Aliza Spiro, who recently launched a new congregation in Toronto with her husband, Cantor Simon Spiro, said the biggest irony is that despite being able trace her lineage through 31 generations of rabbis back to Rashi, the Song Shul they founded will not be led by one.
“My parents kind of flipped out and said, ‘How can you have a synagogue without a rabbi?’” Aliza said, adding that rabbis are not halachically required for services and life-cycle events.
Cantor Spiro, an ordained cantor with 40 years of experience, serves as the new shul’s spiritual leader. Most recently, he served as Beth Tzedec Congregation’s cantor. His contract expired and was not renewed in February. This followed a controversy last year, when the Beth Tzedec Singers choir quit en masse after the shul ruled it had to let its non-Jewish members go.
The same choir, renamed the Toronto Festival Singers, which has worked closely with Spiro since 2005, will continue to work with him at the Song Shul.
READ: RENOWNED BETH TZEDEC CHOIR RESIGNS EN MASSE
According to its website, Cantor Spiro will act as shaliach tzibur, the person who leads the congregation in prayer, reciting all the words, which means there’s no halachic requirement for choir members to be Jewish.
“When Simon’s contract was not renewed, we said, ‘You know what, let’s take all of the things that work in a synagogue and we’ll see if we can start a synagogue that’s all about the music, because we know to create a music program, we know how to daven, how to make music exciting, and I know how to [create] exciting programs,’” said Aliza, a former cantor, a singer and songwriter, and the shul’s creative director.
“The basic thing is that this music service is going to be a full service, but it will be very fast-paced. We don’t want to start at 8:45 a.m., and have rabbis drag this out until 12:15 p.m.,” Cantor Spiro said, laughing.
“We don’t want the oxygen snuffed out of the service. Young people come, and I’ve seen them walk in, and walk out. I’ve had people who have followed me and said, ‘I can’t come to synagogue at 9 a.m., just to have 24 minutes of golden music in a service. It’s just not worth it for me.’ That how we lose them, and they go and play golf.”
Aliza said the music will feature more than typical Shlomo Carlebach and chassidic nigunim. “Because Simon is able to write these amazing arrangements, and because the Toronto Festival Singers can sing anything, we’ll have special Shabbatot where there will be music from Adele and Pharrell Williams, and that kind of stuff,” she said.
“For me, it’s a dream three decades in the making,” Cantor Spiro said.
The Song Shul is independent and non-denominational. It defines itself as “traditional egalitarian,” so it will use Conservative and Orthodox prayer books, but there will be mixed seating, and women participating in services. Space will be reserved for members who prefer separate seating.
Aliza explained that instead of a rabbi’s sermon on Shabbat and holidays, the Song Shul will offer a five- to 10-minute “staccato sermonette,” or a sermon-in-song that will be given by volunteers.
The Song Shul does not yet have a permanent home, so holiday and monthly Shabbat services will be held at Bialik Hebrew Day School until it does.
This year, its High Holiday services will be held at the Toronto Centre for the Arts. Although membership for the shul’s year-round services and programs is free, tickets for the High Holidays must be purchased to cover the cost of the venue.
The Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services will also feature guest speakers, such as Walrus editor-in-chief Jonathan Kay.
In addition to Shabbat and holiday services, the shul plans to have programing for all ages, including a cantor training program for anyone eight and older, and a monthly “service of healing” that uses music to help people achieve spiritual, emotional and psychological healing, Aliza said.
“I think part of the fun is that because it’s all about the music, it’s not intimidating. Music is an amazing force. It brings people together, it excites people, and you don’t have to have a good voice to love music.”
For more information, visit www.songshul.com.
