Happy Birthday Gilad

Today is Gilad Shalit's 25th birthday. He is an Israeli soldier who has been held hostage by Hamas for over 5 years. Hamas has refused requests from the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit him, which is a violation of International law. Please join me in spreading awareness by posting this as your status for one day. Together, we can fight to free a man who deserves to live a life of liberty and peace. Happy birthday, Gilad.

8th day song quoting the Alter Rebbe

"I dont want Your gan eden, I dont want Your olam haba... I want nothing but You alone" Ich vil nit dein gan eiden, ich vill nit dein olam haba, ich vil mer nit az dir alein!" - Schneur Zalman of Liadi, the Alter Rebbe

It's incredible to see awesome music being made based from such holy things

 

Re'eh

 This weeks Parsha goes over the kashrus of different animals. Hashhem gives us signs of whether or not an animal is kosher- split hooves and chews its cud are common examples. Now there is a question whether these animal characteristics are actually just signs and it shows if the actual animal is kosher, or whether these features is what makes the animal kosher. Is the fact that it has split hooves shows us it is kosher...or is it the split hooves itself that makes it kosher? The answer is important is what if an animal has some kind of defect, and its hooves arent split, or arent split all the way....or if it has another feature that would deem it unfit for a Jewish person to consume. Or the other way around, what if an unkosher animal randomly had features that would make it kosher?? Are these features merely signs or the actual intrinsic reason they are kosher

According to halacha, if an animal has some sort of feature that would make it seem unkosher, but its mother and species have that characteristic, then the animal is kosher to eat. So this means that these signs act as arrows pointing to what we need to look at to know that it is kosher or not.

However, even though these features arent the actual reason they are kosher but are signs to tell us the animal is kosher, we can still learn from these signs. Each feature has a reason and lesson we can learn from but I'm going to go into one of them

We can only eat from animals that have a split hoof. Why is that? A hoof is different than a paw in that it is elevated off the ground. The paw is in a very close and intimate state to the ground, into this lowly world.The hoof proves a point just how we are here in the earth but the way we interact with it is that we need to make sure we stay in an elevated state. We have a mission here and we can't get stuck in only the gashmius of the world. Secondly, it is split. This shows us that while we are elevated, we are still in this world and we should sue our elevated state to elevate the world around us. We should go into the world and spread kedusha instead of just staying in a secluded circle. Lastly, with the hoof being split, there is a right and left side. this demonstrates the love and fear we feel of Gd through our emotions and work. Everyone has a natural tendency towards either love or fear in their avoda and one or the other usually comes easier. The equally split hoof shows that even if one comes easier, we need to work on our avoda of both love and fear even if one doesnt come as easy. Avraham's hardest test was to sacrifice his son, which is a test of fear. His other ones were involved with love of Hashem, so they came easier and almost naturally to him. We need to work on our avoda as a whole with what comes easy and what not so easy.

With the hardships in Israel, hurricanes, and earthquakes, Hashem is telling us Moshiach is almost here, we just need to work on both love and fear and ahavas yisrael to show we are ready and merit to bring the geula!

Good Shabbos!!! =)


for a real live deer chewing its cud...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kL_bGZSg634

Moshiach

Moshiach "Objects in Mirror are Closer than they Appear"
taken on my 50 mm Minolta X-370 film camera

Just a bunch of hipsters back in the day...a Klezmer Mumford and Sons

Fantasia 2011

Sunday night my mother and I drove up to Hollywood for FANTASIA at the Hollywood Bowl.

Fantasia is a collaboration between Stokowski and Walt Disney where music is placed with picture animated specifically for those songs. The original movie was released in 1940 and since then it has been in a constant state of revelation and change. New songs are being added and unfinished pieces are being worked on. 

The venue of the Hollywood Bowl is incredible as it has a rounded shape and although it is an outside venue which I usually don't like this sound here is clear and strong. It was a large orchestra playing with instruments ranging from harp trumpets and standard strings.

Conductor John Mauceri did a great job leading the symphony while simultaneously relating to the crowd with stories and jokes.  He is a chancellor at UNCSA, has worked closely with Bernstein, and has conducted or performed at the hollywood bowl over 300 times.

The program started with an introduction shortly followed by Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor. This was set to visuals of shapes and different colors that eluded to the same colors in the music. Other compositions included Beethoven's Symphony No. 6 the Pastoral, Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite, and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. My favourites were the two that arent in the original Fantasia- Debussy's Clair de Lune and the finale- a jazz rendition of Flight of the Bumblebee by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and a collaboration with Salvador Dali set to Armando Dominguez's music entitled Destino and of course the classic "Sorcerer's Apprentice" which is the face of Fantasia. Claird de Lune beautifully synched a story with two egrets in a marsh with a fully orchestrated version of this whispering song. I was fully enthralled and eager to hear every note of that song and watch how it matched the picture. It was great noticing how well Mauceri did at following the visuals and now I better understand how this is done using a click track like I've learned in school. The flight of the Bumblebee was such a nice surprise as I instantly knew from a few measures what this was a derivative of. The pianist was brilliant and added astounding jazz lines and chords while the visuals followed a bee flying on top of a keyboard.

Overall the performance was incredible. The musicians played beautiful and the animators captured the songs in a new light through the visuals. It's over at the hollywood bowl but I suggest anyone watch the 1940's or the 2000 version.

The Heart that Sings

Last night I saw a screening for Robin Garbose's newest film "The Heart that Sings".  It was brought by the production company Kol Neshama which is a company Robin is pioneering. It is a film just for women (sorry all you hipster Chasidim out there...) and has only girls and women actors.
The story line is based on a short story and expounded upon to make a full length musical film. It is of a young girl who came to America in the 1950's after the war who is hired as a music and drama counselor at a girls summer camp. Her depth and Hungarian culture is at first not accepted by her young campers, but the story unfolds to reveal close relationships and lasting bonds. The plot is heartwarming and the script was really well written. It contained a lot of deep meanings and was rooted in yiddishkeit. The acting was great and the cast consisted of mostly young girls and was actually shot in a summer camp type of setting.

The music was beautifully scored by Richard Friedman. He really captured the emotions in the scenes from the sadness in the beginning to the comical and energetic beats in the middle. He infused a lot of the music with Jewish style which I still have yet to master so I thought it was very impressive. All the songs were written by Levi Garbose and were equally as inspiring. He wrote a lullaby style song that was moving and infused them with lyrics praising Hashem so the whole song was filled with so much kedusha you could feel it was coming from a high place. I really loved the music throughout the whole film and now have songs and melodies playing in my head from it.

The whole production and missions statement is incredibly inspiring and something I strive to be apart of. I have been thinking that I want to be part of a team that revolutionizes Jewish films. I want to score beautiful songs that help to spread kedusha and have a deeper purpose. I love watching all films (especially with great scores) but there is something especially holy about taking something that could be used either to be elevated or as a kelipah and making the solid decision to use it to make a dwelling place for Hashem here. This production as well as her other one has been so inspiring to watch and speak to her about. I hope only much brachas for this company and Hashem should bless it so it can grow and grow and continue to inspire and entertain women and girls everywhere.


For a trailer of the film...http://www.imdb.com/video/demo_reel/vi2258279449/

Tu B'Av

          Last night until tonight is the of 15th of Av (or as my Rabbi likes to say "15 Av August" )
          This holiday is intriguing in that there isn't much description about observances on this day but at the same time it is the happiest of all the holidays. This holiday is known for being the night that unmarried women would all wear white dresses and go and dance in a field. Men would come and they would instantly see who is their soul mate and find his wife. It makes sense that this holiday would fall now on the 15th of Av after we just had our saddest day of the Jewish calendar: the 9th of Av. Just as a ball rolling down a hill is found in nature- so too is that idea in a spiritual sense. In order to grow and be on a whole new higher level, we need to go down first. A descend is necessary for an ascent. So right after our saddest day when we mourn the destruction of our two Temples and many other things, we have this great holiday filled with simcha.
          This Tu B'Av I went to a fellow Mayanot alum's wedding to dance and later a shiur on marriage. This is an auspicious time to celebrate in simchas so I was so happy to be able to help celebrate with her along with other friends. It was a beautiful wedding and the kallah was stunning =) May we all be able to dance at eachothers weddings and simchas in Jerusalem soon!
       
Since the nights are longer now, we are meant to increase our Torah learning especially today- and reading this blog was a start!

Happy Tu B'Av!

to learn more about this holiday... http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/53680/jewish/15th-of-Av.htm
        

Today is my last day at my internship! I had such good experiences at Secret Road and am going to miss it! I learned about music placement in film and TV and heard great music from awesome artists like Ingrid Michaelson, Meiko, Andy Grammer, Brett Dennen, and Civil Wars. Off to more and new adventures in the music industry…


Parshas Vaetchanan
In this parsha we have one of the most basic pesukim in the whole torah (we say it in aleinu)  “You should know today and you shall return it to your heart, that in the heavens above and the earth below there is nothing but Gd.” This verse shows the concept of the unity of Gd. It shows us how Gd wants us to LIVE with this thought. It starts in the intellect but shouldnt stay there but rather comes down into your heart and affects your emotions.
There is a story about Chasidm farbrenging and they had this discussion…each chasid had his own interpretation for what the verse meant
1. “You should KNOW today”. this emphasizes and the clarity just like how you have the clarity that it is day right now.
“That YOU should know.” He stressed that it was you and not about someone else knowing, its about how you internalize it.
“You should know TODAY” and not tomorrow- if you want to start something you should start today and not push it off till tomorrow.
We need and can learn from all these of these chasidim. In order to actually internalize something and take it from intellect and into our hearts, we need these 3 steps. One we need clarity and have it clear as day. Then we need to internalize this clarity and break it down and understand it and work it out- which will ultimately bring us to the third which is the present and action upon our knowledge.
once we can do that, we can fulfill our ultimate goal in spreading kedusha throughout the whole world.
Have a beautiful Shabbos and weekend =)
—dvar from Rabbi Meir Levinger on ‘Mayanot moment’

Gettin' Started

Hello there!

I wanted to continue my blog from tumblr onto blogspot. My goal of this blog is to merge the worlds of indie music, high fashion, and Chasidus. We can light the sparks in the gashmius (worldly/physical things)and use it to elevate the world and spread kedusha (holiness).
For all previous posts, refer back to http://rollwithitandsmile.tumblr.com/
Thanks for following =)