Zalmen Mlotek's
Magical World of Yiddish Song

Zalmen Mlotek is an internationally recognized authority on Yiddish folk and theater music and a leading figure in the Jewish theatre and concert worlds.  Mr. Mlotek was raised in a prominent Yiddish speaking family renowned for its Jewish songbook collections.  His formal training as a classical musician and conductor was at Julliard School of Music, the New England Conservatory of Music, the Tanglewood Music Center, Manhattan School of Music and Mannes School of Music.  Among his most notable teachers and mentors was Leonard Bernstein.  Mr. Mlotek also studied conducting with Zubin Mehta, James Levine and other Master of Music and conducting.

​

Mr. Mlotek’s deep roots in Yiddish culture, his elite musical education and his talent and passion for both have merged into a career that has revitalized the world of Yiddish music and theater.  Mr. Mlotek brought Yiddish- Klezmer music to Broadway and off-Broadway stages as a co-creator, music director, and conductor of Those Were the Days, the first bilingual music honored with a Drama Desk Award and nominated for two Tony Awards. He was co-creator, music director and conductor for the The Golden Land, an off-Broadway hit that toured nationally and was produced in Italy under the sponsorship of Leonard Bernstein.   Mr. Mlotek was the arranger and music director for Robert Brustein’s acclaimed production of Isaac Bashevis Singer’s Shlemiel The First at Lincoln Center’s Serious Fun Festival in 1995 that subsequently toured to San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Boston.

​

He is currently the Artistic Director, Musical Director and Conductor of The National Yiddish Theater-Folksbiene (NYTF), America’s oldest Yiddish theater.  When he took over the organization in 1998, he instituted bilingual, simultaneous English and Russian supertitles at all performances.  NYTF is dedicated to bringing quality performances of the spoken and sung Yiddish word, with accessible translation, all year to new audiences around the country.  His vision has propelled classics including NYTF productions of the world premiere of Isaac Bashevis Singer’s Yentl (1998) in Yiddish, Di Yam Gazlonim (2006) (The Yiddish Pirates of Penzance) and the 1923 Rumshinky operetta, The Golden Bride (2016), which was nominated for a Drama Desk Award and listed as a New York Times Critics Pick. Other notable productions include On Second Avenue, an historical musical overview of the heyday of the Yiddish Theater, nominated for two Drama Desk awards and performed in Los Angeles in February 2007, Amerike, The Golden Land, nominated for a Drama Desk Award and most recently, the critically acclaimed, Fidler Afn Dakh (Fiddler on the Roof – In Yiddish).

​

In 1995, Mr. Mlotek conceived and was musical director for the first All Star Klezmer Extravaganza at Lincoln Center, filmed by PBS for Great Performances and later released on CD and video as In the Fiddler’s House with Itzhak Perlman.  Mlotek has concertized in Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Krakow, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and other cities in Europe and Israel and has performed extensively throughout North America.

His many recordings include several made at the request of the United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C.  His tribute to wartime Yiddish Theater, Ghetto Tango, which he conceived in collaboration with Adrienne Cooper, is performed all over the world and is available on the Traditional Crossroads label.  Mlotek’s Yiddish choral work can be heard on Mandy Patinkin’s Yiddish language CD Mameloshen on Nonesuch Records.

​

He has presented master classes in Yiddish art song, folk, and theater music and taught at Columbia University, Yeshiva University, the Jewish Theological Seminary, Hebrew Union College, the University of California at Berkeley, and Bar-Ilan University.

​

As a leading authority on Yiddish folk and theatre music, Mr. Mlotek has taught and performed all over the world, worked with countless singers including Jan Peerce, Theodore Bikel and others. His piano artistry can be heard in over two dozen recordings and films. He is gratefully married to Debra Cohen, a pediatric occupational therapist and is a proud father and zeyde.