Mazel Tov Cocktail Party

Clarinettist David Krakauer is the ringleader for this high spirited album that features the Mazel Tov Cocktail Party Orchestra (with Kathleen Tagg, musical director). Apparently Krakauer came upon the concept of Mazel Tov Cocktail Party when he heard a conservative politician mispronounce ‘molotov cocktail’ as ‘mazel tov cocktail’ and decided to use such to inform both a band and album where the values in the Hebrew expression mazel tov (good luck, good fortune) were exploding rather than bottles filled with petrol. A nice sentiment, although as the Ukrainian people are, as I write, making molotov cocktails to battle Russian tanks, perhaps not exactly in tune with our tense world.

Anyway, Krakauer and his band serve up a merry American klezmer fusion like its 1999 (when The Klezmatics and co were going gangbusters doing such). The band mix up rock and dance music with klezmer and even tackle the popular hymn/folk song ‘I’m a Poor Wayfaring Stranger’ in a straightforward manner. It’s eclectic if rather unfocused (‘Jammin’ with Socalled’ is just that, a jam with little dynamic). The Mazel Tovs are probably good fun live but little here adds to the klezmer canon.