Rising Song Community Spotlight: Dov Rosenblatt
Interview with Dov Rosenblatt by Liz Feldman, January 2022
Could you start by telling us where you live, your day job and about your Jewish background and community?
I grew up Modern Orthodox and recently moved here to Nashville, Tennessee, right before the High Holidays. We were coming from LA where my wife grew up, and then New York before that. The Nashville Jewish community is relatively small, there’s one Orthodox shul, Sherith Israel, where I am now the cantor-in-residence. I am lucky enough to be able to say that music is my full-time job. I am in a band called Distant Cousins— we're a trio, we write songs for ourselves, and we also do a lot of work with TV and film scores. We also started a virtual songwriting workshop at the beginning of the pandemic, so we work with groups all over the world. We’ve written original songs with 12 to 15 Jewish Federations. So music is a big part of my life!
And how did you find Rising Song and Joey Weisenberg?
Last fall I was going to lead High Holidays for the first time at the shul here, and so Joey's course was really my lifeline! I was very stressed about this—it's a big undertaking. I grew up going to shul but there's a huge leap to stepping up to the bima and being the leader and, especially on Yamim Noraim, all of the the weight that it carries. A friend in LA said, “You have to check out Joey Weisenberg.” It was absolutely perfect—I just started devouring the videos. The tutorials were so professionally done and efficient. Joey just has a way. When he's talking to the camera, I felt like it was a one-on-one with him, as if he were my coach. All his videos are an incredible resource. I would pause and practice and take notes. I also love his approach, because his humility comes through, and yet he talks about how even though you come at it from a humble place, it’s OK to have a little chutzpah at times! I’m not a very showy cantor, I love the ba’al tefillah approach, like Eli Kranzler, when the whole mission is to bring the community together through song. Joey is just such a great mentor for that. He teaches you how to bring people in, using hand movements and all these techniques.
Yes! You are describing more of a shaliach tzibur [community messenger] approach, maybe ba’al neginah [holder of melody], which is a term that Deborah Sacks Mintz taught me recently.
And yes, there comes a time where you do need to carry—you are the carrier of the load for the kahal [community]. That's been probably my most challenging balance and I don't know that there's a right answer—each person needs to feel it out for themselves. At certain moments, people want a little more of the old school chazanut. And then other times you can try a new song and just get people singing along. There’s one thing I adopted from my father-in-law, A”H. He always pushed me to lead davening, and he said, “It's not about you”—in a loving way. But so often in music, the ego gets in the way of yourself. So even in the morning, when I get up to lead, I just say, "This is not about you. Take yourself out of it a little. Think about the people around you." Even every morning, just to do daily Shacharit. That’s also a practice leading towards Shabbat, and leading towards the Chagim, and towards Yamim Noraim. So it all works together.
That’s lovely. Do you have your own davening experience when you lead? Or, rather, how is your own davening experience different when you are sha”tz and when you are not?
That's a really good question. Each just has its moments. Sometimes when I'm not leading, I can be off in my own thoughts, while being shaliach tzibur really does bring me that focus—I am looking at the words. And when you're leading, it’s this weird dichotomy of being in your own prayer and yet very aware of everybody around: are people hungry, should I go a little faster, are we getting close to lunch? It's like driving—you're focused on what you're doing, but you're looking around and at your mirrors all the time. You have to be a defensive chazzan!
Great analogy! Could you talk about these songwriting workshops that you do?
It is a perfect marriage of my love of music and Judaism and teaching. It started as an elective at Shalhevet High School in LA, understanding tefillot through songwriting. Now I’m actually doing it with the Nashville community: We take one tefillah, learn about it, who wrote it, what's the theme, what are we saying. We digest that and discuss it. Then, we write our own lyrics based off of the prayer. And then we see where that goes! My band, Distant Cousins, was playing at Limmud in New Orleans, and they asked us to work with the children. In one hour, we wrote a cool song together. Right before the pandemic, we performed for the Diller Foundation staff and led a songwriting workshop with 200 adults. It was awesome. So when everything shut down, they reached back out and asked us to work with Jewish teenagers in 32 cities all over the world. So we went full on and wrote 18 songs. It was such an incredible experience. Some of the sessions were at 3 a.m. for us because there were kids in Australia and Israel. But it was really inspiring. These kids took it so seriously and they got real vulnerable. It was actually therapeutic for them—and for us—to digest what was happening and how they were feeling. That’s become our main business for the past two years. People were looking for ways to connect their staff online and do something fun and meaningful. We did it with kids in schools, with corporations that were just looking for a fun activity, all different organizations.
I imagine there’s a lot of music happening in your home with your four children?
Yes, music plays a big role in our home! The kids come in my studio and play all the different instruments. My oldest son,10, plays piano; he's got a great ear. My daughter, 6, is a better songwriter than I’ll ever be and she’s living in a musical! My younger son, 3, is always singing and picking up a drum so we have awesome family jams. It’s also an important lesson for them to learn about everything—to listen to one another. Ultimately, music is about communication and I always tell my kids that music is more about listening than playing.
What questions do you have for others in this community?
I’m curious to hear from other people's experiences how they balance keeping true to a lot of the traditions and melodies that are clearly dear to many, and, at the same time, switching it up and trying new songs. How do people navigate that? Also, how do we get more people to show up on Friday night? It’s my favorite davening but we have a hard time getting people to show up.
For more about Dov’s work:
