The Songs of the Season - The "Chassidic" Kaddish

Today is the 15th of Elul - the middle of this month of preparations. I've been very involved with clearing the physical spaces around me - my apartment, my office, my car - of all unnecessary clutter. It seems to me that I cannot in earnest begin a new year while still surrounded by the last year's (or years') mess of things.

One website I was reading for suggestions about doing this kind of cleaning gave an absolute rule - you can only touch something one time and in that one time you must either deal with it, get rid of it, delegate it, or file it away. What you cannot do is pick it up, say, "I'll figure this one out later" and then put it right back where it was. Imagine if we could follow the same process as we pick up the various pieces of our lives over this past year. Imagine if not dealing with something was not an option. It is an inspiring, if difficult to accomplish, idea. The potential however... to walk into this new year with a clean home and a clean spirit - well, that seems worth it to me.

Today's melody is the famous "Chassidic" Kaddish.

Download Cantor David Berger - Chassidic Kaddish

This melody, originally just for the last Kaddish Shalem at the end of Ne'ilah (the final service of Yom Kippur) has spread in many communities to pretty much every service of the High Holy Day season.

It is fun, lighthearted, and is able to change the feeling in the synagogue almost immediately. After all the hard work we've all been doing throughout the service, this "Chassidic" Kaddish provides a much needed relief.

But should High Holy Days be the time for fun?

The Zohar reminds that Yom Kippur (sometimes called "Yom Hakippurim" in Hebrew) can also be a "Yom K-Purim" "A day like Purim." Somewhere amidst the chest beating, self-reflection and prayers for forgiveness should be a little of the spirit and energy of Purim. I think this kaddish melody helps make that happen.


The music was written by Cantor Jacob Gottlieb (1852-1900) and was made famous by the "King of Cantors" Yossele Rosenblatt (1882-1933). Pretty much every other famous cantor also included the melody into their own repertoires, leading to a certain amount of confusion over the original authorship. Sometimes you'll see Roseblatt listed as the composer, sometimes Moshe or David Koussevitzky, sometimes it will be listed as "folk" - anyway - now you know - Jacob Gottlieb (also known as Yankel der Heizeriker (Jacob the Hoarse) deserves the credit.

The piece is made for cantor and congregation to sing together - with the famous "v'i..i..i...m'ru u u" refrain. Give it a listen and get into the Day Like Purim feel.

This year let's try and bring some real joy to our High Holy Day prayers. If we do the work I talked about above and really give ourselves a thorough physical and spiritual cleaning - we can come into 5771 ready to do the hard work and ready to celebrate the new year that is beginning.

Download Cantor David Berger - Chassidic Kaddish

The Songs of the Season - B'seifer Chayim

It is the 8th of Elul - which is to say that we are in the second week of preparation for the Days of Awe. Every day of Elul presents us with another chance to begin anew our inner process of self-reflection - what our tradition calls "Cheshbon Hanefesh" - an accounting of the soul.

This week I want to turn our focus to a short petition that is inserted into the last blessing of the Amidah (the central prayer) from Rosh Hashanah all the way through the end of Yom Kippur.

The last blessing of every Amidah is a prayer for peace. In the morning service it is "Sim Shalom" and in the evening and afternoon services it is "Shalom Rav." There are many melodies probably already going through your heads for those blessings we encounter each time we come together to pray.

During the High Holy Days, we add a bit to the end of those prayers for peace - as if to remind God (and ourselves), just before we end our Amidah, that our prayers today are directed with a different, and special kavanah (intention).

We say:

In the book of life, blessing, peace and prosperity,
may we and all Your people, the house of Israel,
be remembered and inscribed before You for a life of goodness and peace.
Blessed are You Adonai, Maker of peace.

Download Cantor David Berger - B'seifer Chayim


What is this book - and, indeed, how many books are there? If you look through the High Holy Day Machzor (prayerbook) you'll see a lot of books listed. Are we to imagine a heavenly library with all different kinds of phone books (and I don't mean the yellow pages vs the white pages)?

Can we actually believe that our fates are pre-ordained and written down from year to year? Too many times our experience of the world has shown us otherwise - life is by its very essence unpredictable, unexpected and ever changing. If I tried to sit down today and write down what I think (now) was my compiled entry in all of those heavenly phone books from last year...

What bookkeeper could possibly have inscribed the citizens of Haiti for the year they have had? What entries are being prepared for those displaced by the floods in Pakistan? These questions are enough to shake my faith to its core.

Still - I like the books. It helps me feel like I know what to pray for. Praying for a good year for myself - for peace, serenity, prosperity and the like feels somehow selfish and silly. The book helps me to focus my thoughts - as preposterous an image as it might be.

So we sing together - this prayer, as you may have noticed, is in the first person plural - the default voice for Jewish prayer. We ask that if there are indeed books up there - that we find ourselves written in the right ones and that we continue to receive the blessings of life, blessing, peace and prosperity that have been with us till now.

Interestingly, this blessing usually ends with "Blessed are You Adonai, who blesses Your people Israel with peace." During these Days of Awe, our tradition reminds us that our vision must be wider and our hopes grander. We cannot pray for peace only for ourselves and our people - we must praise God, the Maker of peace for us, for our people, and for the entire world.

The melody we usually sing for this text was written by Israel Goldfarb (1879-1967). Goldfarb was a Rabbi, Cantor, and professor at both the Jewish Theological Seminary and the Hebrew Union College. His melodies fill our homes and synagogues every week - "Shalom Aleichem," "Magein Avot," "V'ne'mar" and others have achieved the status of "Misinai Melodies" - tunes that seem to have been given by God to Moses at Mount Sinai.

Listen to the melody here:

Download Cantor David Berger - B'seifer Chayim


B'seifer chayim b'rachah v'shalom ufarnasah tovah,
Nizacheir v'nikateiv l'fanecha,
Anachnu v'chol am'cha beit Yisra'eil,
L'chayim, l'chayim tovim ul'shalom.

The music is in a minor key and has a sense of melancholy - but it turns optimistic at the phrase "anachnu v'chol am'cha beit Yisra'eil" "May we and all Your people, the house of Israel" as if to remind us that we are stronger and happier when we are in community.

Perhaps Goldfarb, a great community builder, wanted to teach us that if we can come together here - in prayer, song and action - we can partner with God and do the work to open the books of life, blessing, peace and prosperity for this coming year for ourselves and, indeed for the world.

The Songs of the Season - Achat Sha'alti

Today is Rosh Chodesh Elul - the 30 day countdown to Rosh Hashanah has started. Our (Ashkenazic) liturgy brings this to our attention in two ways.

1) For the entire month of Elul, the morning service ends with a Shofar blast (except on Shabbat). Hearing that clarion call every day forces us to do the spiritual work of "Cheshbon Hanefesh" - accounting of the soul.

2) We include Psalm 27 in every service.

To read the whole psalm in English and Hebrew, check here:
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt2627.htm

This is a sort of tricky one to understand. What is it about this psalm that makes it THE psalm for the "Penitential Season?"

I think to answer the question of the psalm we have to start with an even more basic question - Why does Rosh Hashanah come before Yom Kippur?

It sounds crazy - but it would make so much more sense if it went the other way. If Yom Kippur was first, we could come clean from all that we've done wrong, wipe it all away, and then come to Rosh Hashanah and begin our new year with a clean slate.

Well - as much sense as that makes - it doesn't actually work out that way...

As it usually happens we start with this grandiose holiday filled with BIG music, BIG prayers, and Shofars blasting away and then have 10 days to recuperate before we come back to beat our chests and ask for forgiveness.

So - why do we do it that way?

I think our tradition is telling us that we can't just expect to be able to authentically come before God and ask forgiveness without a lot of preparation. We need to remember who God is - and what we hope God does - and who we are when we stand in God's presence. Rosh Hashanah gives us that preparation and reintroduces ourselves to the longing and hope that lives inside us. Only then can we enter Yom Kippur and access the part of us that asks for forgiveness.

With all that - I haven't mentioned Psalm 27 yet.

This psalm CRAVES God's attention. It starts out proclaiming that "God is my light and my help" with a certainty that belies our real experience of life in this world.
Reality enters the picture with verse 4 -

One thing I ask, only this do I seek
To dwell in Your house all the days of my life
To behold Your loveliness, in the light of Your temple dawn.

We have only one request - to live with the knowledge that we are with God. Whatever situations life gives us, good or bad - we hope and pray that God will be with us in them. We start singing these words today, on Rosh Chodesh Elul - and keep going all the way through the "closing of the gates" at Hoshanah Rabba (at the end of Sukkot).

We try - using the words of this psalm, to bring ourselves into God's presence - so that we can find the parts of ourselves, however deeply buried they may be, that know how to ask for forgiveness.

Here is the melody we use to sing these words:
Download Cantor David Berger - Achat Sha'alti

This melody, written by Israel Katz, is arranged for 2 parts by my dear friend and mentor Joyce Rosenzweig.

Achat Sha’alti mei’eit Adonai otah avakeish (2x)
Shivti b’veit Adonai kol y’mei chayai
Lachazot b’no’am, b'no'am Adonai ul’vakeir b’heichalo (2x)

We will be singing it a lot over the coming month, and the melody will be with us throughout our journey from the beginning of Rosh Hashanah till the Shofar blast at the end of Yom Kippur.

Psalm 27 ends with a simple blessing - some words of encouragement for the work we all have before us.

Hope in Adonai
Be strong and of good courage!
And hope in Adonai.

Chodesh Tov,
the Chazzan

This week at the Chazzan's Shabbes Tish (and a little catch up)

So... it's been a few weeks of busyness so I haven't been able to update as much as I like...
No worries - I will be back up to full speed before you know it.

Just a little catch up...

2 weeks ago at the Tish we had a fantastic chicken tagine made in the slow cooker. It was my first slow cooker shabbes - and a bit of an adventure - but let me tell you - that meat just fell off the bone.

Last week at the Tish - we had a Shabbat Christmas Chinese feast.
Veggie eggrolls (which are really hard to do for shabbat - what with the cooking and reheating and all - they came out a bit soggy but delicious)
Slow Cooker (I know, two weeks in a row...) Chinese Chicken and veggies. Honestly - this was not my greatest success - but I feel that I learned.
Guests included:
Dr. Tzemah Yoreh and his wife Aviva Richman - both of whom teach at the American Jewish University.
Tzemah and Aviva's friends Daniel and Nitzan - who were in town for the Association for Jewish Studies conference.
The Chazzan's sister Jennifer
The Chazzan and his husband.


THIS WEEK!

Guests:
Rabbi Leslie Bergson and Mary Baron
(Leslie was one of the rabbis at our wedding)


Dr. Rachel Safman, Daniel Robinson and Edie Safman
(Rachel is D'ror's chevruta at school)

The Chazzan and his husband.

Menu:
Challah and Chummus

BEER CAN CHICKEN - note the pre-oven picture
I have never made this before but I am so excited to give it a try.
The chicken is covered with a delicious spice rub that I put together, there are lemon basil leaves under the skin - yum! Most exciting though are the cans of Heineken the birds are sitting on.

Roasted veggies

Garlic Mashed potatoes.

Happy 2010!
Good Shabbes to all and to all a Good Shabbes!
Lots of LOVE,
the Chazzan

This week at the Chazzan's Shabbes (and Chanukah) Tish

Guests:

Susan McKibben (Long time friend of D'ror)

The Chazzan and his husband.

Menu:

Challah and Chummus (goes without saying...)

Roasted Herbed Chicken (parsley, mint and basil this time)
(you know, when you put all the goodness under the skin and make the whole thing taste amazing)

Roasted vegetables - carrots, golden beets, potatoes, eggplant, zucchini, broccoli... and other deliciousness

Sufganiyot (Jelly Donuts) and some delicacies from Delice (a kosh French bistro down the street)

Note:
Tonight is all about the 1 pot Shabbos. Everything we are making is literally in one roasting pan. First we partially roasted the veggies (some of them like to be cooked for a long time) and then we put the chicken right on top of them and cooked it. So few dishes and so delicious!

Chag Urim Sameach!
Hot a Gitn Khanike!
Gut Shabbes!
A blessed and holy Sabbath of peace and love to you and yours.

The Chazzan

The Chazzan's new song

Health care seems to be all anyone can talk about these days. Between the coming winter colds, the H1N1 and the unbearably frustrating United States Senate - we could all use a little r'fuah sh'leimah.

So - healing was on my mind.

In the Jewish world (especially in the Reform Movement) there are lots and lots of community prayers for healing. Take your pick of popular synagogue composers, they have all written songs for us to express our hopes and prayers for others.

Interestingly - in the world of Sephardic piyyut (liturgical poetry), it seems like the trend is more often on prayers in the first person.

Two that come to mind right away are R'fa Tziri and Elohei Oz. Both of them have beautiful texts and deeply moving melodies.

There is one more text for which I have been hoping to find a melody - Eili R'fa'eini V'eirafei

This text is by none other than Rabbi Yehudah Halevy (c. 1075-1141), my favorite of the great Sephardic poets.
For more info on Yehudah Halevy - check his wikipedia article.

Eili R'fa'eini V'eirafei

בשתותו סם רפואה
"He said this when he drank his medicine"

אֵלִי רְפָאֵנִי וְאֵרָפֵא אַל יֶחֱרֶה אַפָּךְ וְאֶסָּפֶה
סַמִּי וּמֶרְקָחִי לְךָ בֵּין טוֹב בֵּין רָע וּבֵין חָזָק וּבֵין רָפֶה
אַתָּה אֲשֶׁר תִּבְחַר וְלֹא אֲנִי עַל דַּעְתְּךָ הָרָע וְהַיָּפֶה
לֹא עַל רְפוּאָתִי אֲנִי נִסְמָךְ רַק אֶל רְפוּאָתְךָ אֲנִי צוֹפֶה

My God, heal me and I will be healed.
Don't let the fire of Your anger consume me.
My drugs and medications are Yours - whether good
or bad. Whether strong or weak.
You are the one who chooses, not I.
You know what is good, and what is beautiful.
I do not rely on my own medicine;
I hope only for Your healing power.


Franz Rosenzweig commented that, as a physician, Halevy knew intimately the powers of human medicine. He knew that sometimes when a person is sick a simple remedy can bring a complete healing - and he had no superstition about "those doctors and their crazy ideas. He chose to believe, as a doctor, that the true source of healing is God.

Somehow today this melody came to me for this poem.

Download David Berger - Eili R'fa'eini V'eirafei

Happy Chanukah!
The Chazzan

Tonight at the Chazzan's Shabbes Tish

Guests:

Samara Bay (cousin of D'ror) and her boyfriend Patrick

Achiya Shatz (labor zionist shaliach) and his roommate

The Chazzan and his husband.

Menu:

Challah and Chummus (of course)

Chicken Piccata (with one vegetarian variation - veggie chicken strips piccata)

Angel Hair Pasta

Roasted Broccoli and Cauliflower with homemade marinara sauce (I was inspired by watching Chef Academy on Bravo)

Homemade Pear Pie (made by D'ror) with a crumble on top served with pareve vanilla ice cream.