The Jolly Boys recordings

The Jolly Boys recordings 

Side A: Kabootar (Khatibi) "La Palom" by Sebastian de Iradier (c. 1860)] - Columbia G.P. 107/CO 189. Side B: Yasseman (Fakoor) "Solamente una ve" by Agustin Lara (1941)] - Columbia G.P. 107/CO 191. An instrumental recording featuring Polish popular jazz band,"The Jolly Boys" exiled to Iran. The performers include Stanislaw Sperber, Sonia Vartanian, Ghanbary, F. Socolow, and Igo Krischer. The Jewish band found unexpected sanctuary in Tehran, where they had been invited to perform at the future Shah’s wedding party (in the summer of 1939), and where they continued to perform as a group until the war had ended. Although the “Jolly Boys” never made a commercial recording in Poland, the group did record several songs in Tehran. One bandmate, pianist Artur Baigelman (aka “A. Bay”), one of Henry Baigelman’s many musical siblings, did not survive the war. 

In 2016 the USHMM received a “Jolly Boys” collection from a relative of the group’s drummer, Igo Krischer (Accession Number: 2016.152.1); the collection includes photographs of the group in Poland and Iran, song sheets, promotional material, a several emotional letters from Krischer’s relatives trapped in Polish ghettos. For more information, refer to: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn532717