Songleader Boot Camp post #5: February 16, 2021's sessions

 

Here's a little verbal snapshot of #slbc21

Songleader Boot Camp (SLBC Group)

sessions for Tuesday, February 16, 2021.

I went to the Israeli folk dancing session with

Erica Goldman

and Rabbi

Lisa Silverstein

. It was fun to watch the dancing, and I danced both as much as I could in this postage-stamp of an apartment and what little I can remember after 11 months in "dancers' Galut." Darn--I'm going to have to relearn *everything.* Oh, well.

To be honest, I feel a bit weird *rating* Tefillah, but it was both musical and meaningful. Then again, I should think more about the services that *I* help lead--how do *my synagogue's* services "rate?" That's part of the reason why I'm at SLBC--I'm trying to improve my skills as a baalat tefillah. That and to hear all this wonderful music!

There's Torah in the Wizard of Oz?! Yes--sometimes a person has to stop looking for a savior and look inside themselves. Thank you, Rabbi

David Ingber

, for taking us to the Land of Az and the Land of Oz.

"What good is writing songs if you don't share them?," asked Rabbi

Josh Warshawsky

in his session "Sing Your Strength: The Power of Voices and Music to Inspire Throughout Jewish History." Now I have to go look up a story in the Book of Joshua--Rabbi Josh said that there was a momentous crossing of the Jordan that many Jews don't know about because no one sang about it! We got into an interesting discussion of who's singing the songs and who's writing them when yours truly wrote in the chat, "But this niggun also has to be for the wives they left behind with the six kids [to go to shul in the 1800s in Europe]. "Chani, Moishe, let's sing!" A number of us women (led by Rabbi @Valerie Cohen, if I remember correctly) put in a call, which Rabbi Josh supported wholeheartedly, for making sure that women are included--Josh said that places like the Black Box Theater are our egalitarian tisch spaces.

Marcia Weinstein

called for more women to write niggunim. An Israeli also expressed regret that his daughter is not interested in his parents' Moroccan music--we really need to include more non-Ashkenazi music. We had a really good discussion, both in the chat and aloud.

I probably won't attend many of the sessions scheduled for tonight, tomorrow, and Thursday, since they're intended mainly for professional Jewish musicians. So let me express my immense gratitude to

Rick Recht

,

Elisa Heiligman-Recht

(Elisa, I hope you'll lead a session next year!), and all of the staff who made the Songleader Boot Camp possible. I'll just close out my SLBC posting with the first song of the Tefillah and Shira Kallah, ending as we began, with "Va-ani Tefilati," written by Rabbi

Josh Warshawsky

and one of his former campers, Yael Bettenhausen:

 

Here's the link to "Va'ani Tefilati."