Re: what's a cantorial soloist?

From: Sam Weiss <samweiss...>

Subject: Re: what's a cantorial soloist?

Date: Mon 23 Apr 2001 05.26 (GMT)

You'll find cantorial soloists almost always in a Reform congregation. For many decades Reform congregations (or, more often, Reform rabbis) resisted hiring cantors. This reflected the classic Reform worship aesthetic modeled on the Protestant church, where there is one officiant, the priest (= rabbi), and where the burden of music making rests on a choir with organ accompaniment. Some of the unavoidably soloistic passages were then assigned to the "cantorial soloist," who tended to be one of the Jewish choir members possessing a better voice and, sometimes, some acquaintance with Hebrew. Slowly there developed an understanding of the broader and deeper functions of a cantor, with the ironic result that the first cantorial school in America (founded in 1948) was the one at the Hebrew Union College. ______________________________________________________ Cantor Sam Weiss === Jewish Community Center of Paramus, NJ ---------------------- jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org ---------------------+