Notes from Cantor Avima

     There is something I love about the "last day of a school year". It is not just the feeling of completion and resolution, but it is the knowledge that we will immediately start preparing for the next year incorporating the lessons we have learned and exciting new ideas we can't wait to implement. This year's "last day" of Religious School was possibly the best one of my last three years with Adath Shalom. It is  easy to demonstrate the prayer skills are students are attaining when they lead their class services, but not as easy to showcase the other topics our students are studying such as Torah, holidays and values.  This year our teachers had students prepare end of the year projects. I wanted our parents to see the breadth of what we are accomplishing in the very short time we have with their children. It was wonderful to see what our students produced and to hear them present their own projects.

     Of course it is impossible to demonstrate everything we hope to impart to the students of our school. One of the most valuable values we can impart to our students I believe is the joy of being Jewish. Our students have such enthusiasm whether they are singing on the bimah, enjoying holiday activities, learning Hebrew in the classroom or learning about Israel with our rishon (Israeli teen in their gap year between high school and the army). I truly enjoy my educator role at Adath Shalom. I love the opportunity to integrate the two two roles of Cantor and Educator and hopefully having a double impact in the lives of our students. The "last day" was not joyful because it was the LAST Sunday of having to get up early, etc... It was joyful because it was an opportunity to look back on the growth of our students and a moment to look forward and ask "what more can we do" to make this  formative experience in the lives of our youngest members the most positive and valuable it can be. 

     The last of the three musical services with the Ben Wisch Trio was a big success. I truly enjoyed these services and the opportunity to bring something a bit "different" to our Friday night worship experience. The services have been musically eclectic, full of ruach and I hope they also allowed for congregational participation. I especially am grateful to our guest participants: Cantor Brian Kalver (Feb. 7) and Andy Silberts (May 16). They each brought a different flavor to the services.  I would love to invite Ben Wisch  back for next year, however bringing three professional musicians did not happen for free! I am grateful to those who contributed to this year's services, but if we would like to bring back Ben Wisch and his musicians, we will need to collect  more funds. Please let me know if you are interested in contributing. Their calendar does fill up quickly, so I will need to know soon if I can book them for next year. 

     Meanwhile, I also would like to expand our cadre of torah and haftarah readers this coming year. If you are able to read Torah, but perhaps you need a nudge and help finding a portion to read, please reach out to me. We have a wonderful torah reading scheduling program called torahreaders.net. You can check out upcoming torah readings, see the actual text and sign up on your own, or you can simply reach out to me and I will help you find a reading and even send to you a recording and a picture of the reading in the torah scroll. For access to the program go to www.Torahreaders.net. Follow the instructions to register with our synagogue which is listed as Congregation Adath Torah Synagogue - Parsippany. I will be notified and I will have to  approve you before you have access.  For those of you who would like to learn to read torah or need a refresher, there is a torah reading class on Thursday afternoons.  We review each person's upcoming reading and there is plenty of group support and encouragement! If you prefer some private coaching, we can arrange that as well.  

      I hope to see you in shul this summer!