Meditative and devotional in scope, and all the days were purple sets Yiddish and English poems to music in a song cycle that seeks out the divine while reflecting on the longing, beauty and tumult of life. The album includes texts by Anna Margolin, Edward Hirsch, Rachel Korn, and Abraham Sutzkever, and performances by Eliza Bagg (voice), Lee Dionne (piano), Maya Bennardo (violin), Hannah Levinson (viola), Hannah Collins (cello) and Michael Compitello (percussion). The recording also includes Three Epitaphs, composed in 2016 and featuring excerpts from texts on love and life's transience by Williams Carlos Williams, Seikilos and Emily Dickinson.
Read more about and all the days were purple:
YIVO: A Homecoming to a Jewish World I Never Knew Existed
The Forward: From Alex Weiser, A New Musical Home For Yiddish
LABA Journal: Jewish But Not Judaic: Alex Weiser's New Album
Sequenza 21 / Get Classical: And All The Days Were Purple
New York Music Daily / Lucid Culture: Alex Weiser Resurrects a Brilliantly Obscure Tradition of Jewish Art-Song
Tablet Magazine: The Joys of Yiddish Poetry
The Daily Beast: For Some Jews, Yiddish History Is Sanctuary. For Others, It's 'Dangerous.'
In Geveb: Sweeping, Bewitching, Divinely Dissonant: A Review of Alex Weiser's Album and all the days were purple
Textura: Alex Weiser: and all the days were purple
WRUU Contemporary Classics: Conversation with Alex Weiser
The New Yorker: Goings On About Town: Alex Weiser
I Care If You Listen: Alex Weiser Explores the Divine on "and all the days were purple"
An Earful: Record Roundup: Contemporary Classical In Brief
Second Inversion: Album Review: 'And All the Days Were Purple' by Alex Weiser
San Francisco Classical Voice: Leave No Good Idea Behind: Millennial Composers Embrace a Cosmopolitan Style
The Shmooze: Episode 0240 "Riffing with Alex Weiser"
New Music Box: Anthony Davis Wins 2020 Pulitzer Prize In Music
Talblet Magazine: Yiddish Album Gets Pulitzer Recognition
Forward: Album of Yiddish songs is nominated for a Pulitzer [Yiddish]
Forverts: Album of Yiddish songs is nominated for a Pulitzer [English]
NYU Steinhardt News: Composition Alum is Finalist for Pulitzer Prize in Music
The Jewish Week: Work at YIVO Inspires Finalist for a Pulitzer
Bund Podcast: Episode 7: Alex Weiser
Haaretz: The Music of Alex Weiser: Yiddish Was Like A Homecoming For Me [Hebrew]
Sapir Journal: The Jewish Future Needs Yiddish
