Interested in knowing more about the lives of your parents, grandparents and great-grandparents?

If so, Our Zeydes and Bubbes as Children -- a musical revue featuring composer/singer Binyumen Schaechter and his two daughters, Reyna and Temma, performing as the Shekhter-Tekhter (The Schaechter Daughters) -- may provide some insight. Sponsored by Yiddish of Greater Washington, the show will be staged Sunday at the Jewish Community Center of Greater Washington in Rockville.

"The show introduces audiences to a picture of the lives of our [Yiddish-speaking] grandparents, the kind of interactions they had," says Schaechter. "It's about relationships between kids and other kids, their parents and their teachers between the 1850s and 1950s, both in Eastern Europe and in major cities around the world."

Through songs acted out with costumes and props, the revue demonstrates how children in that era played, argued and teased each other and their parents, he says, with translations provided for those who don't know Yiddish.

Director of the Jewish People's Philharmonic Choir of New York City, Schaechter has performed in one-man shows across the U.S. and in Paris, and has composed musicals in Yiddish and English (Double Identity, The Wild Swans, Dinner at Eight) and music for revues (Pets!, That's Life!, Naked Boys Singing, Too Jewish?).

In addition, Schaechter has translated into Yiddish The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg by Washington, D.C., filmmaker Aviva Kempner. "It's the first-ever DVD with Yiddish subtitles," the Yiddishist says.

Kempner "needed someone fluent in Yiddish and baseball, a combination hard to find, but the trail led right to my doorstep," he quips.

Schaechter and his three sisters grew up as native Yiddish speakers in Brooklyn and the Bronx, N.Y. "My parents decided they wanted to speak Yiddish to their kids, so they spoke to us only in Yiddish," he says.

He has done the same with his children, although his wife speaks to them in English. "But when we're all together, Yiddish is the dominant language," he says.

He first performed Our Zeydes and Bubbes as Children in 2003 with his son, Daneel, and daughter, Reyna. After three or four performances, his son's voice changed.

"Ever since, I have been waiting for Temma [his younger daughter] to be able to learn lyrics," he says. "In January 2008, I saw she had reached that stage."

Later that year, the three performed the show in Paris, premiering the trio, The Shekhter-Tekhter and Binyumen.

Both Reyna, 14, and Temma, 9, enjoy performing, but neither sees a career in professional acting, they say in telephone interviews.

"I do it as a passion," but won't be onstage as a career because it's too hard to make a living, Reyna explains. Temma wants to become a writer.

Reyna's favorite part of the show is the opening number, which is a take-off on a Yiddish song to which she contributed lyrics. "It's a fun song, very actable," she says.

Temma's favorite song is "Kumrukhele" (Come Rachel). She and her sister sing together, she explains. "I do the melody and she does harmony, and I like how it sounds. It's a funny, playful song."

Among the popular songs in the show are "Kh'vil nisht geyn in kheyder" (I Don't Want to Go to Cheder), "Afn veg shteyt a boym" (By the Wayside Stands a Tree) and "Ot Geyt Yankele" (There Goes Yankele).

Despite its use of Yiddish, Binyumen Schaechter stresses, the program is not just for Ashkenazi Jews. "For people whose grandparents weren't Yiddish speakers -- either people who are Sephardi Jews or non-Jews -- they can see how the other half lived and will encounter experiences similar to those their grandparents had," Schaechter says.

Our Zeydes and Bubbes as Children will be performed at the JCCGW on Sunday at 4 p.m. Advance tickets, by calling 301-348-3872, or at the door are $18, $12 for JCC or YGW members.