Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Sing Unto God: Debbie Friedman and the Changing Sound of Jewish Liturgical Music

  • Published:
Contemporary Jewry Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

My essay offers a close look into what can be considered the first major moment of singer/songwriter/liturgist Debbie Friedman’s career: her 1972 service Sing Unto God. This key moment has long been obscured from view. By the time Friedman reached a consistent level of national popularity, the narratives created around her tended to draw a scrim over her early years. Reconstructing her early creative life, therefore, provides insight into her philosophical and musical trajectory, while underlining the scholarly discomfort of doing so. It also opens up new conversations about the changing state of music and liturgy in American Jewish life during the early 1970s.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. The rabbi, Jerome Lipnick, later became rabbi of Adath Jeshurun in Minneapolis from 1960–1965. The basics of Debbie Friedman’s early life take up the first three paragraphs of her biography in Eglash (2014, p. xxii).

  2. As a testament to these efforts, the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism awarded Temple of Aaron Solomon Schechter Awards in “Creative Arts” in 1957 and “Creative Programming” in 1961.

  3. Bennett’s essay was accompanied by a 10-entry bibliography, including some of the latest work on music in Judaism.

  4. The piece, which included rabbi and cantor, readers, organ, choir, and modern dancers, was performed at the College of St. Catherine on May 3 and 4, recorded for local KCTA-TV on May 17, and encored at Minneapolis’s Temple Adath Jeshurun on May 21. The performance was also accompanied by a modern art exchange between St. Catherine’s and Temple of Aaron.

  5. The bulletin also lists Cheryl Friedman as a co-leader for a TYG service in the main sanctuary.

  6. This last comment, published while Friedman was in Israel, was likely made under another songleader. Nonetheless, I believe that it still follows the precedent that Friedman set for the group.

  7. Friedman’s involvement in How To Succeed… appears elsewhere in the yearbook, though without a photograph.

  8. Mount Zion actively supported both national and international NFTY programs through scholarship funds, though it appears that Friedman went on a non-NFTY trip. Kibbutz Yifat, meanwhile, reinforced its iconic status as a center for Israeli pioneer history by opening the Museum of Pioneer Settlement (The Jezreel Valley Museum/Muzeon HaEmek) in 1972, which emphasized the years 1911–1951 (www.pioneers.co.il; Accessed 11 Mar 2014).

  9. Reproduced in http://mzion.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Mt_Zion_panel_3.pdf.

  10. Klepper recalls writing at the time a “‘Sh’ma’ and a ‘Mi Chamocha,’ both with a definite folk-rock vibe, and soon was writing a Havdalah service…”

  11. The accuracy of some of the assertions in Rubenstein’s account, based mainly on oral interviews, may need further verification.

  12. Audio generously provided by Jeffrey Klepper. See also a similar statement by Friedman in an undated interview with the Milken Archive of Jewish Music, http://milkenarchive.org/news_events/view/debbie-friedman-a-tribute-in-her-own-words (Accessed 23 February 2014).

  13. Friedman might have been familiar with this order of prayers due to the institution of a lay-led daily service, instituted by Gunther Plaut during his time at Mount Zion (1948–1961) and continued by his successors (Leigh Lerner, personal communication, February 23, 2014).

  14. Because it will inevitably be noted by someone looking for symbolism, the triple meter and triple repetition associated with “His name shall be one” likely has no connection with Christological associations of the Trinity. More likely, Friedman simply wanted to emphasize a phrase that, perhaps, emphasized the Messianic era at a time when Reform Judaism was beginning to reconnect more robustly with that notion.

  15. Although the “Shema” and “And Thou Shalt Love” existed as separate (if connected) tracks on the original album, I treat them here as a single entity—a designation reinforced by the 1994 CD reissue, which combines them in order to maintain unity with a parallel choice on a later album (Friedman 1994, liner notes, inside cover).

  16. Friedman’s setting also excluded a paragraph specifically added to the Union Prayer Book to memorialize the dead (“Al yisrael v’al tzaddikaya…”/“The departed whom we now remember…”). While this omission appears significant on the surface, in actual practice synagogues rarely recited it by the 1970s. Leigh Lerner, a rabbinical student and assistant at Mount Zion in 1972, confirmed that the congregation had omitted this paragraph since at least the 1950s (personal communication, February 23, 2014).

  17. Rabbi Heidi Cohen featured the transformed anecdote at Friedman’s funeral, stating: “She picked up the guitar at 12 and when her mother spoke to the music teacher about what she saw as Debbie’s musical gift and the need for her to learn to read music, the teacher quickly said, ‘please don’t do that…it would only ruin her amazing gift to play from her heart’” (H. Cohen 2011).

  18. OSRUI Collection, American Jewish Archives, MS-648, Box 10, Folder 11. This four-page photocopied service appears in most of the unit folders from 1972, confirming oral recollections that the entire camp collaborated on this service.

  19. The service at Cincinnati’s Temple Sholom, which featured Debbie Friedman and the Hebrew Union College choir, unfortunately had to be cancelled due to an illness.

  20. UAHC 1973 Biennial program, p. 7. (I am grateful to Kevin Proffitt for locating this source.) For confirmation that the group presented Sing Unto God, see Special Chanukah Service 1973, p. 48. Other worship options during this time period included “A Dance service in commemoration of the 25th Anniversary of the State of Israel,” a “Percussion Oratorio on the Sh’ma,” a “Cinema service celebrating Chasidic life and mourning its destruction in the Holocaust,” “A Multi-Media Midrash for Shabbat,” and a Kutz-based NFTY service addressing Soviet Jewry with commissioned music by Michael Isaacson.

References

  • 450 hear Yiddish Revue. 1972, March 19. American Jewish World: 5.

  • Ashmore, Kerry. 2011, January 28. Remembering Debbie Friedman, singer/songwriter. Northeaster. http://www.nenorthnews.com/CurrentNews.asp?view=1653&paperID=1&month. Accessed 23 Feb 2014.

  • At Mount Zion. 1972, May 26. American Jewish World.

  • Berman, Hyman. 1981. Jews. In They chose Minnesota: A survey of the state’s ethnic groups, ed. June D. Holmquist, 489–507. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bethel Male Chorus. 1966. Sing Unto God [LP]. St. Paul, MN: Bethel College & Seminary.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bluestein, Gene. 1958. Songs of the holidays and other songs, Sung by Gene Bluestein and Children of the Mount Zion Hebrew Congregation. Liner notes by Allen D. Bennett. New York: Folkways Records (FW07554/FC7554).

  • Brinkmann, Tobias. 2012. Sundays at Sinai: A Jewish congregation in Chicago. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Chicago Sinai Congregation Bulletin. 1972, November 21.

  • Christians unite with Jews to experience Jewish liturgy. 1967, April 21. The Catherine Wheel: 1.

  • Cohen, Debra Nussbaum. 2009. Debbie Friedman. In Jewish Sages of today, ed. Aryeh Rubin, 52–61. New York: Devora Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Heidi. 2011. The tapestry woven by Debbie Friedman, z’l. http://www.ravima.com/2011/01/the-tapestry-woven-by-debbie-friedman-zl-rabbi-heidi-cohens-eulogy/. Accessed 6 Jan 2014.

  • Cohen, Judah M. 2002. Modes of tradition? Negotiating ‘Jewishness’ and modernity in the synagogue music of Isadore Freed and Frederick Piket. Jewish Culture and History 5(2): 25–47.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Judah M. 2006a. Singing out for Judaism: A history of songleaders and songleading at Olin-Sang-Ruby Union Institute. In A place of our own: The beginnings of Reform Jewish camping, ed. Gary Zola, and Michael Lorge, 173–208. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Judah M. 2006b. ‘And the youth shall see visions…’: Summer camps, songleading and musical identity among American Reform Jewish teenagers. In Musical childhoods and the cultures of youth, eds. Susan Boynton and Roe-Min Kok, 187–207. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.

  • Cohen, Judah M. 2009. The making of a Reform Jewish cantor: Musical authority, cultural investment. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Judah M. 2013. The sonic boundaries of childhood: Reform Jewish songleading and the flexible practices of youth. In The Oxford handbook of children’s musical cultures, eds. Trevor Wiggins and Patricia Sheehan Campbell, 61–76. New York: Oxford University Press.

  • Dreyfus, Benjamin William. 2001. ‘Hear the echo of Miriam’s song’: American Nusach in Concert. In Studies in Jewish Musical Traditions: Insights from the Harvard Collection of Judaica Sound Recordings, ed. Kay Kaufman Shelemay, 33–50. Harvard Judaica Collection Student Research Papers #7. Cambridge, MA: Harvard College Library.

  • Edelman, Joshua A. 2013. The Debbie Friedman problem: Performing tradition, memory, and modernity in progressive Jewish liturgy. Liturgy 28(1): 6–17.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eglash, Joel (ed.). 2013. Foreword by the Friedman family. In Sing Unto God: The Debbie Friedman anthology, viii. New York: URJ Press.

  • Eisendrath, Maurice. 1964. Excerpts from Rabbi Eisendrath’s ‘State of our Union’ address. American Judaism 13(2): 21.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedman, Cheryl. 2014. Debbie Friedman (biography). In Sing Unto God: The Debbie Friedman Anthology, ed. Joel Eglash, xxii–xxvii. New York: URJ Press.

  • Friedman, Debbie. 1969, November 28. A letter from Debbie. Mt. Zion Temple Bulletin.

  • Friedman, Debbie. 1970, January 30. A letter from Debbie. Mt. Zion Temple Bulletin.

  • Friedman, Debbie. 1972. Sing Unto God [LP]. Minneapolis: SUG Records.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedman, Debbie. 1994. In the beginning… Debbie Friedman [CD]. San Diego: Sounds Write Productions.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedman, Debbie. 1997, September 24. Interview with Robert Siegel. All Things Considered, National Public Radio.

  • Friedman, Debbie. 2007. Interview with Debra Nussbaum Cohen. http://jewishsagesoftoday.com/sages_friedman.html. Accessed March 20, 2014.

  • Friedman, Debbie. 2009, August 17. Interview with Paul Wieder. JUF News Blog. http://www.juf.org/interactive/default.aspx?id=74941. Accessed 19 March 2014.

  • Gottlieb, Jack. 2004. Love songs for Sabbath/Three candle blessings/Psalmistry [CD]. Liner notes by Jack Gottlieb. Los Angeles: Milken Archive of American Jewish Music/NAXOS American Classics 8.559433.

  • Isaacson, Michael. 1972. NFTY folk service. Songs NFTY Sings [LP]. South Norwalk, CT: National Federation of Temple Youth.

  • Isaacson, Michael. 1974. Avodat Amamit [Sheet Music]. New York: Transcontinental Publications.

  • Israel Independence Day Program Wednesday, 8:30 p.m. at St. Paul JCC. 2014, April 2014. American Jewish World: 1.

  • Israeli Fair ’72. 1972, February 18. American Jewish World 1:3.

  • Jewish group buys camp for teaching. 1964, May 10. New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1964/05/10/jewish-group-buys-camp-for-teaching.html.

  • Klein, Jonathan. 1968. Hear O Israel: A Sabbath service in jazz. New York: Union of American Hebrew Congregations.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kligman, Mark. 2001. Contemporary Jewish music in America. In American Jewish Year Book, eds. David Singer and Lawrence Grossman, Vol. 101, 88–141.

  • Ksharim [NoFTY regional newsletter]. Summer/Fall 1967, Fall/Winter 1967. Minutes of the NoFTY Executive Committee, Aug 25, 1967. Robert Tabak Papers, American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, OH. MS-846, Box 5, Folder “Northern Federation of Temple Youth.”

  • Ksharim [NoFTY regional newsletter]. Fall 1968. Robert Tabak Papers, American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, OH, MS-846. Unprocessed materials. 13/A/6 2014.013.

  • Ksharim [NoFTY regional newsletter]. Winter/Spring 1968. Robert Tabak Papers, American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, OH. MS-846, Box 5, Folder “Northern Federation of Temple Youth.”

  • Ksharim [NoFTY regional newsletter]. Spring 1969. Robert Tabak Papers, American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, OH. MS-846. Unprocessed materials. 13/A/6 2014.013.

  • ‘Mass in Memory of Six Million’ Celebrated at Local Catholic Church. 1972, March 17. American Jewish World: 17.

  • Menlo Park Presbyterian Church Men and Boys Choir. 1970. Sing Unto God. Menlo Park, CA: Menlo Park Presbyterian Church, 1970. http://www.menlomaranatha.org/cd.html. Accessed 3 March 2014.

  • Mormon Tabernacle Choir. 1966. Sing Unto God. New York: Columbia Records.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mt. Zion Temple Bulletin. 1964, October 9.

  • Mt. Zion Temple Bulletin. 1972, February 11.

  • ‘New look’ for BBYO minstrels. 1972, February 11. American Jewish World 7.

  • New Mount Zion series of Feature the Mystic Quest. 1972, March 17. American Jewish World 1:14.

  • Plaut, Gunther. 1956. Mount Zion, 1856–1956: The first hundred years. St. Paul: Mount Zion Temple.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rich, Alan. 1967. Music at Warwick. American Judaism 16(2):17, 45.

  • Rising Star. 1973. Reform Judaism 1(6): 2.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rubenstein, Sally. 2011. Historical tidbits. http://mzion.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Historical-Tidbits.pdf. Accessed 24 February 2014.

  • Ruskin, Jesse, and Timothy Rice. 2012. The individual in musical ethnography. Ethnomusicology 56(2): 299–327.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sabbath Services. 1972a, February 11. American Jewish World 11.

  • Sabbath Services. 1972b, June 2. American Jewish World: 8.

  • Schloff, Linda. 2005. Interview with Bernard Raskas. University of Minnesota Libraries, Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives. http://reflections.mndigital.org/cdm/ref/collection/jhs/id/983. Accessed 22 Feb 2014.

  • Seeger, Charles. 1953. Folk music in the schools of a highly industrialized society. Journal of the International Folk Music Council 5: 40–44.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Smolover, Raymond. 1968. Edge of freedom: A folk/rock service for the Sabbath [Recorded by The NFTY Levites with Cantor Raymond Smolover]. New York: Bell Records BELL 6021.

  • Smolover, Raymond. 1970. Gates of freedom: A religious/rock service [Recorded by Smolover Raymond, the TYG, and Zamir Chorale]. New York: Covenant Records 6312.

  • Special Chanukah service. 1973, November 28. Hyde Park Herald, 48.

  • Temple Sholom. 1973, April 26. Advertisement. The American Israelite 16.

  • The Tartan. 1969. Highland Senior High School year book. Saint Paul: Highland Park High School.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weinberg, Robert. 1973. Songleaders’ Guide to 40 Jewish Songs—with words, music and translations. Photostat copy in OSRUI Collection. American Jewish Archives, MS-648, Box 12, Folder 30.

  • Williams, Raymond. 1977. Structures of feeling. In Marxism and literature, 128–135. New York: Oxford University Press.

  • Zipperstein, Stephen and Anita Shapira. n.d. Note from book series editors. http://www.jewishlives.org/content/note-book-series-editors. Accessed 2 Jan 2014.

Download references

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to Cheryl Friedman, Freda Friedman, Mary Ann Wark, Jeff Klepper, Steve Silverman, Steve Brand, Randee Friedman, Joy Kingsolver, Cantor Rachel Stock Spilker, Robert Tabak, the many people in Debbie’s life who agreed to be interviewed for this project, and my two anonymous reviewers. Their extraordinary memories, materials, ideas, and suggestions have made this essay possible. While Debbie Friedman’s recordings can be accessed in a variety of forms, her music remains under copyright protection. Rather than providing “free” links to sites of questionable legal status, then, I encourage readers interested in experiencing the recordings mentioned in this essay to purchase Sing Unto God, which is available for digital download at Amazon, iTunes, OySongs, and other retailers.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lou and Sybil Mervis Professor of Jewish Arts and Culture, Borns Jewish Studies Program, Musicology Department, Jacobs School of Music, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA

    Judah M. Cohen

Authors
  1. Judah M. Cohen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Judah M. Cohen.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Cohen, J.M. Sing Unto God: Debbie Friedman and the Changing Sound of Jewish Liturgical Music. Cont Jewry 35, 13–34 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12397-014-9127-9

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12397-014-9127-9

Keywords

Search

Navigation