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Hootenanny will bring Jewish camp song and spirit to Manhattan temple at Nov. 13 event
Elana Arian has always associated Jewish music with summer camp.
From the time she was a little kid at Kutz, a summer camp affiliated with the Union for Reform Judaism where her parents were on faculty, to when she was a camper at URJ Camp Harlam, Arian liked singing songs, playing guitar and, eventually, leading music for the entire camp.
“I can’t remember a time when I didn’t connect to Judaism through song sessions in the dining hall,” Arian said. “As a kid, that’s what being Jewish meant to me.”
Now an accomplished composer, prayer leader and faculty member at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Arian tours full-time to congregations across North America. She is also the music director behind a special event: a hootenanny, a communal sing-along of Jewish music taking place at Congregation Rodeph Sholom in Manhattan.
Tickets are on sale now for the Nov. 13 event, both for in-person attendance and via livestream.
“In a moment when fear and division too often drown out harmony, the hootenanny reminds us that song can still unite what the world tries to tear apart,” said Rabbi Ben Spratt, senior rabbi at Rodeph Sholom. “Judaism is strongest when every voice is lifted together — in joy, in resilience, in hope. We’re proud to carry forward the courage of past generations and to shine as a beacon of Jewish pride and belonging.”
The event is a benefit for Eisner Camp and Crane Lake Camp, two URJ camps in the Massachusetts Berkshires. Proceeds from the event will benefit the camps’ scholarship fund, making it possible for more families with financial need to give their children a transformative Jewish summer experience.
The hootenanny will feature a who’s who of Jewish musicians who not only have become regulars on summer camp playlists, but whose work is familiar to tens of thousands of Jews across North America. In addition to Arian, the event will feature Noah Aronson, Michelle Citrin, Dan Freelander and Jeff Klepper (Kol B’Seder), Alan Goodis, Jacob Spike Kraus, Joanie Leeds, Naomi Less, Dan Nichols, and Julie Silver. The artists are donating their time for the hootenanny, and the musicians will be on stage together for the entire show.
“The spirit of this is a group of friends and musicians who are playing together and enjoying themselves,” Arian said.
The is the second hootenanny that Rodeph Sholom, a congregation of approximately 1,900 members, has hosted. The first, in late 2022, came as COVID restrictions were being lifted. More than 650 people attended the concert in person, with roughly 300 more watching online.
“People wanted to sing with each other and wanted to come together,” recalled Shayna De Lowe, Rodeph Sholom’s senior cantor. “Being in that room was pure magic. It reminded us why music mattered so much in that moment — and how much it still matters now.”
Those two ideas form the basis of the hootenanny, which has its roots in American folk music. The legendary singer Woody Guthrie led hootenannies — open-mic-style communal singalongs — in the 1940s, and they were further popularized in the 1960s by such folk luminaries as Joan Baez and Pete Seeger.
Many of the songs to be performed at this hootenanny will stem from the Jewish music revival launched by the late Debbie Friedman, who began writing melodies in the late 1960s and early 1970s at Jewish camps. Friedman’s songs, including her setting for “Mi Shebeirach,” the Jewish prayer for healing, are staples in synagogues across America.
The spirit Friedman ignited still resonates today, carried forward by a new generation of Jewish musicians.
The upcoming hootenanny will feature both the camp-inspired sacred music Friedman popularized — some played by Friedman’s contemporaries — as well as newer Jewish music. In addition, a group of New York-area teens will take the stage as songleaders after participating in a master class the previous evening with Goodis and cantor Rosalie Will.
Watch parties are also planned at congregations in Albany, N.Y., and Boston. At Rodeph Sholom, an in-person after party will follow for those in their 20s and 30s.
The presenting sponsor of the event is the Off-Broadway one-man play “Other,” with New York Jewish Week as media sponsor and numerous congregational partners across New York and New England serving as co-sponsors.
Debby Shriber, executive director of URJ Camps, said the importance of Jewish music at URJ camps cannot be overstated.
“The music is the soundtrack of our lives,” Shriber said. “It’s embedded in everything we do at camp.”
(Tickets for the Nov. 13 hootenanny at Congregation Rodeph Sholom, for the livestream, and for the after party are available.)
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The post Hootenanny will bring Jewish camp song and spirit to Manhattan temple at Nov. 13 event appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Lindsey Graham urges Israel not to strike Iranian oil depots even as he says he helped make war happen
(JTA) — Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has called on Israel to rein in its attacks on Iranian oil infrastructure, marking a rare note of caution from a Republican lawmaker who has said he helped push the United States to join Israel in waging war against Iran.
In a post on X on Sunday, Graham praised Israel for its role in the war before adding that “there will be a day soon that the Iranian people will be in charge of their own fate, not the murderous ayatollah’s regime.”
“In that regard, please be cautious about what targets you select,” continued Graham. “Our goal is to liberate the Iranian people in a fashion that does not cripple their chance to start a new and better life when this regime collapses. The oil economy of Iran will be essential to that endeavor.”
Graham’s post linked to an Axios article that reported that the United States was alarmed by Israeli strikes over the weekend that targeted 30 Iranian fuel depots. On Monday, U.S. gas prices rose to their highest levels since 2024.
The warning from Graham, an ally of President Donald Trump and staunch supporter of Israel, comes days after the Republican hawk told the Wall Street Journal that he had played a key role in urging Trump to strike Iran.
Prior to the joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, Graham made several trips to Israel where he met with members of the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu whom he said he coached on how to lobby Trump to strike Iran.
“They’ll tell me things our own government won’t tell me,” Graham told the newspaper.
On Monday, Graham also directed his criticism at Saudi Arabia’s decision to stay on the sidelines of the campaign against Iran.
“It is my understanding the Kingdom refuses to use their capable military as a part of an effort to end the barbaric and terrorist Iranian regime who has terrorized the region and killed 7 Americans,” wrote Graham in a post on X Monday. “Question – why should America do a defense agreement with a country like the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that is unwilling to join a fight of mutual interest?”
The post Lindsey Graham urges Israel not to strike Iranian oil depots even as he says he helped make war happen appeared first on The Forward.
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Belgian officials investigating synagogue explosion as possible act of terrorism
(JTA) — Belgian officials are investigating an explosion in front of a synagogue in Liège early Monday as a possible act of terrorism.
The explosion, which took place at 4 a.m., damaged the door of the historic neo-Romanesque synagogue and blew out the windows of multiple buildings across the street. No injuries were reported.
A range of Belgian politicians, including the prime minister and the mayor of Liège, characterized the explosion as act of antisemitism.
“Antisemitism is an attack on our values and our society, and we must fight it unequivocally,” Prime Minister Bart de Wever said in a statement. “We stand in solidarity with the Jewish community in Liege and across the country.”
The explosion comes amid a surge of concern about possible attacks by agents associated with the Iranian regime, against which the United States and Israel launched a war last week. Iran has a long record of supporting attacks on Jewish targets abroad, including two bombings in the 1990s in Argentina that killed more than 100 people at the Israeli embassy and a Jewish community center. Now, with Iran being pummeled at home, watchdogs are warning that it might lash out through its Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force, responsible for attacks abroad.
Azerbaijan said Friday that it had foiled multiple terror attacks planned by Iranian agents on Jewish sites. In London, four men were arrested last week for allegedly spying on the Jewish community for Iran, with the intent of planning attacks against the community. And a string of shootings at synagogues in Toronto has ignited concern in Canada, too.
Iranian agents have taken aim at non-Jewish targets, too. On Friday, a Pakistani man who prosecutors said had been directed by Iran’s IRGC was convicted of plotting to assassinate President Donald Trump.
The attack in Liège, in the primarily French-speaking Wallonia province, comes amid a range of recent developments that have unsettled Belgian Jews, who number approximately 30,000. They include antisemitic carnival caricatures in the city of Aalst; a ban on ritual slaughter preventing the local production of kosher meat; and an ongoing row between U.S. and Belgian officials over Jewish circumcision practices. The attack also follows a 2014 shooting in which a gunman associated with the Islamic State, a rival to Iran’s Islamic Republic, shot four people to death at the Jewish Museum in Brussels.
A spokesperson for the Liège police described the effects to the area as “only material damage” to the 1899 building. Rabbi Joshua Nejman told local media that he was hoping that security footage would reveal the perpetrator.
“I’m going to try to calm my heart, because it is beating faster and faster this morning,” said Nejman, who said he had been at the synagogue for 25 years.
“Liege is home to a very small but vibrant Jewish community where I personally grew up,” Eitan Bergman, vice president of the Coordinating Committee of Jewish Organisations in Belgium, told Reuters. “Today, the feelings among our community members are a mixture of sadness, worry and profound shock.”
Liege’s mayor, Willy Demeyer, praised the synagogue community to RBTF, Belgium’s French-language national broadcaster. He added, “We cannot allow foreign conflicts to be imported into our city.”
The post Belgian officials investigating synagogue explosion as possible act of terrorism appeared first on The Forward.
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The Top 100 People Positively Influencing Jewish Life, 2025
In honor of The Algemeiner‘s 12th annual gala, we are proud to present our “J100” list — 100 individuals who have positively influenced Jewish life over the past year.