Remembering R’ Shlomo Carlebach On His 25th Yahrzeit

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Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach. (photo credit: JERUSALEM REPORT ARCHIVES)

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Some people are legends in their lifetimes, while others become legendary after their death.

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Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, whose 25th Yahrzeit falls today, was unique in his lifetime, creating a new genre of Jewish music and animating Jews of all walks of life with his warm and heartfelt melodies, but after his death he became an even greater legend, with the advent of the hugely popular Carlebach minyanim.

These minyanim in Israel and in the U.S., have influenced all walks of orthodox Judaism, from the minimally observant to the most Chareidi and in many of them the most diverse levels of religious observance can be seen praying and dancing together.

In his death, Carlebach left a legacy both of music and of love for every Jew and this love permeates these minyanim and energizes all of their participants.

Hundreds of tunes by Carlebach, who did not even read music and never studied in a musical institution, are sung by Jews worldwide, many so famous that their author has been forgotten. However there are still numerous tunes which were recorded by his disciple and neighbor Benzion Solomon, of Moshav Mevo Modi’in and which unfortunately may have been lost forever in the great conflagration which broke out there half a year ago.

Solomon told the Yisrael Hayom newspaper that “I thought the Torah was irrelevant in our time. I lived then in the North California forests, far away from the big cities and when I began my Jewish search, I wrote down all the questions I had and looked for a rabbi. Someone told me that I was lucky as in nearby San Francisco there was a synagogue called the “House of Love and Prayer” and there was a rabbi there. It sounded good so I traveled four hours and arrived there. He was in the middle of a lesson. I sat down to listen and felt he was talking just to me because during the lesson he answered all my questions without me even asking one of them. At that moment I ‘bought’ myself a rabbi.

Salomon later immigrated to Jerusalem and was one of the founders of Mevo Modiin, a place he calls a “yishuv-yeshiva”. The settlement of disciples of Rabbi Carlebach adhered to his teachings and Carlebach himself lived there during the summer months.

“During prayers he would sing beautifully and we would dance” Solomon wistfully recollects. “It was a real festivity. Every Friday night he would sing Lecha Dodi with new tunes which he chose from what he had composed that week. The first part was more slow, spiritual and deep and the second part was more jazzy. Afterwards we would dance sometimes for half an hour uninterrupted. When R’ Shlomo was there we didn’t expect to eat until midnight. We would all eat together and even during the meal there were new tunes and Chasidic teachings. On Motzaei Shabbos we would sit and record the songs.”

Immediately after the death of R’ Shlomo Carlebach, Solomon published a disc with 12 previously unknown tunes. “These are tunes he sung in my studio,” Solomon says. “He said to me: ‘you put these tunes out, I have no time for this.’ This was six months before he died.  Besides these tunes I had others which had never been published but they were all lost in the fire.”

“R’ Shlomo’s house was adjacent to mine and there were times when he taught in my house. My wife also organized shiurim for women. He would come to us to look at books from my library or to borrow a cup of sugar. In the fire both of our houses were burnt- mine and his, except for the room in his house with my books and the room with his books which were miraculously untouched by the fire. The Shul was also untouched by the fire and to this day we pray there daily. Five and a half months have passed since the fire and everything is exactly as it was. The government isn’t helping, just talking, so we’re trying to get back there fast in order to take care of things ourselves.”

Solomon estimates that he had nearly a thousand recordings in his studio and they were all burnt in the fire. Some were recordings in which Carlebach taught songs, others showed him performing. I had a huge archive of his tunes. I did succeed in publishing a number of recordings of his music and my music but there were still a lot of things I didn’t manage to publish, tunes which were lost. It is painful. I remember a lot of tunes but not all of them unfortunately. I hope that other people recorded them so they won’t be lost.”

 


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5 Comments
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get real
get real
4 years ago

The cup of sugar he came to borrow was female

Heshy
Heshy
4 years ago

Reb Shlomo was sent to this world to uplift the broken souls. What many don’t realize there are many many broken neshomas even in the most heimisha homes. The generation after the holocaust needed a reb Shlomo.

lazy-boy
lazy-boy
4 years ago

Shlomo was a very special neshama who really cared more for people and their neshamas than for money. It showed in his life, in his singing and his legacy.

leib
leib
4 years ago

Shlomo”s tunes interpreted the words he sang them with!

Leib