Explore the music of the Jewish calendar with Hadar's Rising Song Institute. Source texts and seasonal prayers are interspersed with videos, songs and playlists related to various holiday themes. Listen while you learn!
Explore the music and lyrics of "Light My Soul" from Rabbi Ariel Root Wolpe's album Ruach Neshama. The song is accompanied by lyrics, guitar chords and related teachings for Hanukkah. Light, listen and learn!
The new year of the trees, Tu Bishvat, typically occurs around the same time as Shabbat Shirah, when we read the Torah portion of Beshalach recounting the Israelites jubilant song after crossing the sea to freedom from Egyptian slavery. There is an old tradition to feed birds before Shabbat Shirah in acknowledgement of their song, which is said to have inspired this spontaneous singing on the shores of the Reed Sea. In this source sheet, we look at sources describing the songs of both trees and birds, searching for new ways to inspire our own music and prayer.
Attributed to the 16th century mystic R. Elazar Azikri, but possibly written much earlier, Yedid Nefesh is prayer of intense passion that is commonly sung on Shabbat. There's a wide variety of beautiful tunes for this piyyut, evoking every emotion from joyous uplift to bittersweet yearning. In this source sheet, we have the prayer's text along with sheet music and videos from Joey Weisenberg teaching prayer leaders how to incorporate an original melody into communal services.