Has it been ten years already?!?!

Ten years! That---s much longer than the life-span of a mayfly. Or any bug for that matter. Compared to how long a tortoise lives it---s not really very much. Of course, Yid Vicious is rarely compared to tortoises OR bugs.

No, Yid Vicious doesn---t need showy wings and mandibles or a fancy-schmancy tortoise-shell shell to make its presence known. Instead, Yid Vicious plays klezmer. All KINDS of klezmer:instrumental, vocal, slow, fast, loud, soft, traditional, less traditional. In short, Madison---s favorite klezmer gang plays with all the versatility and polish that only a band with ten, count 'em, TEN YEARS under its belt can muster.

In those ten years, or ---that decade--- as the historians like to say, Yid Vicious has recorded three CDs (the latest, The Seventh Schlemiel, is IN STORES NOW), won two Madison Area Music Awards (for Best World Music Artist), played parties and festivals across the heartland, and withstood the odd personnel change here and there. And they---re still intact and playing better than ever. You know what band can---t make those kind of claims? The Beatles, that---s who.

Yid Vicious formed through a series of serendipitous chance encounters back in 1995, and played its first concert on Madison---s coldest Groundhog Day - February 2, 1996. Since then, the band has returned to the scene of its inaugural ball each year, sometime in the vicinity of the 4th-most-famous February holiday, to ring in another year of klezmer mayhem. The anniversary party will find the seven-piece band augmented by its prodigious extended family, featuring the talents of alumni and special guests galore.

What---s more, because the traditional gift for a 10th anniversary is that most precious of metals - tin - Yid Vicious will give a limited-edition tin gift to the first 20 audience members. Each of those 20 attendees will receive a Yid Vicious 10th Anniversary MYSTERY FOODSTUFF, contained in an artfully decorated (and professionally manufactured) commemorative tin can.