Maxwell Street Klezmer Band, Featuring Cantor Pavel Roytman and Etel Melamed

One of the first klezmer revival groups in the Midwest, Maxwell Street Klezmer Band has been Chicago’s go-to band for Jewish music since 1983. With their jazz-inflected Big Band sound, they inject horn-driven energy into the lively dance music of the shtetl. Vocalists Lori Lippitz and Etel Melamed pay tribute to the vocal duets of the Barry Sisters and to the stars of the Yiddish stage and screen with favorites like “Bei Mir Bistu Sheyn.” With the violinist and bandleader Alex Koffman leading the way, the laughing, crying sounds of their music touches audiences of all ages and backgrounds. As fans from Carnegie Hall to the Barbican Centre in London and the Mozartsaal in Vienna attest: You don’t have to be Jewish to love Maxwell Street!