Elul 18: Finding Joy in Music Part Two

Posted on by

Yesterday we read about the joy found playing music. I think part of that, as Arlyn suggests is in being part of a community. Whether you are playing in an orchestra, singing in a choir or jamming in a garage band, you are one part of a collective whole. Each part is necessary to make the music complete.

Sometimes music lifts our prayers, our words in ways that the words themselves cannot. Saturday night this week we begin the Selichot prayers, prayers for forgiveness unique to this season of atonement. The music elevates our thoughts. I particularly love hearing Kol Nidre on the cello without the words. Just the haunting, evocative music. It brings me to a different place. It is part of how I as a rabbi prepare.

Beged Kefet, a musical group of now rabbis and cantors using their voices for tzedakah, covered a Peter Paul and Mary song, Music Speaks Louder than Words on their original album. I still think it captures it.

Music speaks louder than words
It’s the only thing that the whole world listens to.
Music speaks louder than words,
When you sing, people understand.

Sometimes the love that you feel inside
Gets lost between your heart and your mind
And the words don’t really say the things you wanted them to.
But then you feel in someone’s song
What you’d been trying to say all along
And somehow with the magic of music the message comes through.

Music speaks louder than words
It’s the only thing that the whole world listens to.
Music speaks louder than words,
When you sing, people understand.

The longer I live the more I find that people seldom take the time
To really get to know a stranger and make him a friend.

What I forgot about Beged Kefet, is that they also recorded the setting of Adonai, Adonai, written by Leonard Sher, that took my breath away when I was driving to a sales call at IBM. I can tell you exactly where I was in Connecticut on Interstate 84 and where I had to pull off. That’s what I mean about the power of music. Here is a link to this setting. http://media2.urj.net/music/10-24-13Clip2.mp3

This week the Today Show asked viewers what is the most happy song. There is lots of music that makes us happy. “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” Pharell’s “Happy” Billboard has a list of “Happy Songs” http://www.billboard.com/articles/list/5915801/top-20-happy-songs-of-all-time While Adonai, Adonai, is not “happy music”, to me it is sublime. I think that is what brings me joy.