Yiddish Summer Weimar

A Yiddish City by the Park an der Ilm

For more than two weeks in July and August, Weimar transforms into a Yiddish city. Musicians, singers, dancers, language students, and scholars come from Poland, Ukraine, Israel, the USA, France, Germany, Russia, and many other countries to Thuringia to learn, perform, and preserve the Yiddish language, its music (Klezmer and much more), its songs, its dances, and its history. Founded in 1999 by the American Klezmer musician and educator Alan Bern, Yiddish Summer Weimar is today the world's most important institute for living Yiddish culture.

Motto 2026 — «Yiddish Wo:men»

The 2026 edition, under the motto «Yiddish Wo:men — Another Story of Modernity», is dedicated to women in the Yiddish cultural sphere. Three new projects will premiere, curated by guest curator Dr. Diana Matut: «Togbukh — Rose Shoshana Kahan, A Yiddish Story of Shanghai», a one-woman musical theatre about actress Rose Shoshana Kahan, who performed Yiddish theatre in Shanghai in the 1940s; «Her:Kol — Yiddish Women's Song Cultures», a concert series featuring contemporary settings of poetry by Yiddish women poets; and «Yiddish Wo:men and the Story of the Book», an online exhibition on the literary activities of Jewish women.

Workshops Before and After the Festival Week

Yiddish Summer is not only a festival but also one of Europe's largest workshop institutes. In 2026, language courses (learning Yiddish, from beginner to advanced) run from July 13th to 26th; instrumental and vocal workshops in two eight-day blocks (July 11–18 and July 21–28); dance and dance music workshops from August 11th to 15th; the «Yidish-Hoyz» immersion program (a residential camp conducted exclusively in Yiddish) from July 31st to August 10th. The instructors are leading representatives of living Yiddish culture worldwide.

Festival Week August 1st–8th — Concerts Every Evening

The public highlight is the festival week from August 1st to 8th: evening concerts (often starting at 7:00 PM or 8:00 PM), daytime mini-workshops for everyone, special performances of the three new 2026 projects, a late-night cabaret, and lecture-recitals. Venues include various locations in Weimar's Old Town: the mon ami (Goetheplatz), Eckermannhalle, E-Werk, Jakobskirche, and the Park an der Ilm in good weather. In 2025, the festival attracted around 12,000 visitors to the city of classical music.

Weimar in Summer — Classical Meets Yiddish

Experiencing Yiddish Summer as a concertgoer allows you to combine the festival with Weimar's classical culture: Goethe House, Schiller House, Anna Amalia Library, Bauhaus Museum, Park an der Ilm. This connection — Yiddish culture in the city of classical music, which was home to the Buchenwald concentration camp between 1937 and 1945 — is not a coincidental choice. Yiddish Summer is also an act of cultural remembrance and the restoration of Jewish presence in the state of Thuringia.