Philip Laskowsky

Early life

He was born Pinchas Laskowsky in Warsaw, Poland in the 1880s.^[1][5][6] His exact year of birth is uncertain; the Leksikon fun yidishn teater gives it as July 17, 1889, but in immigration documents Laskowsky usually indicated July 17, 1884 or sometimes 1886.^[7][8] His father was a lumber merchant and follower of the Radzymin Hasids.^[1] As a youth he was taught by Melameds and his father, and learned music from a Hazzan as well as from his brother, who was a music professor.^[2][1] His brother wanted to prepare him for the career of being a military bandleader.^[1][3]

Theatre career

However, rather than the military he was apprenticed in the opera company "Bustnai" in Warsaw.^[3] He soon became the second choir conductor with them.^[1][3] He also befriended Yiddish Theatre actor named Strasfogel and started to act in small productions with him.^[3] He then acted in traveling Yiddish theatre troupes in Poland and the Russian Empire until the outbreak of World War I.^[1] When Germany occupied Warsaw a central theatre was organized and he played as a character actor in operettas there.^[1][3] He also began to compose music for operettas at around this time.^[1][3] He married his wife Sarah around the end of the war, and they had their daughter Chaia in July 1919.^[8][5]

He left Poland in 1921 and emigrated to the United States, sailing first to Halifax, Canada, then to Montreal and arrived in New York City in March.^{[7][9][10][1][6][8]} There he continued to act and compose short works for the Yiddish theatre, often for productions by Boris Tomashevsky.^[3] He held a number of jobs in smaller Yiddish theatres during the 1920s, often following Tomashevsky to other cities, including in Los Angeles in 1925 and in Philadelphia in 1927.^[11][3][12]

It was in 1929 that he got his first high-profile job writing full compositions, becoming the director, conductor and composer at the Prospect Theatre with Nathan Goldberg and Jacob Jacobs.^[3][1] That same year, on March 4, 1929, Goldberg, Laskowsky and actor Lucy Finkel were involved in an automobile accident, leaving Finkel with a fractured skull and Laskowsky with a broken spine.^[13][14][15] According to Pesach Burstein, Laskowsky spent several months recovering in bed from the injuries.^[16]

In the 1930s Laskowsky continued to be very productive in the Yiddish theatre, not only composing but also arranging the compositions of other composers for performance.^[9] In 1930 and 1931 he worked for the Hopkinson Theatre and also worked for a time in Winnipeg, Canada.^[1][6] In 1931 he returned to the United States to work at the Arch Street Theatre in Philadelphia.^[1] He then returned to New York in 1932 and worked at the Liberty Theatre in Brooklyn.^[1]

During and after World War II, as the Yiddish theatre waned in popularity, he collaborated regularly with Israel Rosenberg and Vera Rozanka.^[17][18] His only contribution to film music seems to have been a partial credit for Catskill Honeymoon, a low-budget 1950 film directed by Josef Berne.^[19][20]

He died in New York on June 13, 1960.^[9] He was buried at Mount Hebron Cemetery in the Yiddish Theatrical Alliance section.^[21]