Amazing Atlanta



CBH choir rehearsal for friday night

 By: Jaffa Road -

I am writing this blog post shortly after returning home from a short trip to Atlanta with Jaffa Road. We went to Atlanta for a short weekend trip as one of the headlining acts of the new (they are in their second year) Atlanta Jewish Music Festival. I wanted to share with our readers a few thoughts and memories about why this weekend was so great.

1) Congergation Beit Haverim: As part of the festival CBH hosted a very special Friday night Kabbalat Shabbat service. This was special for a few reasons. Aviva and I were invited to bring some of our music to the shabbat service, and Aviva was the prayer leader during the service for those pieces. We used some of Aviva's original liturgical compositions for Shabbat (some of the same ones we use for Shabbat Fusion at Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto), and we used Jaffa Road's Lo Yisa Goy.

What was so great about this was that we have always known that the latter song would lend it self very well to a choral arrangement but we never got around to creating one. It was very moving and gratifying for both Aviva and I to hear how CBH's music directors Will Robertson & and Gayanne Weiss created a magnificent arrangement of our tune for the 30+ voice choir and band (which included piano, violin, bass, drums, & percussion). The ensemble performed the arrangement with great skill, emotion, and power. During rehearsal, Aviva got so chocked up that she could not finish the song. It was a great service that included our music, CBH's music, a beautiful, new Yidid Nefesh for choir by Will Roberston, a great arrangement of Jeramiah Lockwood's (of Sway Machinery, our co-headliner at the festival) Ahavat Olam, and a wonderful sermon by CBH's Rabbi Joshua Lesser. Following services was a sweet oneg with the congregation and visitors. People were really moved by this exceptional service. I received a lot of feedback about how moved and impressed people were with Aviva's prayer leading.  One of the congregants shot this video of us performing Lo Yisa Goy with the Choir.   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8k2h66_cb1M

I was also impressed by the hospitality, and warmth of this very creative and welcoming congregation. CBH started its life as a synagogue that was founded by and for Gay and Lesbian Jews in the Atlanta area. This reflected a need to have a spiritual home for people who did not feel welcome/comfortable in other congregations. However CBH is not a Gay shul for the Gay Jewish community. It is a shul that is for Jews who (for what ever reason) have not felt comfortable in other institutional settings. Their warmth, creativity, enthusiasm for inclusion and innovation was very refreshing and should be held up as an example to much larger Jewish community institutions.

Please go to http://www.congregationbethaverim.org/different.asp and read about how this inspiring and creative congregation describes itself:

2) Secondly we got to headline the Atlanta Jewish Music Festival. This new festival is a real grassroots endeavor and we really appreciate the amazing work that Russel Gottschalk (Artistic Director) and his small team did to get us and the other artists on to the stage. We shared the night with our co-headliners Sway Machinery from NYC, as well as the local Nick Edelstien & the Grooves (a local R&B / blues band). The New York based DJ Diwon  closed out the night. It was a great program, we had a great responsive, dancing audience and it was a honor to be a headliner at this festival as well as the first international act to appear at this wonderful new. The other acts sounded great and it was fun to have some backstage hang time with the the guys from Sway Machinery.

backstage during the Sway Machinery sound check 

Aviva



Aaron and Rakesh Tewari: our fabulous guest drummer.


3) Third thing that made the weekend great was Atlanta. From the perspective of a weekend visitor, this a shockingly beautiful city. I live in Toronto which is a really green city. You don't always feel it at street level, but I used to live in on the 21st floor of a condo building and Toronto is an incredibly green city when seen from slightly above. Atalanta is incredibly green and beautiful from any angle.

This photo was shot in a park on the campus of Emory University in the middle of town.



inside Ebeneezer Baptist Church

 4) Lastly I want to mention the Ebenezer Baptist Church. I knew in advance that I would have a free morning on Sunday before flying back. I knew that I would be able to satisfy my interest in Southern Gospel music of the Black Church by going to a real Southern chruch service. I did not realize in advance of my visit that Atlanta was at the centre of the American civil rights movement and that I could actually go to the church where Dr. Martin Luther King used to be the preacher.

So on Sunday morning I went to the service at EBC. This big modern church is adjacent to the congregation's original church building where Dr. King preached, and adjacent to the US national historic site dedicated to Dr. King and the Center for non-violence. I had to walk through the grounds of the national historic site to get to the church. I found this to be a very moving experience. Just walking on the grounds there one can feel the powerful emotional energy that is still reverberating from the civil rights movement, and the leadership of Dr. King.

 Sitting in the church service I was impressed by the welcoming nature of the congregation, by the music and by the amazing energy that was in the room. Most of all I was impressed by both the message and oratorical skill of the EBC's current pastor and spiritual leader Dr. Raphael Warnock. He spoke at length on the spiritual nature of social justice work. This was framed partly in context of a critique of Harold Camping and his followers who raised $72 million, to promote their End of Days gospel, that failed to materialize at their predicted time (the same weekend).

Dr. Warnock was upset by Camping's arrogance (as in, who is he to say he knows Gods plan), but more importantly he was upset by this misuse of funds. "Heaven can take care of it self, there is much work to be done here on Earth, the homeless need to be housed, the hungry need to be fed, the sick need to be healed"... (paraphrasing) I was also really impressed with how this congregation seemed to be using technology to raise funds for congregation. Imagine; the service ended, I went to the restroom, and by the time I got to the exit, a booth was set up where DVD copies of that days service where being sold. There was a large stack of DVDs (of the service that had just ended) available for purchase, and people (including me) where buying them.

Anyway we had a great weekend performing in and participating in the AJMF, and soaking up the Southern sunshine and hospitality in Atlanta GA. Thanks to everyone who made it happen, particularly Russel Gottschalk and his committee and the people at CBH who made it happen there. (Gayanne Weiss, Rabbi Josh, & Will Robertson).

Portraits on the wall at Ebenezer of past pastors, notice ML King jr. and sr.

The man with the plan; Festival founder and director Russel Gottschalk

Ebenezer Baptist Church: the original building, now part of the US National Historical Site

Sadly, I would like to mention that as I wrote this blog post I learned that today (just a day after the festival ended) Russel lost his father after a long battle with cancer. My thoughts are with Russel and his family during this difficult time. May Martin Gottschalk's (z"l) memory be a blessing to his family and those who knew him.