logistics of group-run services
Mar. 1st, 2006 11:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cellioI have heard cantors and cantorial soloists complain about the "jukebox effect" (their words). The cantor, if present, is an essential part of the service; the rabbi or other leader shouldn't just tell the cantor "sing X", nor should he say "just do music" without providing some context. The choice of melodies, and even when to sing versus read, is bound up in the other aspects of the service -- inclusion or exclusion of optional prayers, the topic of the sermon, the weekly portion, and even where you are in the liturgical year, and maybe other outside factors. It's a package deal, and the service is stronger if everyone talks. And (I gather from hearing cantors talk), the cantor feels less like a pluggable part and more like a participant when this communication happens. If you didn't want a breathing, thinking person who might have input, you could just use a jukebox. (Ok, maybe not for other reasons, like on Shabbat, but you get the point.)
When I lead services on my own, I'm free to make all the decisions myself (within the limits of local custom). But when I've been involved in group services at my synagogue or during the Sh'liach K'hilah program, we've always talked about thiings in advance, made sure that the whole meshes, and made sure that everyone is satisfied with his role in the service. Even when I was doing the cantorial-soloist stint for another congregation, where it would have been, arguably, legitimate to treat me sort of like a jukebox, the rabbi and I discussed the service and what I could (and could not) bring to it. He, in turn, left many decisions to me -- I didn't tell him how to daven and he didn't tell me which melody to use for Adon Olam.
The service this Shabbat is a group effort. There is a local (city-wide) women's group, and they asked my congregation's women's group to join them. I am not really part of either group (been years since I went to anything other than these services), but one of the people from my synagogue's group has recruited me for the last few years. In the past they've asked me to read torah (being one of a small number who can); this year I declined that and they asked me to lead part of the service (Sh'ma through T'filah).
Now I suppose I should have asked explicitly about planning, but I didn't. I thought they would talk with me at the appropriate time. The organizers all know that I am competent to lead; they could have quite reasonably decided that I would figure it out, and I would have been comfortable with that level of autonomy. It would be better to know about broad plans (themes? others' roles and preferences?), but information was not forthcoming. The person from my synagogue was pushing on that, on behalf of several of us, so I didn't do so directly. She specifically told them that I'm comfortable with, and prefer, Hebrew.
This morning I received email with the order of service. It's very specific, and it involves a lot of English readings instead of Hebrew ones. The English readings are not translations; they're alternatives. The organizer, who is a cantorial soloist in her own congregation, is taking all of the musical parts, except that they have me chanting the v'ahavta after the Sh'ma.
I feel like I'm being treated as a jukebox, complete with pre-programmed track lists. I was not included in any discussions, and my preferences and strengths were, apparently, not taken into account. What they've given me, mostly, does not require any particular liturgical skill; anyone who can read text in public could do it. I don't feel like a leader of the service; I feel like a recording that's turned on and off as they deem relevant. I have no investment in it, and I should.
I think this would be less annoying if we were doing a traditional service, if they were dictating the standard prayers to me. That would be fine, because it has the weight of tradition behind it and it's what one expects. With the way this service is put together, they seem to be saying that they feel free to adapt, but they don't go so far as to adapt to participants' wishes, only their own.
I'm sure the organizers of this service have some sort of vision in mind, but they recruited me for a cooperative effort (or so I understood) and then dictated to me as if I was a mindless servant. They didn't mean to, I assume, and they might be horrified to hear that feedback (I don't know if I shall give it to them), but that's how it comes across to me.
I will, I hope, in the future be responsible for group-led, cooperative services. I will strive to remember what it felt like to be treated as a lesser being, one to be dictated to instead of talked with. I don't want to do to someone else what was done to me. I don't think I will be going back to this group in future years, and I don't want to be similarly responsible for driving someone away from my congregation.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-03-02 05:55 am (UTC)(However, chanting v'ahavta is certainly an appropriate assignment for a Torah leader. In your city is it generally done with the trope melody?)
One possible explanation is that they planned the service first, and then started looking for ways to plug in people from the groups that they wanted to "include". "Oops, we have to give Monica *something* to do, let's pencil her in here."
(no subject)
Date: 2006-03-02 02:31 pm (UTC)I don't know. In previous years I've been one of the torah readers, so I was pretty insulated from it -- all we had to determine was which aliya I was reading, and I'd tell them that I was chanting instead of reading in case that affected their choice of ordering. It's pretty self-contained. This is the first year I've seen an official order of service.
However, chanting v'ahavta is certainly an appropriate assignment for a Torah leader.
True in principle. In practice, everyone knows the melody, which bears only a loose resemblence to the cantillation, and everyone will be chanting along.
I've heard the same melody everywhere I've gone in this city. It probably evolved from the trope, but it's not the same, nor is it consistent -- that is, it's not just a different trope system; different words with the same ta'am have different melodies when they shouldn't. Even though I know how to lein (so I knew it was wrong), the magnitude of the difference didn't really strike me until I went to HUC and we did it correctly, twice a day, for a week per visit. I'd like to see our Shabbat morning minyan (flexible and open-minded) do it this way and my rabbi has mentioned the same desire, but we haven't done it yet.
I should talk with the organizers about my unhappiness (after the service, as there's nothing to be done now without making a scene) -- either that, or I should talk with my congregation's "represenative" to that group, the person they asked to recruit people from our congregation. She's the one who made the invitation, and the original offer was for a block of the service (specifically identified). She and I were both surprised when the order of service came out and my part of kri'at sh'ma was 95% English. She did push back on that and I think that's when they gave me v'ahavta. It sounds like they have a model of "we dole out parts; you are to recruit people and/or be those recruits". But I think our person, at least, if not also I, should have been part of that planning discussion, and that didn't happen.
(I just took a closer look at the order of service. Not counting torah readers, there are five names next to assigned parts. It's not like there are a bazillion of us and involving everyone would have been difficult.)
Hmm. Maybe the problem is that we had different models of this service. I thought I was being asked to help lead; perhaps they think they are doing me some kind of a favor by "letting" me lead. But I don't need that; being allowed to lead, as opposed to helping to lead, is relevant in an established community that I'm part of. If my rabbi said "you can lead part of Friday night nad this is exactly what you'll do", that would be different -- that would feel like a privilege. This service isn't a privilege, so they don't have the standing (in my mind) to treat me like a mindless flunky. And now I don't feel motivated to be involved in future years.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-03-02 06:27 pm (UTC)Precisely. You're being given an honor, just like being called to the Torah for an aliya is an honor.