Rising Song Intensive

This year, participants will have the opportunity to spend dedicated time sinking deep into one subject area of their choosing over the course of two mornings:

• Maqam - Yoni Battat
  Over the course of two sessions, participants will encounter the centuries-old tradition of Arab musical modes, called maqam. We will approach this microtonal musical system through the lens of Syrian, Iraqi, and Yerushalmi melodies, tracing their evolution from Arab Classical and Pop music into Jewish life, piyut, and prayer. Through careful listening, brave experimentation, and maybe even trying out a solo or two, participants will have the opportunity to relish the ways in which the specific notes, slides, and ornaments of the Arab musical aesthetic can offer new possibilities for expression.
   
• Nusach - Joey Weisenberg
  We will study some examples of nusach - the fixed but flexible collection of beautiful prayer chants and melodies sung by the prayer leaders in davening.   We will explore how nusach is born of lovely musical motifs, which are then pushed and pulled against by the practitioner to create a stretchy artform, which mirrors all traditional artforms in that it becomes juiciest in the dialogue between the fixed and the unfixed - between the "form" and the "fire."  This track can be for beginners and advanced practitioners alike, and serves as an entryway into the more intensive nusach study that's available in Joey's online Masterclasses in Jewish Song and Prayer.
   
• Emotionally Integrated Voice - Aviva Chernick
  We sing out in prayer, in performance, in shared song. How might we cultivate a relationship to our voices that allows for current and true emotional content, finding further freedom in this means of expression? Aviva brings her longtime study and recent certification as a teacher of Emotionally Integrated Voice technique (Fides Krucker) together with an extensive career leading tefilah and sharing music in concert with creativity and play for this exploration of the voice, airflow, architecture, and emotion. No previous vocal training is required. Please come dressed in comfortable clothing to be prepared to move and bring your curiosity.

Expand your horizons and explore a wide range of topics with our stellar faculty in this year’s daily elective offerings, including songwriting, rhythm work, tefillah leadership, klezmer, nigunim, ladino song, music history, and more. 

• The Beginnings of Song: Finding Our Own Music
  Aly Halpert
  In this workshop we will ready ourselves to receive, write, and play our own music, with the intention, form, and purpose of the songs we want to bring into the world from the beginning. This workshop is a chance to lightheartedly explore songwriting practices and strategies together in community, and also to listen for what comes through!
   
• Body Percussion and Rhythmic Flow
  Richie Barshay
  Where does rhythm live in your body? A crash course in body percussion and movement, designed to enhance your groove and rhythmic creativity. For beginners and seasoned musicians alike who are looking to find a little more pocket, rhythmic independence, and more familiarity with drumming in general. The class will tap into eastern and western traditions of movement and music, cultivating open-focus and a more grounded connection to time and the beat. Through elements of the Alexander Technique (Richie is also a certified teacher), you’ll learn to use your body as a gateway to more rhythmic flow.
   
• Piyyut Rising
  R. Yosef Goldman and Yoni Battat
  Rising Song Records’ newest project, Piyyut Rising, explores R. Yosef and Yoni’s Iraqi, Syrian, and Yemenite ancestry in conversation with their intersecting musical influences. Spanning from Temple times to today, piyyutim utilize complex and beautiful Hebrew poetry to infuse spirit and meaning into the sacred and ordinary moments of human experience. The stirring melodies are rooted in the illustrious and colorful tradition of maqam- a distinct system of musical expression found exclusively in the music of the Arab world, Turkey, Iran, and North Africa. In this session, we’ll bring these melodies to life in real-time communal song and exploration.
   
• Misinai Melodies: Defining and Redefining our Anchor Songs
  R. Deborah Sacks Mintz
  Many iconic Jewish communal prayer melodies have come to be known as "miSinai"- a revelation directly from Sinai itself, passed down l’dor v’dor, from generation to generation. And yet, many of these melodies have quite recent - and often surprising- origins. We’ll dig into some of these tunes and their history, alongside the foundational melodies of our own prayer communities, and explore: how does the communal ownership and transmission of a melody affect its status? How does this affect our own relationship to the songs we sing? How do we infuse a sense of misinai to the melodies - both new and old - with which we anchor our own communities?
   
• Songs that Nona Sang
  Aviva Chernick
  For a decade, Aviva Chernick went back and forth from Toronto, Ontario to Alexandria, Virginia to study and spend time with mentor and adopted Nona, Flory Jagoda z”l. Flory was recognized as an American National Treasure and the Mother of the Balkan Ladino Tradition, sharing songs she remembered from her Nona as well as writing many of her own.  Join Aviva to celebrate songs from Flory’s repertoire and other beloved songs in Ladino shared with her over the years. No previous experience with Ladino required.
   
• Song as Technology for Blessing
  Batya Levine
  Drawing on the tradition of aliyot - being called up to bless and be blessed by the chanting of the Torah - we will interweave nigunim with ritual in a co-created group space to call our prayers into the song, and call the song into our prayers.
   
• Klezmer Music in America
  Michael Winograd
  Take a dive into the world of Klezmer music! Alongside migration of Jews from Eastern Europe to the United States in the 19th and 20th centuries, came a migration of Jewish culture and arts as well.  Yiddish music and theater filled the streets, wedding halls and auditoriums of the Lower East Side, and impacted the cultural melting pot of New York City.  Simultaneously the world of radio and recorded sound was thriving, and quickly became the most popular way to consume music.  In this elective we will explore a half-century of Klezmer, starting with the earliest recordings made around 1911, and its development through the seminal recordings made in the late 1950s.  Joined by accordionist Ilya Shneyves, this session will include live performances, listening to old records, as well as discussion, participation, and plenty of time for Q&A. 
   
• Joining or Defying the Song of the Heavens
  R. Aviva Richman 
  Each week on Shabbat, we sing about heavenly lights in the piyyut "El Adon."  These luminous bodies joyously serve and praise God by virtue of their very existence.  What is our relationship to this song of the heavens?  Are we meant to mimic this model of natural praise, and join our voice to this collective song?  Or is the nature of human song different, perhaps more complex than simple obedience and praise?  We'll trace some of the earliest Jewish sources that wrestle with the ideas at the heart of El Adon, and learn a melody by R. Menachem Goldberger.
   
• Lost and Found: Wordless Song as a Guide
  R. Deborah Sacks Mintz
  When the limitations of words tether our prayers, wordless song may offer a pathway into the experience of both communal and personal spiritual practice. Equal parts communal song, group processing, and skill-building, we'll explore both the possibilities and potential - as well as the boundaries and challenges -  of singing beyond text as one grounding strategy and entryway into the richness of tefila in moments where we may feel the most adrift.