Mordecai Bauman

Mordecai Hirsch Bauman (March 12, 1912 in the Bronx – May 16, 2007 in Manhattan) was an American baritone.

Bauman was born on March 2, 1912, to Allen and Minnie Bauman in the Bronx, New York City.

He attended James Monroe High School, then was granted a fellowship to the Juilliard Graduate School of Music during his freshman year at Columbia College in 1930, making him the first and only student to attend both institutions concurrently.

He studied voice with Francis Rogers at Juilliard.

During the 1930's he became active in the communist political movement within the United States, and made several recordings with a group under the name "The New Singers" where they recorded English language versions of well known communist songs.

In 1939, Mordecai Bauman made the first recording of a group of songs by Charles Ives -- six of them issued by Musicraft on 78 rpm discs.

In 1941, he was the narrator in the world premiere of PAUL BUNYAN by Benjamin Britten and W.H. Auden.

This performance was at Columbia University.

He married Irma Commanday.

Together, they started the Indian Hill Art Workshop in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

Indian Hill was the first summer school in the arts for high school students.

It was open until 1978.

During the Bach Tercentenary in 1985, he led a tour to the Bach Festival in Leipzig.

A few years later, he completed a documentary, "The Stations of Bach", in East Germany.

These are described in the book SONG ON RECORD, edited by Alan Blyth in 1988.

The documentary was funded by the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities and broadcast nationally on PBS in 1990.

CUNY TV now owns the documentary and broadcasts it annually on Bach's birthday, March 21.

In 2006, Mordecai and Irma published their memoir, titled, From our Angle of Repose.

He died in 2007 at the age of 95.