Adult Education

This lesson examines how women joined—and transformed—the Reform cantorate: a role encompassing prayer leadership, sacred song, and a caring, relational presence in Jewish life. Tracing the cantorate’s evolution from European synagogue models through American training and cultural change, learners will meet early trailblazers, first-generation pioneers, and today’s wide range of cantorial voices—while considering how tradition and innovation shape (and sometimes challenge) Jewish worship.

This lesson invites learners into the vibrant, evolving world of klezmer—an Ashkenazic Jewish instrumental tradition rooted in celebration, prayer, and everyday life. Moving from village celebrations and communal gatherings to American stages and contemporary reinvention, learners will explore how klezmer carries Jewish memory, emotion, and identity across time and place.

This lesson will examine the development of American musical theater, highlighting the involvement of Jews at each stage of production. We will focus particularly on Jewish songwriters and their work on Broadway.

You will embark on an exciting, educational journey which will take you through many aspects of Jewish music and how it connects to our history, practice, and identity as a Jewish people.

This two-part lesson explores the use of music in the work of doing justice. It will explore the power of protest, the power of ritual, and the power of performance.

This lesson is an exploration and celebration of the very rich music and culture of the Moroccan and Persian Jewish communities.

This lesson is an exploration and celebration of the very rich music and culture of the Moroccan and Persian Jewish communities as expressed through some of their lifecycle and holiday practices.

This lesson will explore how American Jews have engaged with Israeli musical forms, from the 1920’s through the 1950’s. We will examine how Israeli music navigated the ongoing relationship between American Jews and Zionism and Israel.

This lesson will explore how music of Israel grew in the consciousness of American Jews and penetrated American culture generally. American Jewry formulated its own brand of Zionism, which supported the enterprise in Palestine but remained committed to life in America.

This lesson will explore some of the musical activities that took place during the Shoah, and the ways that Jews have collectively remembered the Shoah through music.