Joseph Moskowitz

Joseph Moskowitz (Yiddish: יאָסעלע מאָשקאָװיטש, 1879 – June 1954) was an American cimbalom player, composer, restaurant owner and recording artist in New York City during the first half of the twentieth century.

[2][3][4] His father Moses Moskowitz (nicknamed Moshe Tsimbler) was a klezmer musician and cimbalom player who was Joseph's first teacher.

[9] After making appearances in cafés there and in New York, Moskowitz toured the United States for the next five years, often with the Matus Gypsy Ensemble or in hotel orchestras.

[4] At some point between 1909 and 1913 (sources disagree), he opened a restaurant, the Moskowitz Wine Cellar, on Rivington Street in Manhattan's Lower East Side.

[15] This restaurant was a narrow cellar lit by gas lamps, with pastoral Romanian scenes painted on the wall, where up to a hundred customers smoked and drank wine while listening to his playing.

[18] His wide performing repertoire and deep knowledge of Romanian music also apparently influenced other Jewish recording artists in the New York area, such as Dave Tarras.

The restaurant became quite popular, especially among Romanian Jews and young writers, and was soon expanded into the adjoining cellar to make room for the growing clientele.

Then, when the place was full, Moskowitz got on stage and performed various European folk numbers (Romanian, Hungarian, Russian, French) as well as some light classical music by Tchaikovsky and Brahms.

This new upscale restaurant began to attract celebrities, bohemians, and writers, including Jascha Heifetz, Eddie Cantor, Sid Caesar, Mischa Elman, Joseph Pulitzer, Abraham Reisen and H. L.

[22][23][24][4][15] He continued to entertain his patrons with his music performances late into the night, as they ate the hearty Romanian Jewish cuisine.

[35] He is thought to have made an uncredited appearance playing his cimbalom in two restaurant scenes in Joseph Seiden's 1939 Yiddish language talkie Der Lebediker Yosem (The Living Orphan).

[37] After leaving New York, Moskowitz lived in Akron, Ohio starting in around 1940, playing concerts at the Jewish Center there and in the Romany Restaurant.