Culture Corner: Therefore, I Sing

By Lara Torgovnik
New York University

"A painter paints pictures on canvas.  But musicians paint their pictures on silence."  - Leopold Stokowski

Spirituality has no singular definition. We all choose our own precious somethings – our small, tangible symbols of universality. If we are taught that God is in everything anyway, is that okay? Are we creating our own religions?

I sit and listen to David Broza’s meandering fingerpicks as he sings about homes. It’s a Friday afternoon and somewhere, I know, there’s a cantor warming up for evening services. I’d never thought of it before – preoccupied as I was with school and Friday night movies. For years, I had practiced for my piano and voice lessons on those very same afternoons. Was that blasphemy? If I find solace and reason in music, am I replacing God?

Judaism seems to most often pose a problem to the contemporary aspiring intellectual. Do I send my child to Hebrew School or Music School? Is there time for both museums and minhah services? What if Billy Joel has a concert on a Friday night? I’ve come to realize that it’s not about choosing, but rather, it’s about what we choose to see in all we do. We compromise. Some find compromise to be the affliction of an assimilating Jew. However, I believe that compromise is the way to keep Jews from vanishing. One shouldn’t have to choose. I’m a singer/songwriter who believes in God, goes to services, lights candles on Shabbat and hangs a mezuzah on the door of her small dorm room. Judaism is the religion of learning and achievement. That achievement can apply to the arts as well.

I think the answer really came to me when I joined the Zamir Chorale in my freshman year at NYU. Everything fit in. The music was dazzling, the people were welcoming, and, more importantly, I found a niche in which my sort of duality was encouraged. Women were cantors and choruses were mixed and the minor chromaticisms resonated with the sweet overtones of devotees’ heartstrings. Zamir proved to me that passion and spirituality can’t be compartmentalized. I believe in God, therefore I sing. I sing, therefore I believe. Music is my means of expression -- my most genuine way of communicating with the sacred.

I listen to our conductor challenge us with phrases like, "How can you believe in an invisible God if you don’t even believe in an invisible downbeat?" The metaphor enthralls me. There are enchanting cascades of music that overwhelm our senses just as much as the beauty of a sunset may leave us awestruck with God’s magnitude. However, some of the most precious instances in a piece of music are the breaths of silent release between passages. It is the meaning of that silence – that glorified absence of something – that makes me understand why God must exist. It is in the moments that we don’t create that the magic lingers. It is within music that we find the interludes where God speaks.

Lara Torgovnik is a student of the Gallatin School in NYU, pursuing a career in songwriting. She sings with the Zamir Chorale and is happily active in NYU's Jewish community.

[Posted 3/6/08]