One of the most beloved Yiddish songs ever written: an old teacher, little children, and the alphabet learned by the fire. Russian version performed by Riglis Band.
In the hearth a little fire burns, and the house is warm, and the rabbi teaches little children the alef-beys. That is how the most famous Yiddish teaching song in the world begins, and for more than a century it has meant one thing above all: this is how a people hands itself, letter by letter, to its children.
It is a gentle song with a serious heart. The teacher tells the children to look carefully at the letters, because one day, when they are older and carry the weight of exile, these same letters will hold their strength. A song about an alphabet turns out to be a song about survival.
Every culture has to solve the same problem: how to give itself to the next generation before the last one is gone. Warshawsky answered it with a stove, a teacher, and twenty-two letters. The song works because it is not a lecture; it is a warm room a child wants to stay in.
That is precisely the mission of this project, stated a century early and better than we could state it: carry the letters, the warmth, and the memory into the language today’s children actually speak, so the fire does not go out.
"Warshawsky already wrote our mission in the 1890s: teach the children the letters by the warm fire, so the letters carry them through the cold."
- Walter J. Kin, on the project's approachThe words and melody of Oyfn Pripetchik are the work of Mark Warshawsky, published in the late nineteenth century and long in the public domain; the project’s arrangement is new. The Russian text is an adaptation by Olga Anikina. Warshawsky deserves to be remembered by name, and this page is, among other things, a small act of remembrance.
The project’s Russian poem is a new text. Its full lyrics and a kids’ room are on the Russian page.
| Words & melody | Mark Warshawsky (late 19th c.), Oyfn Pripetchik |
| Russian poem | Olga Anikina (adaptation) |
| Arrangement | Walter J. Kin (RIGLI) |
| Performance | Riglis Band |
| Production | Walter J. Kin (RIGLI) |
| Project | Jewish Songs for All / JewishSong.org |
The project’s version is in Russian, with Olga Anikina’s poem, performed by Riglis Band. The full Russian text and a kids’ room for parents and teachers are on the Russian page.
You may watch, share, and enjoy this recording freely. For performances, recordings, film and media placements, and printed arrangements of the project's version, licensing is handled simply and respectfully by Rigli Publishing.
The project’s arrangement and the Russian adaptation were created for RIGLI: the poem by Olga Anikina, the production by Walter J. Kin, Member of the Dramatists Guild of America, published by Rigli Publishing as part of JewishSong.org. The original Oyfn Pripetchik by Mark Warshawsky is in the public domain and belongs to the whole Jewish people.