Sunday, May 12, 2019

Kabbalat Shabbat experiment #1: Guitar, go away

Read this post first, to understand how we ended up at a Kabbalat Shabbat service with a guitarist.

Maybe I should have realized that I might find davvening (praying) with instrumental accompaniment annoying.  The fact is that, for as long as I can remember, I've always adjusted my vocal harmonies when singing with guitar or piano accompaniment so as not to clash with the instrument's chords.  But, since I've rarely gone to a Jewish service that had instrumental accompaniment, I've rarely had to do that while davvening.  I don't mind adjusting my harmonies in prayer when there are others in the room who are also singing harmony.  But adjusting for the sake of people is one thing--adjusting for the sake of an inanimate object is just an intrusion.

More experiments will follow shortly.  If instrumental accompaniment continues to be a problem for me, or, perhaps, if I don't feel so comfortable going to a service that feels more like a concert, we may need to find an old-fashioned Conservative synagogue that still davvens a cappela.

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