Prayer and Jazz at Temple Isaiah

Praying is like playing jazz. The more you pray, the richer your prayer becomes. You can pray alone, but the exciting things happen with fellow pray-ers. It helps to know and trust others, too (although you learn a lot when you pray with new people). Some services are traditional, others creative. Some synagogues are formal, others less so. The Jewish service is built around a set of spiritual themes. Sometimes we all pray in harmony, other times we pray at our own rhythm, at our own volume.
- RABBI LEVI KELMAN

At Temple Isaiah, our prayer services are participatory, inspiring and filled with the spirit of Jewish tradition. We embrace the broad spectrum of Jewish musical and liturgical history, while including the contemporary sounds and instrumentation filling our world.

Temple Isaiah has become known as "the place for Jewish jazz." Throughout the year, our jazz bands and vocal groups join the rabbis, cantor and choir on Friday nights for Shabbat worship.

Our resident jazz band, Steve Fox and Friends, joins our Shabbat celebration on the 2nd Friday of the month. This rousing ensemble also appears at temple-wide celebrations like Yom HaAtzmaut and Simchat Torah. Steve Fox and Friends, along with guest vocalists Mitzi Schwarz and Deborah Pearl, have been enhancing liturgy at Temple Isaiah for almost a decade.

The George Kahn Ensemble, under the direction of Temple Isaiah member George Kahn, is a jazz trio with a truly elegant sound. George's wife, Diana Zaslove, often joins Cantor Kent to round out this incredible ensemble.

The newest addition to the Temple Isaiah jazz-lineup is the Larry Steen World Jazz Ensemble. Under the baton of bass player Larry Steen, this group presents traditional and contemporary Jewish prayer melodies, folk songs and contemporary Israeli pop with a distinctive world-beat. Throuhgout the year, this talented band wil inspire, entertain and encourage dancing in the aisles!

Temple Isaiah Show Choir (formerly Cantor's Chanters) is a students' vocal ensemble. Under the direction of Cantor Kent and Diane Feldman, this group of talented student vocalists presents eclectic programs filled jazz arrangements of familiar tunes. TISC also represents the Temple Isaiah community at public venues and festeivals.