Hasidim, Songs. Shoshanas Yaakov. Gerer Hasidim

Gerer Nigun, 'Shoshanas Yaakov', composed Purim 1953, by Yankel Talmud.

This song, sung accapella by Gerer Hasidim in Brooklyn, was recorded by Benedict Stambler ca. 1960. Stambler was a collector of music and an ethnomusicologist.  He visited various parts of the Hasidic community in his efforts to preserve and record authentic Jewish music.

In Poland the primary composer of the Ger hasidic court was Reb Yankel Talmud. Talmud moved to Israel after World War II where he continued to compose new 'nigunim' or melodies for the Gerer hasidic community.  Talmud also conducted the Gerer choral group, in Poland and in Israel. He composed more than a thousand 'nigunim' in his lifetime.

The leader of the Gerer Hasidim in the interwar period before World War II was Rabbi Avraham Mordechai Alter (1865-1948),  known as the Imrei Emes. The Gerer hasidic court was based in Gora Kalwaria, a suburb of Warsaw.