tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76410832101933283112024-03-14T06:46:02.307-04:00Jeff Klepper's BlogWherein you'll find my calendar of upcoming events, musings on Jewish music, spirituality and humor, and wistful memories of days gone by.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger50125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-73065231639854523392016-08-07T20:36:00.000-04:002016-08-07T20:38:07.033-04:00Eisner Camp and the Power of PlaceIt's not hard to fall in love with a place.
If I remember correctly, one of my professors, Dr. Lawrence Hoffman, taught me that a place becomes truly meaningful 1) because of its innate physical beauty, or 2) because something really important happened there. Or both.
In the case of the URJ Joseph Eisner Camp in Great Barrington, MA, it's both. I was a camper there in 1968, and returned Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-67895965712145927832016-05-23T19:03:00.000-04:002016-05-24T00:03:14.243-04:00Happy 75th Birthday Bob Dylan!About 15 years ago, I wrote this piece for a now-defunct web site. That was long before critic Josh Kun waxed more-or-less definitively on the topic in the wonderful documentary Hava Nagila (The Movie). For further insights, I also recommend David Kaufman’s take on Dylan's Jewish identity in Jewhooing the Sixties.
Bob
Dylan’s Jewish Blues: “Talkin’ Hava Nageilah”
The
audience chuckled Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-70385551462513763002016-05-18T22:36:00.000-04:002016-05-18T22:36:11.916-04:00Rabbi Robert Samuels, z"lFrom the moment I picked up the phone, I always knew when Bob Samuels was calling. "Hello?" "SHALOM, JEFF," he would say, and it sounded like he was standing next to you. "BOB SAMUELS. MAH NISHMA?"
Bob's big Texas personality came through on the phone and everywhere he went. He spoke the same way to a Druze villager or a cabinet minister. He treated every person with dignity and respect.
Bob Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-57006700084535769042015-08-24T12:13:00.000-04:002015-08-24T12:13:42.102-04:00The Late, Great Yosi Piamenta
He was often called the "Hassidic Hendrix," but Yosi Pimenta, z"l was a brilliant guitarist long before he decided to drop everything, move to Brooklyn and join Chabad. Drop everything, that is, except his Fender Stratocaster, on which he could play rings around anyone, and did, for nearly four more decades, until the illness that took his life yesterday at 63.
When he played and recorded Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-78885978386664955622015-06-09T15:43:00.002-04:002015-06-09T16:30:23.250-04:00Cantor Lawrence Avery in Concert
The 1970s seems so long ago. Jimmy Carter was President, my one-bedroom on W. 69th rented for $450, and the Upper West Side was horrified when Häagen Dazs opened on Columbus Ave, charging one dollar (!) for a cone.
FM radio was still something you could listen to for long stretches, and Sony's new Walkman made it possible to enjoy Paul Simon's latest as you walked past his co-op Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-6979682613765785772015-06-03T12:24:00.003-04:002015-06-03T22:13:17.075-04:00In Memoriam: Cantor Lawrence Avery, z"l
In Jewish life, teachers are among those upon whom we bestow great honor. Many of our teachers are remembered with affection for the time they spent with us. But how many of them had a truly lasting impact on our lives?
Cantor Lawrence Avery, z"l, died last week at the age of 88. From 1974 to 1980 Cantor Avery was my teacher and my mentor at HUC-JIR (Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-79230061630534027232013-09-22T13:36:00.001-04:002014-02-17T12:51:20.478-05:00The Birthday of the World (For Rosh Hashanah 5775...and beyond)With appreciation to Theodor Geisel, and his Jewish doppelganger Uncle Eli...
The Birthday of the World ֻ• הַיּוֹם הֲרַת עוֹלָם
(by Jeff Klepper)
Today is the birthday, the day of the birth
Of the globe in the sky that we call Planet Earth.
Today is the day when the heavens were born,
When the sun and the moon and the planets were formed.
When the forces of nature were Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-88227617974108001052012-02-08T12:34:00.027-05:002012-02-08T14:42:09.016-05:00Poems for a Tu Bishvat SederOur friends came over for an impromptu Tu Bishvat Seder last night. They brought the fruit (thanks Barbara and Brian!) And I brought my offering in words (isn't that how we Jews do it?)I always forget which fruits you eat when, and how much white or red wine to drink, so I dashed off a poem about the Four Worlds of Creation that you can use for next year's seder. Chag same'ach!Poems for a Tu Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-63898731598271201842012-02-02T00:55:00.014-05:002014-02-17T12:51:42.417-05:00Debbie Friedman: Under the Stars & Over the Rainbow (1991)
On July 13, 1991 Debbie headlined an outdoor concert at camp to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Olin-Sang-Ruby Union Institute in Oconomowoc, WI. A limited edition VHS tape of concert highlights is the source of these performances, posted here with the camp’s permission.
As Debbie sang, she was distracted by the buzzing and biting of “dive bomber” mosquitoes, and also by a small plane Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-50440569404425468622012-02-01T22:51:00.007-05:002014-02-17T12:52:01.784-05:00Shabbat Shirah with Debbie Friedman (& Me) - Part 3
Here is the third and final group of songs from Shabbat Shirah, 1988.
12 Rabbi Peter Knobel speaks
13 Miriam's Song
14 B'ruchot Haba'ot
15 Kaddish D'rabanan
16 Debbie speaks (intro to L'chi Lach-tape ends)
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-91323131036473777492012-01-31T23:00:00.008-05:002014-02-17T12:52:20.776-05:00Shabbat Shirah with Debbie Friedman (& Me) - Part 2
Here is the second group of songs from Shabbat Shirah, 1988.
(Check back tomorrow for the final batch.)
07 Mi Chamocha
08 V'sham'ru
09 Yism'chu
10 Shalom Rav
11 Oseh Shalom
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-76378279585930069282012-01-31T00:25:00.019-05:002014-02-17T12:52:35.323-05:00Shabbat Shirah with Debbie Friedman (& Me)
Twenty-four years ago, when I was cantor of Beth Emet Synagogue in Evanston, IL, Debbie Friedman came to sing at my shul one Friday night. It was Shabbat Shirah, January 29, 1988. Debbie had concerts in the area on Saturday and Sunday, and somehow I had learned that she was free on Friday. (It was just Debbie - those were the days before "the band.") So I called her a couple of weeks before Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-46394529386539422622012-01-29T23:35:00.005-05:002014-02-17T12:52:53.057-05:00Debbie Friedman: The Early Years
Anyone wishing to see what I looked like at age 15 or 16 (pre-Jewfro) need merely click on my Slideshow (top right). But, sadly, photos of Debbie from early in her musical career are rare. To paraphrase the famous quote attributed to Leonard Bernstein's father, "Who knew she was going to turn out to be Debbie Friedman?"
Elsewhere on this blog are photos I took of Debbie in the summer of 1970 Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-66402364656185643652012-01-29T00:36:00.009-05:002012-06-23T22:03:46.890-04:00Debbie Friedman sings Shir HaShirim
The year is officially 1 A.D. (After Debbie) — today was her first yahrtzeit. I'm going to attempt to post something about Debbie each day this week, culminating in Shabbat Shirah, when thousands of people will remember her and sing her beautiful melody for "Shalom Aleichem" in synagogues across the country.
At this point I will let Debbie do the singing...and joking. We gave a little concertUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-76545474894669187302012-01-27T16:07:00.013-05:002012-01-31T14:58:00.773-05:00Debbie Friedman "נְעִימַה זְמִרוֹת יִשְׂרָאֵל"This Shabbat is the first Yahrtzeit of Debbie's passing according to the Hebrew calendar. I wrote the following to introduce a service of her music at my synagogue, Temple Sinai in Sharon, Massachusetts:Like Miriam, whose spirit is felt so keenly in next week’s Torah Portion (Shabbat Shirah), Debbie Friedman brought the Jewish people together with song and dance. As Rabbi Dan Freelander has Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-66389035287936341482011-02-28T20:38:00.010-05:002014-02-17T12:53:11.894-05:00Jack Gottlieb (z'l) talks about his music on WQXR (1980)
With the recent passing of Jack Gottlieb, the Jewish music world has lost a giant. A brilliant and gifted composer, Jack's music was just as captivating and effective in the synagogue as it was on the concert stage (and vice versa.)
In October 1980, Jack celebrated his 50th birthday with an extraordinary concert of his music that I was privileged to attend. (More on that very soon.)
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-383558696263154282011-02-06T13:00:00.022-05:002012-01-27T22:35:38.122-05:00Debbie Friedman - Chanukah 5762
On December 9, 2001, I put together a Chanukah concert for the final day of the URJ Biennial in Boston to benefit the Rashi School. More than a thousand attendees filled the Hynes Convention Center to see Doug Cotler, Julie Silver, Peri Smilow, David Paskin, Yom Hadash, myself, and of course, Debbie Friedman, who pushed her tired voice and gave as rousing a performance as I have ever seen. A Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-80428597809710989052011-01-16T23:37:00.026-05:002011-01-17T01:24:35.391-05:00Debbie Friedman's Cantor Controversy, 1980In my JUF News article on the passing of Debbie Friedman, z"l, I quoted from her letter to Reform Judaism magazine (above) in reaction to a November 1980 piece by Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin (below) on the paradigm shift toward more musical participation that was beginning to take hold in Reform synagogues in the late 1970s.I don't believe that cantors were opposed to participation, per se. But they Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-55609091981763490292011-01-13T23:29:00.009-05:002011-01-15T14:30:21.620-05:00Debbie Friedman: Her music, her lifeThe JUF News in Chicago has published my very personal reminiscences of Debbie, going back to our first meeting in the Summer of 1969. The article is here.I took these photographs of Debbie song-leading in the dining room at the NFTY Kutz Camp in 1969 or 1970 and they have never been seen before. (For good reason - I'm pretty confident that I will not be remembered as a photographer.)Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-74466614850013484472011-01-13T22:33:00.008-05:002011-01-13T23:29:09.134-05:00Remembering DebbieMy dear friend (Rabbi) David Paskin has established a website called rememberingdebbie.com. Thanks to his organizing skill (and powers of persuasion!), and thanks to the generosity of Boston's Temple Israel, there will be a memorial concert for Debbie Friedman on Sunday, January 30 at 4 p.m., free and open to the public. Lots of wonderful people will be singing and reminiscing. Click on the Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-82074535142837251212011-01-10T01:45:00.003-05:002014-02-17T12:53:38.495-05:00In Memory of Debbie Friedman (1951-2011)
Dearest Debbie,
You gave us your heart and soul,
and a gift of prayer and song that will always be with us.
Rest in peace, Sweet Singer.....
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-71610944742476614832010-08-01T16:13:00.004-04:002010-08-01T16:33:12.725-04:00Having fun at NewCAJE!!!!Hey everybody....I'm here at NewCaje, leading a music seminar with Ellen and Peter Allard, David Paskin and oodles of cool Jewish people! We are learning "Blogging for Musicians." Doesn't that sound like fun? This is me having fun. Tonight will be a rockin concert with Julie Silver, Yom Hadash and Kol B'seder (hm...never heard of them)... If you are anywhere near Boston look us up and drop by Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-2169524059987685492010-05-26T23:57:00.009-04:002012-02-08T14:41:54.469-05:00A Guitar Workshop for CantorsWhen I came to the School of Sacred Music (of Hebrew Union College) in 1974 and began to conduct services as a student-cantor I used a guitar to accompany myself. How else was I going to do it? Since joining NFTY in 1968 I had led dozens, maybe even hundreds of services, always with guitar. It was like a part of my body - I knew no other way. Thanks to my wonderful teachers, in a very short Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-92060207193523123622009-12-18T17:12:00.005-05:002009-12-18T17:53:25.976-05:00Like A Rolling Cohen!Mazal Tov to journalist/author/critic/blogger and friend, Seth Rogovy, on his eye popping new Bob Dylan Torathon, Bob Dylan: Prophet, Mystic, Poet.I'll wait until I finish the book before offering any critiques, but here's a tip of the shtreimel to Seth, by-way-of the first internet video release of one of my Jewish Dylan parodies. All told, I've done a dozen or so - several made it onto my LiveUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7641083210193328311.post-63112844285182971512009-10-29T12:21:00.003-04:002009-10-29T12:33:09.166-04:00Evanston Here I Come!On Sunday November 1, at 12 noon, I'll be visiting my old stomping grounds (1982-2000), Evanston, IL, to sing a family concert at Beth Emet Synagogue in honor of my (former) rabbi, Peter Knobel on the occasion of his impending retirement. Joining me will be long time musical buddies Stuart Rosenberg (violin/mandolin) and Mike Heimlich (bass). Beth Emet's new cantor, Arik Luck, will join me on Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0