It’s been eleven years that I started my little productions on the new at that time field, YouTube, which in comparison with today’s conditions, was something very simple, small and cosy, with inhabitants of a similar quality. All of that made that every visit, every return to it and to them was like a come back to a friendly home. Everything was new and on a limited scale, the trends, fashions and styles still not fully developed, different from what we are having now. In some way I would say nicer and more honest. Still free of the fever of ill rivalisation which later had been exuberantly developing.
One of the very first videos made at this channel was devoted to the song of Jewish origin with typical Jewish climate in music and in the lyrics - "Miasteczko Bełz" (Mayn Shtetele Belz), popular in many countries and in Poland recorded in mid 1930’s by Adam Aston and by a few other prominent at that time singers. The sound was taken from the original Syrena-Electro record offered me by my friend, Wanda Włodarczyk. It was made – as everything at that time – in a simple way: the sound not of the whole length, digitilised from the cassette tape by a radio specialst, Jacek Kurkowski and – the thing that I regret most today, cleaned and mastered by my American friend, Jane, although that action was a nice gesture of her. The final result may be still a subject of viewing: [ Ссылка ] .
With passing time I was thinking that such a record, such a song, deserves better technical approach, more authentic and more natural. And after 11 years the moment of the righteous repetition has finally come - today.
The record is played at full length of the recorded material, on the original acoustic gramophone from early thirties with especially selected needle and after a few camera trials, just to be sure that the best result both for the picture and for sound was achieved.
I thought also of adding some counterbalance to the sentimental line of the song, something that might widen the scope of the phenomenon: Jews in pre-war Poland. Thing that I decided to present is the evidence that relations between Jews and catholic Poles, at least on the economic and trade field, must have been far from sentiments. These are the back sides of the photos taken 1937 by a group of students from the university of Lvov. The photo workshop which made the copies, put the stamps on the back side of each of the photo with a printed warning/exclamation: „Nie kupuj u żyda !” (Don’t buy from a Jew !) and/or “Kupuj u Chrześcijanina !” (Buy from a Christian !).
This is not a place for a deep dissertation or a historical lecture, therefore I would direct my foreign visitors, who would like to know something more on this subject, to the article which in a brief and right way describes the situation of Jews in pre-war Poland:
[ Ссылка ]
And for my domestic visitors I would suggest reading the essay of Jan Błoński:
[ Ссылка ]
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