Vale Theo Bikel

Successful Jewish actors on stage and screen are not exactly unknown, and popular Jewish singers are not unfamiliar. But the late and great Theo Bikel -- singer, actor, activist -- was in a class of his own.

As his friends and admirers prepare to mark his "Shloshim" next week, some in Los Angeles where he died on July 21 aged 91, and many more internationally who saw him perform or cherish his recordings, it's worth reflecting on Bikel's uniqueness and greatness.

Quite simply, I regard him as the most authentically Jewish performer of his time in the Diaspora, ie in the 70 years since the end of World War ll.

A big call, some might say. But the key words for me are "authentically Jewish". There have been many greater international performers than Bikel who happened to be Jewish, and some who may have been quite actively so.

But none were quite like him. His sheer achievements were impressive. He held the record of over 2,200 performances as Tevye in "Fiddler on the Roof", appeared in some 150 roles in films and on television, and recorded 27 albums of songs in 21 languages, with Yiddish, Hebrew, and Ladino featuring prominently. At age 87 he toured with his own presentation "Sholem Aleichem-Laughter Through Tears", and just in time for his 90^th birthday, he produced the documentary, "In the Shoes of Sholem Aleichem."

But Bikel was more than the sum of his performances. Nor was his influence restricted to stage and screen. He was an American Jewish leader on many of the great issues; a vice-president of the American Jewish Congress who marched with Martin Luther King on civil rights; an early and passionate advocate on Soviet Jewry; and an outspoken Zionist supporter of Israel's left-wing Meretz party and the Peace Now movement.

There was clearly a connection between Bikel's activism and his artistry. In his autobiography "Theo" (Harper Collins) he vividly recalls how as a 13 year old he witnessed the Nazis march into Vienna, how his family escaped to Palestine, and the impact of his teenage years on kibbutz, as the Holocaust cast its shadow. He writes: "Maybe I was meant to use my voice as a warning that history must not repeat itself..."

But he also writes he decided he would not be "maudlin, not even sombre or solemn". Instead, he would show that "my people had mastered the art of survival". In 2013 he did just that. When the Austrian government honoured him in Vienna on the 75^th anniversary of Kristallnacht, Bikel asked the Austrian dignitaries to stand as he presented the powerful "Song of the Partisans" - "Zog nit kein mol az du geist dem letzten veg" _ "Never say this is the end of the road."

So what made Bikel special? In a word, Yiddishkeit. Yes, it's a much used - and abused - word. But if I had to define it, I'd say "cf Theo Bikel". A secular Jew who revered the tradition and was deeply knowledgeable about it. His all-encompassing Yiddishkeit resonated when he came to Melbourne in 1988 to perform in the "Nign" concert at the Palais Theatre. And it was palpable over the more than 40 years I was privileged to know him and be involved with some of his projects.

The last time we met, some two years ago in his Los Angeles apartment, my wife and I sat transfixed as he gave us an impromptu performance of his one-man Sholem Aleichem theatre piece - all 90 minutes of it. The voice was as beguiling as ever; his marvellous Yiddish and his mischievous humour were a joy.

Of all the tributes to Bikel, the most moving and special was one that he was able to hear just a month before he died. At the presentation of a Lifetime Achievement Award to him in New York by the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, the writer and critic Leon Wieseltier said: "...Theo Bikel remembers. He is a man of the whole. The range of his Jewishness is as exhilarating as it is rare: He is immersed in the entirety of Jewish expression. He possesses the languages and he possesses the literatures. He knows all the songs, and the meaning of all the songs. He knows how we daven and he knows how we demonstrate..."

But Bikel himself had the very last word. He prepared his own epitaph. On his tombstone he wanted written in Yiddish: "He was the singer of his people". Indeed he was.