If I Were a Tailor

A Yiddish folk song about trying every trade and laughing at every mistake. A new Russian version for children, performed by Riglis Band.

A Yiddish folk song about trying every trade and laughing at every mistake. A new Russian version for children, performed by Riglis Band.

A tailor, a cook, a singer, and a lot of laughing

There is a whole family of Yiddish folk songs built on a simple, joyful idea: imagine yourself as this, imagine yourself as that. This one imagines a little tailor.

He sets out to cut a fine coat and somehow produces a rag; he means to bake and forgets the flour; he wants to sing and only frightens the nightingale.

And through every cheerful failure he keeps going, delighted with himself.

It is a children’s song in the best sense: it teaches something real, that mistakes are funny and survivable, without ever once sounding like a lesson. The nonsense refrain, digi-digi-don, is the sound of a child who has decided to enjoy the day no matter what.

Permission to get it wrong

Children spend their days being corrected. A song that lets the hero fail at everything and stay happy gives them something rarer: permission to get it wrong and keep singing.

That is a real gift, and it is exactly what the best folk songs quietly hand over.

It also carries a whole vanished world of Yiddish humor in a form a five-year-old can hold: the shrug, the self-mockery, the refusal to be defeated by a botched coat. Keep the song alive and you keep that humor alive too.

"A song where the hero fails at every trade and stays delighted is the most forgiving teacher a child will ever have."

On authorship and attribution

The melody and the Yiddish original, Bin ikh mir a shnayderl, are traditional, their author unknown; the project’s arrangement is new. The Russian text is an original adaptation by Olga Anikina, written for the project.

Each new contribution is credited by name.

This version

Hear it in Russian

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.

Listen freely. License to perform.

For films, stages, and schools

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 traditional Yiddish folk song belongs to the whole Jewish people.

Original Bin ikh mir a shnayderl, Yiddish

Type Folk song

Author Unknown / traditional

Russian poem Olga Anikina

Performed by Riglis Band

Melody: Traditional Yiddish folk song (Bin ikh mir a shnayderl), arranged by Walter J. Kin (RIGLI)

Russian poem: Olga Anikina (adaptation)

Performance: Riglis Band

Production: Walter J. Kin (RIGLI)

Project: Jewish Songs for All / JewishSong.org