SHABBAT EVENING

Yedid Nefesh

The Friday night service opens with this soulful prayer, widely attributed to Rabbi Elazar ben Moshe Azikri (1533-1600), who first published it in his work Sefer Charedim. The first letters of each of the four verses make up the four letter name of God, known in English as the tetragrammaton. The prayer describes the intense love we should have for God, which intensifies as the Shabbat begins.

Kabbalat Shabbat

Aside from the numerous melodies for which Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach (1925-1994) was renowned, he was also famous for leading services in the style he developed based on prayer motifs, family tradition, and the strong Chassidic influence on his life and teachings. The opening of Kabbalat Shabbat is Carlebach’s own original composition; although it is not the traditional nusach, it is in a major key and therefore still adheres to the majestic spirit of the prayer as we welcome the Shabbat, as do the various songs used throughout the Carlebach Kabbalat Shabbat experience.

Tunes we will use include Shiru LaHashem to the tune of Carlebach’s Ata Takum, and Mizmor Shiru LaHashem to Carlebach’s Hashem Oz Le’amo Yitein, composed by Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach after the Yom Kippur War. Cantor Berson will sing the well known recitative Moshe ve’Aharon, one that calls for a wide range of pitches and is a popular piece among chazzanim. It is an introduction to the well known tune for Mizmor LeDavid that is a staple of the KJ Carlebach Kabbalat Shabbat. It is in a minor key, reflecting the yearning the verses express for our prayers to be answered as were those of Moses and Aaron.

Berlin Neue Synagogue

Tzaddik Katamar

This piece is known throughout the world and sung every Friday night in many congregations. It was composed by Louis Lewandowski (1821-1894), the choirmaster of the Neue Synagogue in Berlin and composer of many well-known choral settings of Jewish liturgy in the Western European cantorial tradition. This melody is the ending of the original setting of Psalm 92 written to be sung responsively between cantor and choir.

Hashkiveinu

This is another well known setting by Louis Lewandowski.

R’tze Vimnuchateinu

This soulful setting of a passage from the Shabbat prayers was composed by Cantor Moshe Ganchoff (1904-1997), who served in a number of New York’s most prestigious congregations and was considered one of the last representatives of the “Golden Age of Chazzanut.”

Yigdal

This piece was composed by Abraham Saqui (c.1824-1893), the first choirmaster at Liverpool’s Princes Road Synagogue. Saqui was born in London and raised in the Bevis Marks Sephardic community there. His famous Yigdal contains references to the second movement of the Mozart Clarinet Concerto, and has become a standard feature of the Shabbat service in the United Synagogue in England. It was popularized by Cantor Naftali Herstik at the Jerusalem Great Synagogue.