Emily Cohen is a rabbi from Brooklyn, NY. In this episode we discuss the rich musical tradition in Judaism. Emily provides insight into her role as a rabbi at West End Synagogue, a reconstructionist congregation in Manhattan, and her extensive involvement in music, including her participation in a secular choir and her compositions in Jewish music. The conversation delves into the rich traditions of Jewish music, including liturgical chants, folk traditions like klezmer, and the influence of various Jewish cultural backgrounds. Emily also shares her approach to songwriting, her vision for integrating social justice themes into her music, and the significance of music in sacred and secular contexts.
Follow Emily:
Instagram: @em.cohen
Website: www.rabbiemilycohen.com
**Morgan:** Welcome to Zeitgeist Radio, the podcast for music lovers to expand their horizons into new and interesting musical subcultures. I'm your host, Morgan Roe, founder of the Zeitgeist Academy. Each episode, I interview someone from a different musical community. Zeitgeist means spirit of the times. And my goal is to make that spirit come alive for you and help you appreciate musical communities you may not know much about.
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My guest today is Emily Cohen, a rabbi from Brooklyn. Emily, welcome to Zeitgeist Radio. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really happy to be here. I'm so excited. You and I have sung together many, many moons ago in choir in college and I have a lot of very happy memories with you. So it's very, I'm really looking forward to seeing where you've gone and what your journey with music has been, um, and your journey generally.
So, uh, Um, for our listeners, can you give a brief introduction of who you are? Um, and also who you consider yourself to be musically.
**Emily:** Yeah, I'm, I'm professionally, I'm a rabbi. Um, I am the rabbi of West End Synagogue, which is a reconstructionist congregation, which is too complicated to get into what reconstructionist means, but, um, it's a progressive Jewish movement.
Um, and it's about a 200 member family or. 200 member family unit, uh, synagogue on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. I live in Brooklyn. Um, I've been an artist forever. So, you know, lots of music, also a lot of writing. I, I do some Jewish journalism and, um, some creative stuff that we'll get into. And I also sing with a secular choir in Manhattan that just does like, Actually, we do a lot of sacred music, but it's a secular ensemble.
We just rehearse in a church and, you know, end up singing a lot of stuff about Jesus, because that's what happens. I have friends
**Morgan:** here who like aren't choir people and they're, I'm like, come to my concert. Cause you're always like, come to my concert always. And they're, um, she actually, she's Jewish and she's like, is there going to be Jesus?
And I'm like, well, I mean, you can't not.
**Emily:** There will be Jesus, but not like that kind of Jesus, just like singing Jesus. We're just.
**Morgan:** That's who writes the checks to the composers and a lot of very beautiful music. So
**Emily:** when you sing in a church, the acoustics are
**Morgan:** so good. Yeah. Awesome. I'm so happy you're still singing.
That's great. Um, I would like to start setting this conversation, uh, with an overview of, uh, Jewish music generally. The music that you have, that you have played publicly, um, and then just kind of get some definitions going. So, cause my knowledge on this is not very great.
So can you kind of, is there an overview of like music in the Jewish scene that you can kind of set the scene for us? Sure.
**Emily:** Um, that is a question that could take the rest of this hour, but I will give like a brief overview. So like, like Judaism is an extremely musical tradition. Um, Our liturgical stuff is based a lot on different modes of chants.
So we read the the Torah, which is like the Hebrew Bible, um, So, you know, Genesis, all that stuff. And there are particular modes of chanting that. So we don't just recite it as like written words. We actually chant it to music. And the same is true for most of the prayers that we do in synagogue. And some of these modes of chanting are over a thousand years old.
Others are, have been developed much more recently, but we really were an oral tradition first. And so there was a lot of music that came in as part of that. In addition to all of the liturgical stuff, there's a huge folk tradition that has been around. Also kind of forever. Um, so what's probably most well known in Jewish music is klezmer, which is, um, a mostly European form of Jewish music featuring clarinet, particular scales that are like neither major nor minor.
They're kind of, um, it's called like the Freilich scale. Um, and then there's also a bunch of other music forms that come from different parts of Judaism all over the world, because while the most well known kinds of Judaism in the United States are Ashkenazi, which is this scale. There's, you know, Eastern European Judaism.
There's also a lot of really wonderful Sephardic Jewish music coming from the Iberian Peninsula and from North Africa. There's Jewish music coming from the Middle East and other parts of the world as well. So, everywhere that there are Jews, there's Jewish music and there's a lot of languages as well.
That are combinations of Hebrew with local languages. So like Yiddish is probably best known. So that's like Hebrew and German, but there's also Ladino, which is Hebrew and Spanish. There's, um, you know, Syrio Judean, which is like Hebrew and, you know, like there's just so many different languages that this works with as well.
**Morgan:** Wow. I just learned so much. So, okay. Is there a difference then between, um, just because I've had some folk dancers on here, including Anastasia, who you know, as well, um, Israeli dance, Israeli music is kind of in the folk scene. It's its own thing. Where does that kind of sit in? Is that, I mean, there's, there's Klezmer and my understanding is Israeli music is a little bit different.
And is that also considered Jewish music? Like. Like automatically, like,
**Emily:** well, so in Israel, you have a lot of Jews. You also have a lot of Arab Israelis who are people that come from Muslim and Christian backgrounds, like Palestinian Israelis. Um, and so the, the most popular music in Israel right now is actually Mizrahi music, which is that kind of North African, Middle Eastern music I mentioned before.
And there's also a, of course, a good bit of Klezmer and kind of more classical music. So yeah, I would say music produced by Jews. is Jewish music. Um, you know, regardless of like, kind of what the, what the point is of it. Like, you know, my dad's a composer. I would say that his music is Jewish, even if it's not written specifically with like Jewish motifs, just because of the fact that he happens to be a Jewish composer and I'm a Jewish
**Morgan:** composer.
Um,
**Emily:** and maybe I can't quite say that. Cause like, obviously if you're like trying to write a, a pop album and you happen to be Jewish, maybe you're not bringing Jewish influences in, but the question of what is and isn't Jewish music is a little bit difficult to pin down. Sure.
**Morgan:** Yeah. So what would you consider, like, what's, what's your style that you lean into?
Like, who are some of your influences? Where do you draw your inspiration from?
**Emily:** Um, I mean, I'm definitely a folk person. So there's been like this kind of amazing revival in Jewish folk in the last. 10, 20 years, like, you know, certainly since, since I've been an adult, um, where, like, when I was a kid, there were a few artists that were sort of like folkish and poppy in their orientations.
Like I grew up with some of that, Debbie Friedman, um, may her memory be a blessing was really a trailblazer in the Jewish folk scene. Um, she was really active. This one. awesome, like, lesbian who just, like, had so much Jewish music that, like, people sing stuff all the time in the Jewish world that they don't even know was written by Debbie Friedman, but, like, was.
And so she was probably my first influence when I was a kid, but then as an adult, there's these incredible Jewish writers, um, Joey Weisenberg, Deborah Sachs Mintz, um, Josh Warshawski, like, I mean, I could keep going, but there, there's just, like, It's been this really intense Renaissance and how we do Jewish music and how we bring new melodies to these ancient prayers, which is really cool.
**Morgan:** Yeah, that's amazing. I love it. Um, so what would you say, I'm so interested in, in the role of how you're saying that you chant and actually it's funny cause again, I'm, I'm not Catholic, but I've sung a lot of masses just because you're a singer and then you do, that's what you do. So I've sung so many passages of the Bible.
So many times. And one time I went to our, I knew someone whose family member passed away and I went to a Catholic mass and they just spoke it and I was like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop. What are you doing? Like, it was so weird to just hear what you do said. I'm like, I've spent literally 45 minutes just on this phrase.
So, um, so can you, can you, um, how do you see the role of song? Um, Versus just the spoken word, um, when you're expressing ideas, either in a sacred or in a secular, um, environment,
**Emily:** I love that question. I mean, it's interesting, like, in the, in the, like, sacred context, certainly with, like, the Jewish context, most Jews.
In the progressive world are not fully bilingual with Hebrew and English. Some are for sure. And if you get to like a more of an Orthodox environment, you would get like a higher level of fluency. But a lot of Jews who just come to services on a weekly basis at my synagogue, they can maybe read Hebrew, but maybe they can't.
Um, and they probably don't know what all of it means, but if you put a melody to it, it becomes something that you can remember, I mean, in the same way that like, You know, I can probably recite the Latin mass if I want to, despite not being Catholic because I've been singing it since like my children's choir days, you know?
And like, when you have it that much in your memory, it just kind of sticks. Or the presidents
**Morgan:** or the states. Yeah,
**Emily:** exactly. Yeah. Like, so it's like, I can also like still sing 50 nifty, you know, like, whatever we learned that in like fourth grade or something. So, I mean, I think that like, definitely is like a mnemonic.
Music is a huge help. Like, I think like, We as human beings, sometimes we drift away from music as something that is innate, but I do think that it's truly innate. And when we sit together and sing together, it creates this really deep connection that like, actually, we've talked about this a lot in my secular choir.
Like, you know, I I'm probably one of the only people in the group that would like quasi define myself as religious, but we talk about like, the spiritual elements of what we sing and how like when you sing in a group, there's something that happens that transcends the moment. And so you don't have to call that God or religion or anything, but it's like, there's something that's like greater than the sum of its parts.
And that's, that doesn't really, it can take a secular moment and make it sacred. Like, I don't know. I remember on a choir retreat, Um, do you remember, um, Hark, we hear the harps eternal or that? So we were at, you know, we were at that like retreat center and for some reason I was late coming from the lodge house, whatever, over to the campfire.
And y'all were singing that like, as I was walking up and I just remember being like, Whoa, and then I got there and I like joined in in the middle and I was just like, There's something deeply spiritual happening here, whether we want to call it religious or not. Like there's something about human singing.
That's just really powerful. I don't even know if that got to your original. No, what I love
**Morgan:** about that is, um, I've also tried to put my finger on that. Um, phrase and I've taken it back to, um, to music classes at Mac with Mark Mazzullo and, um, and learning what the word zeitgeist means, the spirit of the times.
And so that I've kind of seen that. My version of that is a zeitgeist moment. And we'll get to that again later in the conversation, but where that, where you like, cause you're like plugging in the spirit is coming alive, uh, whether you're singing or some people experience it through dancing or, or, um, even playing instruments, like whatever it is that your connection is, even just listening to a song when you like access that spirit.
Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's beautiful. Um, so you've written some pretty powerful blogs that I love reading. You're such a good writer. Um, and I've kind of over the years, you've taken some stands, um, in the social justice space. Um, can you describe kind of your relationship with social justice as kind of a, like gateway into how music kind of fits into this?
**Emily:** Sure. That's an interesting question. Um, So, I mean, for me, I know there are some artists who kind of separate their art from what's going on for them emotionally or in the world. Um, for me, they've always been linked. So like, a lot of what I've written, not, not like majority of it, but like a good, a good amount of it has come about as a result of something in the world.
So, you know, um, There, I remember, like, I wrote a song of peace based on a prayer called Osay Shalom when I, like, right after one of the too many shootings, I don't even remember which one anymore, which is like, sad to say, but, like, you know, I remember, like, after some shooting, this, like, this particular version of Osay Shalom just, like, came out of me during COVID.
Um, like, at the height of the pandemic, I wrote a healing prayer again, based on, like, a text from the Torah that again, just was kind of like, it was my way of metabolizing what was going on. And so I think that for me, sorry, Brooklyn is going to have sirens apologies, but, um, But, you know, I think for me, it's, it's a way to engage with the world and provide something that's like generative, um, instead of something that's, you know, more destructive.
And so like for me, writing and music kind of go together with that in some ways. Like sometimes if I, if I want to explain something, I'll write about it. Um, if I want to feel something, I'll typically compose about it. And. For whatever reason, the Jewish texts just work well for me. I mean, I do write some melodies without words on occasion.
I also will sometimes try to write my own lyrics, but I'm not very good at that. And so like, you know, these texts that are built into the tradition can really help me to just like make sense of what's going on in the world and are like a nice counterpart to the writings that I do. At least I hope so.
**Morgan:** Yeah, yeah. Well, and again, during, I remember you've posted on Facebook. I think the one after the shooting, you went, did you go live on Facebook? Or you, I remember you posted the videos, maybe, was it that one? I remember I've seen you post, um, songs that you've done and just like your way of, and I don't even know sometimes the words, right.
Um, but the way that you sing them and your intention behind them comes through really strongly and it's just so beautiful. Um, So you play guitar, right? And you mostly write on guitar.
**Emily:** Yeah.
**Morgan:** Yeah. Nice.
**Emily:** I'm not a very good guitarist. Like I described myself as like, kind of a survival guitarist, like it's like, you know, I can play well enough to do what I need to write.
And that's like, that's nice. But I think the, honestly, I'm left handed and I learned righty and I think that that was a mistake, but it's sort of like too late now to like, yeah. Switch and start over. Turn it upside down.
**Morgan:** Yeah. So I'm just kind of like,
**Emily:** I'm, I'm kind of stuck with my, with my left handed guitar or my left handed playing of a right handed guitar.
And, um, I do my best, but my partner is a much better guitarist than me. And so sometimes like, if I want to record something, um, like properly, I'll just. Be like, can you do the guitar for this? And I'll just sing and that helps. Nice.
**Morgan:** Nice. So you've talked a little bit about what these songs do for you. Do you write them with an intent to impact others as well?
Or are you saying, or is it more of an internal thing? What is your experience there?
**Emily:** Um, I mean, I don't know that I write them for other people, but I, but when I write after I write them, I often will want to share them. And it's interesting to like, social media makes this so different. Like, I'm shy about playing my stuff in public.
Like, even like for my congregants, like, so we're very lucky to have a full, a full time canter at my synagogue, which means that like, when she's on vacation, I'm like on as like the singer, but Most of the time she takes lead on the music and I just like harmonize with her and get to hang out and do that, which is lovely.
Um, so it's rare that I bring My music to my synagogue when she's on the, on the BMO, like when she's doing her work with me, but when she's away, like I'll sometimes be like, okay, like I should play something that I wrote, you know, like, and bring it in and I get so shy about it and get nervous and usually don't play it very well, but.
With social media, I just feel so much less scared of sharing it with the world because it's like, it's not actually interactive. Like, it is. People will like, look at it and like it or write a comment or whatever, but like, it just feels a lot less scary to put it in the world that way. So, I don't know. I guess I like the idea of sharing what I write, but I don't necessarily write it.
For the community except on occasion there have been a couple times where i've been like i'm writing this for a particular group or for a particular Moment, and I want to make sure that it's out there. I do have a hope of recording An album at some point. Um, I keep saying this year and this year keeps shifting.
Um, but really,
**Morgan:** yeah, exactly.
**Emily:** But my, but my husband actually, like, um, we have sort of a very basic studio set up in our tiny apartment, which, um, we have to figure out we have anyway. Long story short. Um, we, we have like what we need to do, like a very basic, like. guitar, bass, drums, like voice setup. And so I'm hoping that this maybe will be the year, maybe this summer it'll actually happen.
Cause I'd love to like actually do a cohesive album as opposed to just like, Oh, here's a piece. Here's a piece. Here's a piece.
**Morgan:** Yeah, yeah, when you would write that, so would you write fresh stuff for that or do you have like ideas of like, Oh, I've written these songs that would go together? I'm always curious how people put albums together.
**Emily:** Yeah. I mean, I, I haven't, well, I mean, so I have a nice little structure because it would be based on the Friday night Shabbat service. So it'd be like, okay, like we're going to do like this melody to open and then like some of the stuff I've written and some of the stuff I'm like, okay, I'd want to write a piece that is for this particular prayer.
Um, and I, I think I want to do a mix of like, I want to do mostly prayers that are already set in the liturgy, but like one or two that would maybe have like original lyrics or like, you know, going in a slightly different direction. So I have a, I have a basic outline. I just haven't written half the stuff and I definitely haven't recorded any of the stuff.
**Morgan:** Sure. Sure. Oh, this is so interesting. I know we'll get. To the social justice stuff, but I'm just, I love hearing how people approach, uh, songwriting. So you're using the sacred texts and then are you using the melodies, like traditional melodies as like a basis and then playing with them, or are you completely coming up with original melodies most of the time,
**Emily:** usually original melodies, once in a while, I'll take.
The new sock, which is like the traditional melody and I'll like, try to use that same mode, but there's a, I mean, there is this rich tradition in the Jewish community. And again, especially with like, this kind of Renaissance of the last 20 years of just like, writing your own melodies for things. So, and then you teach them to the community.
So, like, there's a piece of the service every week called which is like a. It's a medieval, uh, entry into Shabbat or basically like Shabbat is personified as like a bride. And so it's like, the chorus is like, come, let's go and greet the bride. Let's bring the Sabbath presence within like in Hebrew, but it's, it's got a billion different tunes.
Like if you look up like melodies, you'll get like at least a hundred. And so like I wrote two of those, um, like one fast, one slow, because it's also a very long song. It's like nine verses with the chorus in between. And so often if people are doing all nine verses, they'll switch melodies halfway through.
So they'll do like a slow one and then switch to a fast one or vice versa. So like I did that. Um, and so that's one of the, that's one of the few bits of the album that's like already written. Um, but yeah, it's, it's just a mix of mix of things.
**Morgan:** Nice.
So people have used music in social justice for a really long time. There's always been protest tunes. There's always been, you know, union, uh, tunes. There's always been marches. Um, , what is your thought of how you put music into, um, these spaces where you want to, process something that happened or see change moving forward?
Like, what is your, what do you bring into that when you write your music?
**Emily:** It's interesting, like, So protest songs are very specific because protest songs need to be very singable. They need to have repetitive melodies, probably not have a huge range, be very rhythmic. Like, you know, so, so a protest song is something that like, if I were to try to write a protest song, I would be very specific about like, I'm trying to write a thing that we could use at a protest.
Um, most of what I write is not that some of it, I guess could be, but, um, you know, most of what I write is. Maybe it carries a social justice message, but it's not specifically meant to be sung in like a group setting like a protest or a march or a rally. Um, but I know amazing composers who do write for that.
It's just not something that I'm I mean, maybe I could be good at it, but I tend to get told that my stuff is complicated. So that makes it a lot harder to like bring to like a, a mark. So I, I haven't really done too much with that, but you know, there's, there's been a lot of Jewish music written recently, particularly since October 7th, like, um, where there's been this, You know, crazy war going on and people have very different opinions, but you can see both for, um, Jews on the more pro Israel side and for Jews who are more critical of Israel.
There's been new music that's been written and brought to these different rallies in these different marches. And that's, that's cool to see in its own way, like regardless of the politics.
**Morgan:** Yeah, definitely. Um, so, so then when you decide that you're going to write a song, that could be, um, and I love again, Anastasia, um, said about dance that because it's people coming together, all dance is political.
Um, and I just, I just thought that was so interesting. And I think maybe some of the same could be said, um, about Jewish music at this time. I don't know, but like, how, what are your thoughts on that?
**Emily:** I mean, like, it is like, there's, there's been actually, like, some kind of intense controversies around some of this.
So there's a rabbi named Menachem creditor, who wrote a piece shortly after 9 11, when his child was born, um, called which means we will build this world from love. Um, there are a number of Jewish groups that have, that had been using that song at rallies that were advocating for the well being of Gazans and Palestinians.
And this rabbi, um, basically forbade them to use his song because he said that, like, it was against the people of Israel and like, you know, that it was not okay. And like, they were like, you know, taking his song hostage and blah, blah, blah. And so, you know, groups have had really different reactions. Some groups have said, like, good riddance, if you're going to be this kind of person, like, we don't want to sing your music anymore.
And others have said, like. But we really like the message of this song and like, you know, this idea of building the world from love, which is like what we're trying to do, even if like our method of doing so is not the same as the method that that you would think is right. So, I've heard that come up most prominently with with that particular song, but I think in a couple of other places as well where it's like, you know, okay, if you're choosing to use this person's
melody or this person's music. What does that mean? There's a rabbi who died a number of years ago named Shlomo Carlebach, and he was probably one of the most prolific and powerful Jewish composers for a long time. He has also been credibly accused of sexual assault and sexual harassment in a major way.
So many synagogues, including mine, will not use his melodies. Um, the melodies are gorgeous and they're catchy and people like them. And so often when I'm finding myself in a Jewish space, that's like meant to be accessible you'll hear a lot of Carlebach because it's like what people know. And to change that, you have to bring in
a bunch of new melodies and teach them and get people to really process them properly, which takes time. So, you know, I think with all of this, it's like, of course, there's a social justice element to all music and it's like, considering the composer, considering the context, considering, like you know, there's also melodies that are written in orthodox world where women are not allowed to sing, um, which is not true across all of orthodoxy, but in like the most stringent, um, ultra orthodox communities, there's this concept of Koli Shah, which means the voice of a woman and women are literally not permitted to sing.
And so it's like, if you have a melody that you love from that community, do you reclaim it by saying like, we're women and we're going to sing this? Do we say, No, we like don't want to touch that because we don't appreciate the values of the people that wrote it. Um, it's, you know, there's always a lot of, a lot to talk about with that.
**Morgan:** Emily has a blog called More Than Four Questions, a millennial rabbi's musings on modern religion, where she tackles some really hard topics, including COVID anxiety during the pandemic, student debt relief, interfaith Jewish families, and challenges of inclusivity in Jewish communities. She's even written articles for Teen Vogue.
And of course she's tackled the awful situation in Gaza and the feelings of hatred and grief that people on both sides are feeling. Just this week she published a post titled What Is Our Anger Doing For Us On Letting Our foundations be rocked while we're talking about her music on this podcast episode
I love reading her writing, and I definitely recommend checking it out. The link to all of her stuff is in the description. And while you're online, don't forget to head over to zeitgeist academy.com/radio and sign up for my newsletter. I send you cool musical stuff every week. That's Z-E-I-T-G-E-I-S-T academy.com/radio.
What are some of the common themes that you like to write about? . Um,
**Emily:** you know, a lot of like peace stuff for sure.
Like, I mean, part of the interesting thing about the Jewish landscape is that like, Even though there's tons of liturgy, if you look at a, um, a service in my synagogue or many other synagogues that are similar to mine, you would have maybe like 20 or so common pieces to choose from as far as the liturgy.
And so I've written. to probably like half of those over the years, like just because they're, they're there. I don't always like what I write, you know, a year or two later. And so there's actually sometimes where I've written like more than one melody for a particular piece. Um, and then there's also stuff from the Torah itself, like as opposed to from the, from the prayer book.
And so that is a lot of generative, um, Stuff to like, just like, what can we do with like, there's a passage in, um, the Noah story where it's like, God saying, like, never again, will I do this kind of stuff like, you know, like, we're going to have a better world. And, like, I set that to music a couple of years ago, like, going along with the, the Torah portion of the week, because every week in Judaism, there's a different Torah portion over the course of the year.
And so, like, you know, focusing on, like, connection, focusing on community, um. I prefer to do that kind of message, I think. And then, um, sometimes it's just a matter of like, what makes sense with like, okay, we, like this melody that we always use for Sadiq Khatmar annoys me cause it sounds like Disneyland.
So like, let's write a new thing for this just because it's a piece that we do almost every week. So like, let's have a different tune. Um, you know, and that, that's kind of part of it too. Sometimes like I've actually asked people, like, I remember when I was in rabbinical school, I would ask classmates, like, what do you need a new tune for?
And they would tell me, and I would try to write. for them. Um, and sometimes successfully, sometimes not so much.
**Morgan:** Are your families like open? Like how, how, how much change before they, I don't know, is that like just part of the culture? Like, yeah, you sing a different melody to this all the time. Like,
**Emily:** so some people, yes.
Some people know some people love new melodies and they would like fully learn new ones each others are like, this is the tune for Adone Chalam. Why are you doing a different tune? Um, you know, and that just depends on the person. Um, you know, I remember my, my grandpa complaining about like how they had these new tunes at his synagogue and, um, you know, he was just like, but that's not the melody that I know.
And so I think it partly depends on like, how musical are you, but also like, how much do you want to like, have your Shabbat experience be a learning experience as opposed to like a comfort experience, you know? So we try to do, I would say. 80 percent to 90 percent familiar at each service, then we might introduce 1 or 2 things that are different than what we typically would do.
And then it builds over time. Like, I would say, like, right now, I know I've talked about before, like, my congregation probably knows. There's at least six melodies for the Hadodi, just because we kind of cycle through them. And then they might sort of tangentially know like two or three, but like not, not fully.
Um, and every synagogue is different. So like we sometimes have visitors who are like, you do all different tunes from my synagogue, even if they come from another reconstructionist synagogue, just because everywhere you go, it's a little bit different.
**Morgan:** Yeah. So when you're teaching, when you write something that, that you are bringing to them, um, You mentioned that it's an oral tradition.
Do you teach it orally or do you have sheet music for it? Or what do you do with people? I almost
**Emily:** never have sheet music. Um, actually it was very sweet. There, uh, about a year ago, um, they did so like, there's something called an installation when you're like in, in a new synagogue, they. install you as a clergy, like, like a refrigerator.
Um, but like, but it's like this lovely like service where like, you know, people say nice things about you and you give like a speech and whatever. But, um, but we have a wonderful person in our congregation who's a composer and, um, he's written a ton of amazing Jewish music and he, Was kind enough to like take something that I'd written that was just like a chant that I'd really freestyled Like again with with my husband and like our studio set up I can just be like hey Can you turn the studio on and I can just like loop over myself kind of thing that for this chant and This wonderful person in the congregation tried to like notate it and set it up for our choir at the synagogue Which was really cool, but also like I never write a song Things with like sheet music, except like once in a while.
Um, so they, they sang this piece and it was like really cool to hear my melody. But also I was just like, I don't even know how you wrote that down. Cause like I think about it. Um, I have occasionally tried to set things for choir. So like. I wrote a piece that actually that same composer in our congregation was like, I'd sung it solo at some point, like just with guitar.
And he was like, you know, this feels to me like it wants to be bigger, like this would be really great for choir. And so I did try to arrange it and like, we haven't actually sung it at the synagogue or anywhere else, but like, I've, I'm, it's a work in progress. Maybe like next year, we'll actually try to try to sing it because it's cool, but it, but it's, it's rare that I would.
Yeah. do notes. So usually both for me and for the cancer that I work with, if we're bringing a new melody, if it's simple, we'll just sing it together a couple times and hope people catch on. And if it's like more complicated, we'll literally do call and response and just try to get people to learn it.
And sometimes if it's extra complicated, we'll do like, Part A one week and part B the next week and then try to put them together.
**Morgan:** It's just like a choir rehearsal with your congregation. Yeah,
**Emily:** without sheet music. Without sheet music.
**Morgan:** Yeah, here, remember this for two weeks, okay? Exactly.
**Emily:** Um, actually like there's a, there's a thing that like, somebody taught me like when I was in rabbinical school about like the four levels of knowing a melody.
So there's like not knowing it at all, right? There's knowing it well enough that like, you can sing it with somebody else. Um, and then there's knowing it well enough that you can sing it if somebody sings the first three notes. And then there's knowing it well enough that you can pick it out of the air.
So like, we have a lot of things at my synagogue that I would say are like level two. It's like if others are singing it, they can get it. We have a few things where people can catch on if it's like you sing the first few notes together and then it's like, okay, when can we get to that fourth level where like, we can just say, we're going to do like that melody and you just know what it is.
**Morgan:** Yeah. Yeah. Um, again, I'm so ignorant. I'm so sorry. Are your services kind of again, like, um, Catholic masses, very regimented. You do this thing and then this and then this and it's very detailed and laid out. Um, is that kind of the same with your services?
**Emily:** Um, yes and no. There's like some things that are going to be true every single week.
So like, there's always a call to prayer. Um, there's always like this, Prayer called the Shema, which is like, we don't have a credo in Judaism, but like this would be the closest thing to it. It's like, you know, here, Oh, Israel, um, Adonai is our God, Adonai is one. And so like, you know, that's going to be there every week, sometimes different melodies, but like those two prayers will be there.
There's, um, you know, the Amidah, which is like this central prayer and then the Kaddish, which is the prayer for those who've died. And so like those elements, no matter what, you know, you're not going to have a service without, without those. And there's many other things that will show up. 80 percent of the time, but there is some flexibility, um, within all of that.
So there's just a few things that are like absolutely required every single service.
**Morgan:** Got it. Got it. Um, and then do you direct the choir? Or does someone? No, um,
**Emily:** we have a, actually a wonderful congregant who directs the choir and comes from like an a cappella background and as a lawyer and his like real life job, but like also as a deep love for music and the choir is really sweet.
It's like we have, um, I think our youngest member is 12 and the oldest is 80 and you know, it's just like, it's not, it's not audition. And some people are like really great musicians and others are people that have a deep love for music. And like, we just all kind of come together and practice, but the choir doesn't perform regularly.
The choir performs for like special services a few times a year, but it's just members within the congregation. And then we also have a band that rehearses, not that rehearses, that performs, um, once a month for Shabbat services, and then also for like our special high Holy day services in the fall. So that's really sweet too.
Nice.
**Morgan:** So, uh, going back to instruments. So you play guitar when you're writing, um, do you tend, cause again, you mentioned that like Klezmer for example, is in like different modes, uh, not non Western, uh, what do you tend to use like tonally when you're writing?
**Emily:** I don't really, I guess I don't really think of it that way.
Like I just, the way that I write, well, okay. There's a couple of different approaches. There's like the, there's, there's Emily without a guitar and there's Emily with a guitar. If it's Emily with a guitar, chances are high that it's going to go a minor G D minor, a minor. Um, you know, there's going to be like some kind of thing going on there.
Um, and I mean, you know, so like, I have a couple of kind of like standard progressions that I feel comfortable playing and like, Um, without a guitar, I get more creative and sometimes my partner will also be like, all of your stuff is in the same meter. I'm going to put on a drum loop for you and you need to like work on something over that instead, you know, so we'll just put on like a drum loop on YouTube or something and be like, you know, right to that instead of to like your normal.
Like what's your normal meter? I don't know. It's probably just four, four, um, you know, kind of a very basic, like four, four situation, um, most of the time. And so sometimes I'll do a six, eight or like a, you know, an equivalent, but it's interesting, you know, I was a music minor at Mac and I did take like three semesters of theory.
And like, I, in theory, I. In theory, I do know, like, how all of this works, but it's been so long since I've actually worked with, like, proper understanding of, like, what is meter? What is like, like, what are these key signatures? Like, I use it a little bit for choir, but even there, I've had to. I've had to really work on renewing my memory of how rhythm works.
Um, cause it's, it's just like, not my, it was never my strong suit. And now it's like, especially boring. Cause I'm not rehearsing four days a week. Um, right. Situation. Yeah.
**Morgan:** Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Let's talk a little bit about, you've mentioned several other people. Um, it sounds like there's kind of a. A whole community around, um, well, Jewish people writing music and then also potentially, um, going back to some of the social justice themes, um, Jewish people writing social justice themes.
Music, whether that means, I don't necessarily mean like for protest, but like with the potential, like the, the direct intent of making a message. Of whether it's equality or peace or whatever in the world. Um, what is, who are like some of the people that are out there? And you've mentioned some names already, but like, like who are some of these people who are, who are writing this and what is, what is their, uh, kind of world?
Yeah. I
**Emily:** mean. Some of these folks I know personally, others I just know, you know, by their, by their music, but like the first person who comes to mind is Batia Levine. Um, they're based in Philly and, um, they've put out one album. I want to say they're working on a second and the album that I know just has like a mix of, um, like traditional prayer melodies, but I mean, not the melodies are not traditional, but the prayers are traditional that they've sent music to, but then, um, also like these lovely.
really powerful statements. Like, um, one of their, um, pieces that we actually saying at our high holy day services this year is just the words are just, we are good. We are flawed. We are the breath of an imperfect God. Um, and I love that. And like, so it's that kind of message where it's like getting people to feel
drawn in and getting people to feel connected to something that might feel a little bit foreign. Like, I think that's a big problem we have in the Jewish world in general is like, the Hebrew thing is such a high barrier to entry. So, like, if you happened to be raised with it lovely, you know, everything that's great.
But like, many Jews were not. And then, of course, there's tons of people who come into Judaism, like, you know, who were not raised Jewish, but the convert to Judaism and like, so they don't have that knowledge. And so, when there's stuff written in English, that's still kind of liturgically grounded it's a really beautiful way.
And that almost to me feels like justice work within the Jewish world, because it's saying, like, you don't need to know every one of these words. Hebrew words in order to feel connected to this tradition that you're engaging with. Um, so they're, they're a wonderful one. Um, let's see, Yosef Goldman is a rabbi who I think is based currently in the Baltimore area or somewhere in Maryland.
But actually, I think, I think he's moving to New York this summer and like, and, um, he also put out an album a year or two ago that was like, This really beautiful mix of, um, like old stuff and new stuff. But one of the pieces that I remember very clearly from that is, um, just, we are loved by an unending love, which is a take on
um, this prayer that we do as part of the Shabbat evening service every week, but he put it in English and then said, like, that the B part is like, open up my heart. I know I am love. I know I am loved, you know, and it's just like, again, this way in for people. So, and that's something that I've actually heard sung in some protest context too, because it's a little bit more repetitive and like easy to get to.
Yeah. So those folks come to mind.
**Morgan:** Nice. Nice. Awesome. Uh, I will try to put links, find those people and put links in the podcast notes.
**Emily:** I can also send you stuff if you can't find them. That would be
**Morgan:** amazing. Yeah. Just for people to go. I think it's interesting. Cause again, I'm so choral, it was funny. I was, uh, I'm on the reunion committee, uh, and, uh, for Mac and, um, they were trying to figure out like who is doing things that like they, like, you know, The hobbies they did at Macalester, still doing them.
And I was like, Oh man, I'm like, I'm in an a cappella group. I'm in a large choir, mixed choir. That's like, I'm doing all the same stuff. I'm very consistent, but in that world, I, I love hearing the plethora, like how much music there is, um, Jewish music. And it's also making me kind of sad because, um, every like winter song esque concert.
Right. There's like, they try to do something, you know, they try to include all traditions and put something Jewish in and it's usually either not that interesting or it's like dreidels or like, you know, something really like, um, and so hearing that there's like all of this rich tradition that is, uh, I wonder like where that divide, why that divide is so strict.
**Emily:** I think part of it is that we don't have as much written out. Like it really is, or a lot of it is just like natural harmonies. So it's like, you know, if you're listening, even to a like recording, like somebody's album, it might have been that they said, okay, like you take like, you know, the third above and you do this thing or whatever.
But I think it's not unlikely that even some of that stuff was not choreographed. You know, that it was just like, you're gonna sing, you're gonna harmonize. Like, I mean, that's what I do with the cantor that I work with all the time. Like, I, like, there's some pieces that, like, we do often enough that I just kind of have a standard harmony that I do.
But sometimes, like, if I'm tired, like, I've been having a bit of a vocal part crisis for the last couple of years. I don't even know. I'm like a sopralto at this point. And like, it's confusing. Like sometimes I'm like, I want to be up here and sometimes I want to be down here. And like, anyway, so like sometimes when I'm, when I'm leading services with her, I'll just be like, and we're going to do lower harmonies today.
Like, that's just like where we are. Um, And I'm, I'm lucky to have an ear where like, usually I can figure stuff out, but, um, but like, that's something that, you know, in the Jewish oral tradition, it is just like a lot of singing and people either picking up the melody or if they have the skill picking up the harmony or like bringing in the table percussion, like there's a lot of hand drumming and things like that.
And so it's a natural approach, but it's really different from choral stuff. And I actually remember having this experience. Like I, I love music and I love choral music and some of the most spiritual experiences I've had in my life, like I mentioned earlier, have been singing in a choral context and like a more like kind of classical context and like sometimes singing like actually like Christian music, but with like people that sing.
And I remember like when I was in rabbinical school one year, I went to this this introduction to like, you know, the art of, of singing, you know, Jewish music. And it was the first time that I actually felt that same sense of power singing Jewishly as I'd felt singing secularly, because the person running the space, this guy, Joey Weisenberg that I mentioned earlier, was just like very deliberate about creating this spiritual mode and also making sure that we were able to.
Like, so people started breaking into harmonies after we'd learned this melody just a couple of times. And he was like, Nope, we're too early for harmonies. Like you got to learn the melody first and like stop people. Cause he's like people that can do harmonies, just like take it as an excuse not to learn the melody.
And so, um, I felt very attacked, but I also like started singing the melody. Um, but it's like, and I did have this experience of like, when we actually, when you actually was like, okay, you can bring in the harmonies now. And people just like started like. breaking in, I was like, Oh, this is like what I'd been missing when, when I was like doing Jewish music in the past.
Cause a lot of it's just a lot of the Jewish music that's been written for choir is so dry and kind of sanitized that it's difficult to like figure out even what it's supposed to be. And I would love to crack that code because I would love to have Jewish music for choir that actually feels genuine, but also is.
Fun to sing in a choral context. And you're not just like having like the melody sung by the Sopranos and everybody else kind of doing like some weird stuff in the backgrounds. Like, but I, I don't know quite how to do that yet. Cause there's just like an authenticity to the spontaneous singing of it.
That's harder to bring in if you're codifying it.
**Morgan:** Yeah, yeah, there was, when I was in the Portland Symphonic Choir, um, we had a man, Shlomo Farber, who wrote, um, he was frustrated by that as well, and he was a composer, generally, and he wrote, um, a piece, and I should have looked it up before, I guess, I was thinking about it, but he wrote a piece for us, and it was, But it was, it was very interesting to like, um, and the point was that it's like, no, this is a, this is more of a traditional, like, uh, what we would actually say in synagogue.
It's not, you know, he wanted to kind of start to break that mold and it was actually quite challenging. Um, and I kind of chalked it up to his, writing being very, uh, complex and it was very good. Um, but maybe that's also just coming from the tradition. Cause his was complex and you mentioned yours is complex.
And I don't know, but it was a beautiful piece. I'll look that up as well and put it in the, in the notes. Um, and I think he promoted it around a little bit because other choirs were also trying to find anything that was written down. Because us classical Western trained people cannot not have sheet music in front of us.
Right, right. Which I get,
**Emily:** although I've had the opposite problem actually sometimes too. So there's a Unitarian Universalist society in New York that we've partnered with occasionally and done like interfaith programming with. And so they were doing a program around Hanukkah. And they asked me if I could come and like be there for that for that service and like sing and, and like do some speaking with their, with their minister.
And I said, sure. And, um, so I partnered with their music minister to like figure out the music for it. And in their hymnal, they had a couple of Hanukkah pieces. And so I was like, sure, like, if you want to do these, cause like he'd suggested it, I was like, yeah, we can definitely do these, but it was sheet music.
Right. It was not quite. Right. Like it was like somebody had like, again, kind of like made it more standard than it should have been. And so like this wonderful pianist, like super talented, could like switch keys without thinking about it. Like that kind of thing, um, was like trying to like do this with me.
And I kept doing it wrong because like, I knew like the oral version that was not the same as like this written version. Cause it was like, Oh, there's supposed to be like a grace note there that like, isn't in this music or like, you're supposed to like, it's not really an eighth note, even though it says it's like just two eighth notes.
It's really more like, probably like a dotted quarter. And like, you know, like, it's just like, it's not quite. Yeah. And so it was really funny to try to like, Get on meter for for that for him. Yeah, it worked out mostly.
**Morgan:** What what do you want people to know just generally? Um, I think most of my audience does not have a lot of experience with Jewish music. like what are some, what are some things that you wish people knew?
**Emily:** Um, I mean, I think like when it comes to Judaism in general, there's a lot of stereotype. And I, in some ways, I'm a walking, like, rebuttal to those stereotypes because, like, I am young and female and, uh, queer and part of an interfaith family and, like, it's on and on and on, like, you know, so in some ways, just, like, by being who I am, I, um, show that some of those stereotypes are not true, like, when you put rabbi in front of my name, it, like, Confuses people.
Um, I still probably have a conversation at least Every month or two with somebody who's like I didn't know women could be rabbis and I'm like it's been 50 years But
**Morgan:** thank you. Um, you have a great a great blog article on that
**Emily:** Thank you. But um, but yeah, I mean, I think like that's that's part of it But that goes for social justice as well that like I think again, there's a lot of There's a lot of people who understandably because of the way that the media works in the United States think that religion is right wing, um, and that religion is something that justifies conservative stances and that justifies like, you know, putting women in their place and like not having LGBT folks have equal rights and all of that.
And I am a huge proponent of the religious and spiritual left where it's like, actually part of why I believe the things that I believe about equality, about justice, about making this world better is not in spite of being part of a religious community, but because of it, that, like, I am really somebody who.
My, my activism informs my Judaism. My Judaism informs my activism. Like, I can't separate them out from each other. Um, and it's just always been kind of who I am. And then my music is something that just, you know, Is part of that, that like, you know, I, I write because it helps to soothe me when things are crazy.
I write because it helps me to feel held when, um, the world is feeling like it's coming off the hinges. And I also write because it is a way for me to connect with people who might feel. Equally upset or equally at sea. Um, and so I guess, you know, I'm not in the business of saying, like, people should be involved in religious communities.
If it's not for them, but I am in the business of saying that we need communities in general, and that can, that can be a religious community. It can be a choir, it can be a sports team, but, like, we need places to be connected. And I think music is a connecting point. Justice is a connecting point. And religion is a connecting point.
**Morgan:** Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. I remember being really surprised when you went to rabbinical school.
**Emily:** I think that surprised people a lot more than when I came out as queer. Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's like, there's a responsibility. Like, it's like, yeah. If people like me don't become rabbis, then like, Then we are just going to have like this divide between like the secular left and the religious right.
And like, I just don't believe that that's a dichotomy that actually serves anybody, because I think like it's totally fair for people to live, to leave religious communities that don't serve them like totally fair. Um, and I think that religious community can do a lot. I mean, partly not to get too deep into this.
Like I have congregants who are in their twenties. I don't mean like children. There's also children or congregants, but I have like adult congregants in their twenties and adult congregants in their nineties and when they show up at services together, we just don't have that many places in our, in our modern society where like you actually have intergenerational connections.
And so like, As much as, like, there's challenges in having intergenerational community, I really love those moments where we have people coming together across these different divides and, like, working for a better world. Um, there's a concept in Judaism, Tikkun Olam, which is repairing the world, and it comes from, like, this ancient, um, you know, mystical tradition relating to, like, goodness being poured into jugs and bursting and, like, complicated stuff.
But, um, yeah. It's modern application really is just about repairing the world and trying to make it a better place for everybody to live. And that's just as Jewish as, you know, the people saying that women shouldn't sing. I would say it's more Jewish,
**Morgan:** but right, right, right. Yeah. . So I, I like to end, uh, the podcast, we kind of went into what a zeitgeist moment is earlier. Um, so just to quickly recap, it's where you feel connected through music to something bigger than yourself. Um, and so, um, what is it?
I'll ask you what was either a recent or a memorable Zeitgeist moment. And while you think on that, I'll go, I'll go with one. And really, so again, Emily and I were in choir in Macalester and I just have such memories of, you know, we would have these concerts and then we'd have the after parties and the, you know, we call it drunk appella where we would just like, we'd just sung for like, however many hours
after a week of like prep rehearsals of singing for hours and hours and hours and hours and then we'd do the concert and then we'd go to somebody's house and just sing for hours and hours after that. Um, and I just have so many, it's rather than like a single defining moment. I just have so many, like.
Like warm and wonderful moments of standing next to you because we were both Sopranos and just like, like watching you sing it and it was just like in just a purely joyful, this was like year after year after year, you know, like, it's like this collage in my head of just like, singing in such joy with you and all of these other people.
And, and it was, you know, it was raucous for a little bit, but then it was always kind of hit that moment where it would just like calm down and we'd sing the slower stuff. And we were just all like, so overwhelmed with this incredible music that we were making together that we just never wanted to stop.
Like we'd go on tours and the entire, I remember the bus, Drivers being like, Oh my God, we never stopped singing. And that is just such like formative memories for me of special moments of being connected to, uh, to these people on such a level. Like, like, I don't know, it was truly a magical, magical series of moments.
Um, just of, of making music with you and watching you sing.
**Emily:** I love that. And I agree so much. Like there's, there's nothing like college choir. There's really not like, you know, we rehearsed. Like, I mean, if you include women's choir, we rehearsed four days a week, we rehearsed six hours a week. It was like, and for those of us that joined when we were freshmen, it was like, you know, all four years of our college experience, we're just like four 30 to six was booked, you know?
Like that was just what it was. And like, I feel so lucky that I got to do that. Um, I won't steal what you just said, although I definitely could, because like, I, I resonate and agree with every word. Um, but I, like the first thing that came to mind was also a choir tour. Um, that my secular choir took actually a few months before the pandemic, we went to Serbia, um, which was incredible.
And, um, we, we were mostly like going around doing different things, but like we had an afternoon where we were free in Belgrade. And so a few of us took like an organized, like kind of van tour thing, just cause we were like, we only had like part of a day, we wanted to like see some different sites. And so, um, the driver brought us to like this, uh, Um, this church that had this incredible like underground crypt situation that was very beautiful and there were maybe like, I don't know, like seven or eight of us and we happen to be relatively well split with voice parts like there might have been like three something but it was like, you know, reasonable and so there's a very famous Serbian composer whose name I, of course, am completely blanking on, but he'd set this piece, Tebe Poem, um, which is like used in a lot of, um, like Orthodox, like, like, uh, you know, uh, Christian Orthodox settings.
And, um, we just started singing this, like in this really resonant Space like this group of like Americans, like, and just like, we're going to do this. Okay. I guess we're going to do this. And like all of these people were just like stopping to like stare at like this choir, just like, you know, spontaneously singing.
And it was just like very genuine and pure and lovely. And the same thing you were talking about, like just these moments of like, we're doing this for the joy of it. This isn't a performance. Like, yes, technically you're performing, but like, that's not what it's about. It's about just like making this music and like bringing this out into the world.
And isn't that amazing. And let's do it all.
**Morgan:** Yes, let's do it all the time. I try to do it all the time. Yeah. Oh, that's so beautiful. Well, Emily, thank you so much for being on my podcast. so much.
**Emily:** I'm so excited that I got to do this with you.
**Morgan:** Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Zeitgeist Radio. If you'd like to take the next step in your musical journey, head over to zeitgeistacademy. com slash radio to join my newsletter. Seriously. It's fun and informative, and I never spam or sell your information. That's zeitgeistacademy. com slash radio.
Music for this episode was created by Ian Boswell. Please hit that subscribe button and tell all your friends you found a cool new podcast. See you next time.
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