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The Barry Sisters

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Name
  
The Sisters

Active until
  
1960

Members
  
Clara Barry, Minnie Barry

Active from
  
1940

Record label
  
RCA Records

The Barry Sisters httpsuploadwikimediaorgwikipediacommonsthu
Albums
  
Their Greatest Yiddish Hits, The Barry Sisters Sing

Similar
  
Chuck Berry, Connie Francis, Andy Williams, Benny Goodman, Ornette Coleman

The Barry Sisters – Vyoch Tyoch Tyoch


Minnie (c. 1923 – October 31, 1976) and Clara Bagelman (October 17, 1920 – November 22, 2014), best known under the stage names Merna and Claire Barry, were popular American Klezmer and jazz entertainers from the 1940s to the early 1970s.

Contents

The Barry Sisters The Barry Sisters quotChiribim Chiribomquot YouTube

The Barry Sisters – Tumbala Lika


Early years

The Barry Sisters TheBarrySisters YouTube

Minnie and Clara were born in the Bronx, New York, to Ashkenazi Jewish parents, Herman and Ester, from Russia and Austria, respectively, and two younger sisters, Celia and Julia. When Minnie and Clara decided to entertain by singing in Yiddish, as The Bagelman Sisters, their father told them they would need to do it in the manner of the Old World and not with American accents.

The Barry Sisters The Barry Sisters quotSide By Sidequot

The young girls got their first break as singers on WLTH Radio's "Uncle Norman" show for children and were still then known as The Bagelman Sisters. They made their first recordings with Victor Records in the late 1930s. They made a name for themselves as Yiddish jazz singers. When the Andrews Sisters' version of the Yiddish song, "Bei Mir Bist Du Schon", became a hit, musician and composer Sam Medoff, also known as Dick Manning, started his "Yiddish Melodies in Swing" radio program on New York's WHN. Before joining the radio show, the sisters made a change of their stage surname from Bagelman to Barry.

The Barry Sisters Bei Mir Bist Du Schoenquot Yiddish Melodies in Swing

From 1937 until the mid-1950s they performed on the program, where they would sing jazz recordings in Yiddish. Their recordings included popular tunes, such as "Rain Drops Keep Falling on My Head", translated into Yiddish ("Trop'ns Fin Regen Oif Mein Kop"). They also performed in New York's Catskills resort hotels. They eventually toured with Mickey Katz. During the height of their popularity, they made appearances on the Ed Sullivan and Jack Paar shows and were one of the few American acts to tour the Soviet Union in 1959. The sisters entertained Israeli troops during the Yom Kippur War. The Barry Sisters "didn't look like the typical Yiddish theater stars or singers of that era", said Breier. "They looked glamorous. And they spared no expense for their orchestrations—they always had the best orchestrations possible."

Personal lives

Merna Barry, later Mrs. Emanuel Pine, was born around 1923 and died on October 31, 1976 from a brain tumor following a lengthy hospitalization in Manhattan's Flower and Fifth Avenue Hospital. Claire Barry (later Mrs. Easton) was born in 1920 and died on November 22, 2014, aged 94, in Aventura, Florida. She was survived by a daughter, Joy Pargman. Claire Barry Easton, who survived her younger sister by almost forty years, was featured in the 2002 NPR radio show, The Yiddish Radio Project.

The sisters' 11th and final album, My Way, was issued in 1973. Danny Stiles frequently played their records on his radio show.

Discography

  • The Barry Sisters; Banner BA-1009 (compilation of recordings originally released as 78 rpm records)
  • The Barry Sisters; Cadence CLP-4001
  • At Home with the Barry Sisters; Roulette SR-25060 (w/Abe Ellstein)
  • Side by Side; Roulette SR-25136
  • We Belong Together; Roulette SR-25156; 1961 (w/Jerry Fielding)
  • Shalom; Roulette SR-25157
  • The Barry Sisters in Israel (live); Roulette SR-25198
  • The World of the Barry Sisters: Memorable Jewish Melodies; Roulette SR-25258
  • Fiddler on the Roof; ABC-Paramount ABCS-516
  • Something Spanish; ABC-Paramount ABCS-578 (arranged and conducted by Chico O'Farrill)
  • A Time To Remember; ABC-Paramount ABCS-597
  • Our Way (Tahka-Tahka); Roulette/Mainstream/Red Lion MRL-393; 1973 (w/Jim Tyler, Jerry Graff)
  • Songs

    Chiribim Chiribom
    Tum Balalaika
    Abi gezunt
    Papirossen
    Giss-Giss
    Shein vi di levone
    Ich hob Dich zifeel lieb
    Hava nagila
    Kuzhina
    Wie nemt men a bissele mazel
    Ketzele baroiges
    Vi Is Dus Gesele
    A Lidele
    My yiddishe mamme
    Bublitchki Bagelach
    Rumania - Rumania
    Roumania
    Passover Medley
    Vyoch tyoch tyoch
    Zug es meir noch amool
    I Love You Much Too Much
    Fargess mich nit
    Yuh mein tiere tochter
    Tsi shpait
    Dem Neyem Sher
    Bublitchki
    Vi Iz Dus Gesele
    Halevai
    Oy mama bin ich farliebt
    A bisl
    Eshet chail
    We Belong Together

    References

    The Barry Sisters Wikipedia


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