Debbie Friedman

Content type
Collection
Eden Derso

Jewish Ladies Who Rock, Vol. 2

Rebecca Long

What better way to celebrate spring than by listening to the second installment of JWA’s playlist of Jewish women who rock?

Topics: Music
Debbie Friedman with Her Guitar

The Music In Us All

Gabrielle Cantor

I grew up singing. My family sang songs every holiday, and we even listened to fun Jewish family songs in the car. My favorite part of Hebrew School every week was when we got to sing, and I looked forward to coming home and serenading my parents with the latest song that I had learned. 

Debbie Friedman

Debbie Friedman’s music transformed prayers for Jews across the movements.
Olivia Link's Bat Mitzvah

Discovering the Art of Prayer

Olivia Link

Adults may scoff, and my friends may hypocritically mock me, but I can never deny that I would want to stand out in a crowd. Whether a college application, a creative thesis for school, or even the food that I bring for lunch, I want to discover a personal uniqueness that I carry so I can have some special pride in my stride. Luckily for me, I can already claim an artistic and spiritual individuality that I bring to the table as a female Jew.

Topics: Feminism, Art, Dance, Prayer

Debbie Friedman

The more our voices are heard in song, the more we become our lyrics, our prayers, and our convictions.

Debbie Friedman

The Lives They Lived: Jewish women to remember in 2011

Leah Berkenwald

“[Debbie Friedman] emphasized the value of every voice and the power of song to help us express ourselves and become our best selves. As she wrote for JWA's online exhibit Jewish Women and the Feminist Revolution: 'The more our voices are heard in song, the more we become our lyrics, our prayers, and our convictions.' The woman who wrote the song that asks God to 'help us find the courage to make our lives a blessing' herself modeled for us what that looks like.”—Judith Rosenbaum.
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Debbie Friedman

By Spirit Alone: Remembering Debbie Friedman

Judith Rosenbaum

Tonight I drove home to Boston with Debbie Friedman's memorial service streaming live on my phone.

"Debbie Friedman at Carnegie Hall" Album Cover

Debbie Friedman: In our thoughts

Leah Berkenwald

Fifteen years ago today, Debbie Friedman gave a sold out concert at Carnegie Hall, commemorating 25 years as one of the Jewish community's most beloved singers. Yesterday, Friedman was hospitalized for pnemonia. JTA reports that she is currently sedated and on a respirator.

Topics: Music, Music

Savina J. Teubal, 1926 - 2005

Savina reclaimed the stories of Sarah and Hagar through her writing, and through her life. Like Sarah, Savina went forth into new lands, without maps or mentors to guide her. Like Sarah and Hagar, Savina lived in a patriarchal world, challenging that world with her choices and her clarity about the work she was called to complete….

First CAJE Conference

August 29, 1976

On August 29, 1976, the first Conference on Alternatives in Jewish Education began at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.

Debbie Friedman plays Carnegie Hall

January 7, 1996

On January 7, 1996, Debbie Friedman gave a sold out concert at Carnegie Hall, commemorating twenty-five years as one of the Jewish community's most well-known and influential contemporary musicians

Project Kesher

Project Kesher is a feminist Jewish organization empowering women in Belarus, Russia, Ukraine, and the Russian-speaking community in Israel to build a society in which inclusive Jewish life can flourish, and where women are the instruments of peaceful change.

Feminist Jewish Ritual: An International Perspective

Beginning with the first bat mitzvah, Jewish women began adapting traditional ceremonies to focus on women and their experiences. Other rituals have been created for parts of the female life cycle such as menstruation or childbirth. However, there continues to be a lack of recognition of women in recently created holidays that are based on nationalist and Zionist beliefs.

Women, Music, and Judaism in America

This article emphasizes American Jewish women’s multivalent musical choices from the eighteenth through the twenty-first centuries. In doing so, it acknowledges that mainstream Jewish liturgical, educational, art, and “popular” music histories often exclude or minimize women’s participation—as does the very term “Jewish music.” Instead, this article focuses on Jewish-identifying women’s activities in both religious and non-religious settings, rather than seeking to classify the music they create.

CAJE

CAJE—the Coalition for the Advancement of Jewish Education—brought together a diverse spectrum of the Jewish community. After CAJE folded in 2009, it was replaced by NewCAJE, which shares ideas and innovations, offers professional development across denominational and workplace lines, and builds a strong Jewish community.

Arise, Arise: A New Wave of Jewish Women Musicians

Jordan Namerow

Yesterday I attended a workshop on themes of social justice in Jewish music. I was given a music packet that included songs by Bob Dylan, Peter Yarrow (of Peter, Paul, and Mary), Pete Seeger, Jeff Klepper, the stud-of-a-Jewish-Rockstar Rick Recht, and E18hteen (the modern Jewish rock band founded by Dan Nichols). "E18hteen" sings that catchy song "Kehilah, Kedoshah" which is all the rage in Reform Jewish camps (I'm not going to lie -- I dig this song despite its cheesiness).

Topics: Activism, Music, Music

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