The Mayrent Collection of Yiddish Recordings is unique in its comprehensive scale and scope. The over 9,800 78rpm discs include Yiddish theater, popular and traditional music, cantorial songs, klezmer music, poetry, drama, and event ballads and from locations as diverse as the United States, Eastern Europe, Latin America, South Africa and Israel. The contents offer an unparalleled audio entrée into the vibrant, fascinating cultural practices of early- mid 20th century Yiddish life.

Sherry Mayrent, collector and musician, gives an engaging account of the collection's origin and its educational and cultural potential in this video interview.

The Mills Music Library and General Library System gratefully acknowledge Ms. Mayrent's generosity in donating this unique collection. The Marinus and Minna B. Koster Foundation, the Littauer Foundation and Ms. Mayrent have generously provided essential support for cataloging, access, and preservation.

In partnership with the Mayrent Institute for Yiddish Culture, the collection will include:

• Catalog record – with Yiddish, Hebrew script, translated title(s)
• Label image
• Digital audio – remastered and speed corrected
• Sheet music (when available).

Languages represented on the discs are principally Yiddish, Hebrew, Russian and English. The database record include titles, names and other information as it appears on the disc labels. For non-English titles, we created an English translation if one did not appear on the disc. Non-English title information is also presented in transliterated form (a phonetic approximation using the Latin alphabet). The transliteration scheme is from the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research.

Please note that this is a long-term project! For questions and access to recordings not yet represented online, please contact the Mills Music Library.