Singing at the Vatican
Cantor Roslyn Barak of San Francisco’s Congregation Emanu-El will be sharing her music in Europe this fall. She’ll travel to Paris, Vienna and Warsaw with the Koret-Taube Foundation’s Jewish Heritage Tour and, along with other members of the Cantors Assembly (of the Conservative Movement), will present cantorial concerts in those cities.
And that’s not all. Along with cantors Leigh Korn of Temple Isaiah in Lafayette, David Margules of Congregation Rodef Sholom in San Rafael and Lauren Bandman of Congregation Beth Am in Los Altos Hills, Barak will be a part of a special concert presented by the American Conference of Cantors. The Reform movement group will sing at the Vatican on Nov. 16 as part of an event to honor William Henry Cardinal Keeler, who is prominent in Catholic-Jewish dialogue.
Whimsy at the CJM
Did anyone else wonder why artist Maira Kalman calls the occasional events that are happening around the exhibit of her art at the Contemporary Jewish Museum “Miltons”?
Here’s the answer, from the CJM’s Rachel Petru: “Milton is Maira Kalman’s daughter’s nickname, and the Milton concept was named in honor of her. Maira was approached by the New York Times during the renovation of Times Square and asked what she would do if there were no limitations. Her response was ‘Milton,’ a store that sold different items every day. The nature behind the project is that things change and we don’t want to get bored, so we might as well just do what we want to do. Milton also honors Maira’s appreciation of the entrepreneurial spirit and her preference to ‘sell’ versus ‘give away.’ ”
So now you know! By the way, there are three Miltons scheduled in October.
P.S. Thinking the letters were an acronym, Milton Weiss of Mill Valley came up with “Many Interesting Little Tzchakas Of Note” — which isn’t too far off the artist’s concept.
Oakland musician on the rise
Linda Yelnick of Menlo Park, who manages Oakland pop-fusion singer-songwriter Hyim, writes that Hyim is a KFOG “Local Scene” artist for August. His song “Elation” is featured on the station’s latest Local Scene CD, volume 7, which raises money for music in schools.
Hyim’s latest album is called “Sex In the Morning” and Yelnick says the title track is “loosely based on the mitzvah of having sex on Shabbat.” Check out his music at www.myspace.com/hyim.
Short shorts
Noah Tuchow, a graduate of Brandeis Hillel Day School in San Francisco, has been awarded one of 650 National Security Language Initiative for Youth Scholarships for 2010-11. The scholarship is enabling Noah to study Chinese in China for the summer … Janice Litvin, who teaches Zumba Fitness in Contra Costa County, was featured in a story in the Contra Costa Times. Zumba, according to the story, is a hot new exercise done to fun, hypnotic, sassy Latin music, and reportedly it doesn’t feel like a workout … Scott Maltz is the new president of the Peninsula JCC in Foster City, reports the PJCC’s Eileen Mitchell … Jeff Rosen, who was elected district attorney of Santa Clara County in the June elections, was formerly president of Congregation Kol Emeth … At the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival about a month ago, Israeli filmmaker Ronit Avni said that her film “Budrus” was the second-night film at the Dubai film festival. Her film was made with a hand-held camera, but the opening Dubai film certainly wasn’t: It was “Avatar.”
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