Performances music special.
Ilene Stahl
Ilene Stahl has been clarinetist with the Klezmer Conservatory Band since 1987. She has
been featured on numerous recordings and on radio and TV broadcasts, including the Great Performances program In The Fiddler’s House with Itzhak Perlman, as well as both recordings based on that collaboration. In 1998 she cofounded ¡Klezperanto! to create a new kind of dance music combining zydeco, cumbia, funk, second-line, and Romanian brass band surf music with klezmer.
Mark Berney
Mark Berney joined the Klezmer Conservatory Band in 1998 and has appeared at the Hollywood Bowl and Carnegie Hall. He teaches trumpet, improvisation, and music history at the University of Rhode Island and has been known to perform a lively wedding celebration on a Saturday night and then run a full marathon the following morning.
Mark Hamilton
Mark Hamilton has been a member of the Klezmer Conservatory Band since 1985 and appeared with Itzhak Perlman on The Late Show with David Letterman. He has performed with Joe Williams, Victor Borge, Robin Williams, and Joel Grey, among others. A graduate of New England Conservatory and the University of Delaware, he is also a founding member of the Brass Planet and ¡Klezperanto!
James Guttmann
Bassist Jim Guttmann joined the Klezmer Conservatory Band at its inception and has toured internationally, performed and recorded with Itzhak Perlman and Joel Grey, performed on all the band’s recordings, and coordinated the production of the last five. Mr. Guttmann is a founding member of the Really Eclectic String Quartet and has worked with Eartha Kitt, Mark Murphy, Johnny Shines, James Cotton, Tiny Moore, Russ Barenberg, and the Artie Shaw Orchestra, among many others. He was a member of the 2004 Grammy Award–winning ensemble that recorded Yehudi Wyner’s The Mirror.
Grantley Smith
Grantley Smith has toured globally and performed with Yo-Yo Ma, Don Byron, the Violent Femmes, Garrison Keillor, and Jane Wang.
Pete Rushefsky
Pete Rushefsky is a leading performer, composer, and teacher of the tsimbl (cimbalom), the traditional hammered dulcimer of klezmer music. He serves as executive director of the Center for Traditional Music and Dance, which has worked to preserve and present immigrant performing arts traditions in New York City since 1968. Mr. Rushefsky has performed at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Town Hall, Symphony Space, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, and Paris’s Cité de la Musique. He has concertized and recorded with Itzhak Perlman and with many of Jewish music’s leading performers.
A leading voice in the world of klezmer music and Yiddish song for more than 30 years, the Klezmer Conservatory Band continues to thrill audiences all over the world. With a repertoire ranging from Yiddish standards to rousing dance medleys and little-known gems, KCB musicians have served as important ambassadors in promoting the universal appeal of Jewish music. Over the years, the band has appeared at dozens of international music festivals in major venues across the United States, Europe, and Australia, and on ten broadcasts of A Prairie Home Companion. KCB provided the musical accompaniment for The Fool and the Flying Ship featuring Robin Williams, played an integral rode in Joel Grey’s Borscht Capades ’94, and performed the music for the much-acclaimed American Repertory Theatre production Shlemiel the First.
Since the late 1990s, Itzhak Perlman has featured KCB with In the Fiddler’s House, including performances at Wolf Trap, Great Woods, Radio City Music Hall, the Ravinia Festival, the Saratoga Music Festival, Moscow’s Barvikha Concert Hall, the Mizner
Park Amphitheatre in Boca Raton, and the Mann Music Center in Philadelphia. Recently the band rejoined Mr. Perlman as an integral part of his cantorial-Hassidic-klezmer-Yiddish folk music project, Eternal Echoes. The band is also featured in Rejoice!, a PBS Great Performances music special.
Ilene Stahl
Ilene Stahl has been clarinetist with the Klezmer Conservatory Band since 1987. She has
been featured on numerous recordings and on radio and TV broadcasts, including the Great Performances program In The Fiddler’s House with Itzhak Perlman, as well as both recordings based on that collaboration. In 1998 she cofounded ¡Klezperanto! to create a new kind of dance music combining zydeco, cumbia, funk, second-line, and Romanian brass band surf music with klezmer.
Mark Berney
Mark Berney joined the Klezmer Conservatory Band in 1998 and has appeared at the Hollywood Bowl and Carnegie Hall. He teaches trumpet, improvisation, and music history at the University of Rhode Island and has been known to perform a lively wedding celebration on a Saturday night and then run a full marathon the following morning.
Mark Hamilton
Mark Hamilton has been a member of the Klezmer Conservatory Band since 1985 and appeared with Itzhak Perlman on The Late Show with David Letterman. He has performed with Joe Williams, Victor Borge, Robin Williams, and Joel Grey, among others. A graduate of New England Conservatory and the University of Delaware, he is also a founding member of the Brass Planet and ¡Klezperanto!
James Guttmann
Bassist Jim Guttmann joined the Klezmer Conservatory Band at its inception and has toured internationally, performed and recorded with Itzhak Perlman and Joel Grey, performed on all the band’s recordings, and coordinated the production of the last five. Mr. Guttmann is a founding member of the Really Eclectic String Quartet and has worked with Eartha Kitt, Mark Murphy, Johnny Shines, James Cotton, Tiny Moore, Russ Barenberg, and the Artie Shaw Orchestra, among many others. He was a member of the 2004 Grammy Award–winning ensemble that recorded Yehudi Wyner’s The Mirror.
Grantley Smith
Grantley Smith has toured globally and performed with Yo-Yo Ma, Don Byron, the Violent Femmes, Garrison Keillor, and Jane Wang.
Pete Rushefsky
Pete Rushefsky is a leading performer, composer, and teacher of the tsimbl (cimbalom), the traditional hammered dulcimer of klezmer music. He serves as executive director of the Center for Traditional Music and Dance, which has worked to preserve and present immigrant performing arts traditions in New York City since 1968. Mr. Rushefsky has performed at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Town Hall, Symphony Space, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, and Paris’s Cité de la Musique. He has concertized and recorded with Itzhak Perlman and with many of Jewish music’s leading performers.
