Background
Brandwein was born in Przemyslany, Poland-Galicia (now Ukraine), into a family of klezmer musicians, part of the Stretiner Hasidic dynasty founded by Rabbi Yehuda Hirsch Brandwein of Stratin. His father Peysekhe played violin and was an improvising wedding poet (badkhn). Of his thirteen sons, Moyshe played violin, French horn, and valve trombone, Mendel played piano, Leyzer played drums, and Azriel played cornet.
Azriel became Naftule"s first music teacher, and had a lasting impact on his playing.
Career
Emigration to the United States
In 1908 Brandwein emigrated at the age of nineteen to the United States where he quickly became a star of the 78 rpm record era, proclaiming himself the "King of Jewish Music". Thus, he was considered to be among the first wave of American klezmer artists, those trained in the Old World, as opposed to the second generation who learned their skills in America. Decline
His career soured from the mid-1920s onward, as demand for his traditional approach to klezmer music waned.
He made his last recording in 1941 and lived out his final years in relative obscurity, playing in the Borscht Belt.
While he did not live to witness the resurgence of interest in klezmer that began in the mid-1970s, his legacy has been revived by a new generation of klezmer musicians, who cite him as a key source of inspiration. The intricate traditions of klezmer music are not well preserved in sheet music, and his recordings are one of the main sources people look to for the "original" klezmer style.
2008: Yom New King of Klezmer Clarinet (A tribute to Naftule Brandwein) (reviewed on Klezmer Podcast by Keith Wolzinger).
Membership
Between 1922 and 1927, he cut twenty-four records, first as a member of Abe Schwartz"s orchestra, and then as a solo artist after 1923.
