Cantor Joel Kaplan

By Larry Gordon

Cantor Joel Kaplan
Cantor Joel Kaplan

It’s an annual event featuring four outstanding chazzanim, and it all happens on Monday night, June 8, at CBS–Congregation Beth Sholom in Lawrence. Cantorial music, davening, and performances like the one featured next week are an art form that some have a great appreciation for.

Next week’s concert will once again be an exciting one to attend and will feature some of the greats of today. That includes today’s dean or big man of the cantorial circuit scene–Itcha Meir Helfgot–whose powerful voice reaches scintillating heights in the context of moving and emotional traditional prayers familiar to many.

So the objective here this week is essentially twofold. One is to help CBS promote this carefully prepared program, which is sponsored in part by Ben and Lynda Brafman. And then also analyzing and trying to understand the allure that chazzanus has for so many in the sea of advanced and developed musical styles and genres that are out there and available for music aficionados to enjoy.

So to probe this idea and gain a bit more insight, I turned to an old friend–Joel Kaplan–the chazzan at Beth Sholom whom I affectionately refer to as “my chazzan,” even though I only occasionally attend services at the shul where he leads davening on alternate weekends.

I explained that I have never been grabbed by the great attraction that so many, including members of my family, have to cantorial music. I can, nevertheless, appreciate the greats like Helfgot, and I’ve heard Cantor Yossi Malovany of the Fifth Avenue Synagogue both daven and perform. I have to admit that I heard something there that was stirring and even inspiring, though I did not actively seek out other performances in this genre.

The Jesse Aronson Beth Sholom Choir
The Jesse Aronson Beth Sholom Choir

So I asked Cantor Kaplan to help us–that’s you and me–understand the magnetism of chazzanus and the interest that so many have when it comes to listening to chazzanim perform. I asked him where the dividing line is between a chazzandavening, leading the shul in prayer, and doing a performance. What is the difference? He explained that on Shabbos when a chazzan is davening at the amud, he is acting as a shaliachtzibbur–a representative of the overall mass that is the composition of a k’hal, a  congregation. On the other hand, at a concert like the one that will take place on June 8 in Lawrence, although there is also an air of inspiration that moves the shul, it is in a context that is something other than prayer. “People listening might be swayed and even moved to tears,” Chazzan Kaplan says, but that is outside of the conventional Shabbos morning shul setting.

And as long as we were discussing this difference, we moved over to how a cantor feels when the crowd or the congregation chimes in, so to speak, and begins to sing along with him. Here too there is a dichotomy between the two divergent scenarios. Cantor Kaplan says that when a chazzan is davening on Shabbos or yomtov, the hope is that the congregants will be moved to sing along. That is less likely to take place during a performance where it could unbalance that which the artist is seeking to present.

CBS concert organizers with Cantor Helfgot
CBS concert organizers with Cantor Helfgot

I wondered aloud to Joel what his feelings are, and if he could speak for other cantors’ feelings, about the dominance of Shabbos services that utilize the songs and tunes of Shlomo Carlebach, of blessed memory. Do chazzanim resent Carlebach?

Joel’s initial observation was that while Carlebach-type davening usually takes place on Friday nights, most cantors–himself included–lead the services only on Shabbos at Shacharis or Mussaf. So there you have it–the way things break, there is really no Carlebach—cantorial conflict, and that’s a good thing. There is plenty of room in shul for both, apparently.

But then he adds that there are chazzanim who utilize Carlebach as part of the service they perform; he points to Brooklyn’s extraordinary chazzan, Ben Zion Miller, in particular, as one who frequently does Carlebach tunes.

Cantor Yitzchok Meir Helfgot
Cantor Yitzchok Meir Helfgot

Even if you are not a fan of chazzanus, it is still likely that you have heard the names of some of the greats whose performances of tefillos like KolNidrei and AvinuShebashamayim have resonated through the generations. Some of those names include the inimitable Yossele Rosenblatt, Moshe Koussevitzky, Moshe Oysher, Zavel Kwartin, and later Moshe Stern, Yossi Malovany, and today Itcha Meir Helfgot.

Those are just a few of the names that stand out amongst a handful of figures who have carried the legacy and tradition of cantorial music on their proverbial shoulders for nearly a century. Since I do not get the opportunity to explore the subject and write on this subject too often, there are a few questions that I have been curious about for a long time, which I am hoping Cantor Kaplan can answer.

He says that I should go ahead and ask away. So I ask Joel about Oysher and Kwartin in particular. How was it that chazzanim of renown like those two were known not to be particularly observant Jews but are still considered amongst the greatest chazzanus talents that ever lived?

Kaplan said that he had read that Moshe Oysher had once told an interviewer when asked that question that he was first and foremost an actor and only secondarily a chazzan. That notwithstanding, Joel says, today 99% of the chazzanim are observant Jews, so that was an anomaly more than anything else.

As Ben Brafman, one of the main sponsors for the upcoming 13th anniversary concert, explains, “The Beth Sholom Cantorial Concert has become a favorite annual event in the community and for me personally as well. I enjoy great chazzans, and Helfgot, for example, is clearly one of the “best” of my generation. By co-hosting the event, it also gives me a chance to honor my parents, Rose and Sol Brafman, as well as Moshe Ehrlich, himself a great cantor and also a childhood friend of my father’s in Vienna.”

Dr. Sherry and Joel Wiener are sponsoring the evening in memory of her father, Colman Steuer, and dozens of other distinguished members of the community have also donated resources to ensure the success of this event, which pays tribute to the late great Cantor Moshe Ehrlich who led the davening at Beth Sholom for decades.

The Beth Sholom Annual Concert is not just about listening to some outstanding chazzanus. The concert also features a sixteen-man choir made up of community members who begin weekly rehearsal in February to prepare for the performance. Chairmen are Alan Bankhalter and Bernard Fuchs, and the choir is led by Cantor Eric Freeman, and Kaplan says that the training and the practice sessions are tough, challenging, and intense. All in all, he says, the objective is to achieve perfection and offer up both a memorable and inspiring night of chazzanus.

This year’s concert will feature chazzanim Yakov Lemmer and Chaim Dovid Berson and accompanist chazzan Daniel Gildar, in addition to Cantors Helfgot and Kaplan. It’s a wonderful and spellbinding night of music not to be missed.

Comments for Larry Gordon are welcome at editor@5tjt.com.

 

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