By Sam Kricsfeld /
Contributing Writer
The COVID-19 pandemic has upended virtually everything, and that includes Jewish studies, as an area cantorial student has discovered.
Rachel Black, 36, of Lawrence, Kansas, began her courses at the Jewish Theological Seminary’s H. L. Miller Cantorial School Aug. 31. The school is based in New York City and is conducting classes via the online video platform Zoom.
“(Cantors) have been able to adapt to this virtual environment pretty well,” Black said. “We’ve moved to services on Zoom. And it’s obviously not what it was in person, but it is working, and it’s getting us through this time.”
Black applied to a five-year program at the cantorial school in early July, doing her entire audition and interview process through Zoom. New students would normally fly to New York to go through the admissions process. The pandemic prevented that.
Because she is studying from home, Black has purchased improved lighting, a cell phone stand and other “semi-professional” gear to improve the quality of the video and audio assignments that are due several times a week.
“I am doing both audio recordings – just on my phone to send in the homework assignment – and then more sort of polished recordings on video,” she said.
The video option requires adaptation. Because there is lag, students cannot sing at the same time. Black said that if there is an instance where everyone is to sing together, every student except one is muted. They then take turns.
“You have to just kind of hear the other people singing in your heart,” she said.
The H. L. Miller Cantorial School confers a “degree of master in Sacred Music,” according to the JTS website. Graduates become members of the Cantors Assembly, a network that offers “mentorship, professional development and personal growth” and “placement, insurance and retirement planning,” according to their website. Both the JTS and the Cantors Assembly are affiliated with the Conservative movement.
Black is no stranger to Kansas City congregations and other musical audiences.
She has appeared as a guest cantorial soloist in the Kansas City area at Congregation Beth Torah, Congregation Ohev Sholom, and The Temple, Congregation B’Nai Jehudah.
She earned local headlines two years ago upon the release of the commercial CD featuring her acclaimed song “Edyka,” which tells the story of her grandmother’s harrowing escape from a Nazi boxcar destined for the Treblinka death camp. It is sung from the perspective of Black’s great-grandmother, who pushed her daughter out of a vent at the top of the moving boxcar.
As The Chronicle explained in its 2018 story, Black knew it was time to share her family’s story widely after recounting the history at Temple Beth Sholom in Topeka.The incredible tale includes the meeting of Black’s grandparents, when Jewish resistance fighter, Herschel Lipa, rescued Edjya “Edyka” Katz, who had been left for dead in mass grave of Jews murdered by Polish militia.
The Temple Beth Sholom presentation led to Black serving as the keynote speaker for the 2018 State of Kansas Holocaust Commemoration in Topeka. Preparing for the presentation inspired Black to write “Edyka,” completing it in one hour at midnight. She performed it at the piano at the end of her Kansas Holocaust Commemoration keynote.
All signs pointed to Black becoming a cantor.
Her mom told her stories about how she was making up songs and singing since she was barely walking. Black first performed as a 6-year-old, and she started writing music at age 14.
She went on to graduate from the Berklee College of Music in Boston.
In Lawrence, Black was the religious school director at the Lawrence Jewish Community Center, in addition to leading High Holiday services. She was also the executive director of the Americana Music Academy for five years. Her last day at the AMA was the same day as her orientation at the cantorial school.
“Sometimes God gives you little signs that this is what you should be doing, and then sometimes God gives you a big blaring billboard with shining lights and says, ‘Now this is what you’re supposed to be doing,’” Black said.
Black’s “billboard” came in February at the Hilary Lewis Community-Wide Faculty Professional Development Day, held by the Rabbinical Association of Greater Kansas City. Attending as the LJCC’s religious school director, she studied with Rabbi Jan Katzew, the director of the Rabbinical School and Associate Professor of Education and Jewish Thought at Hebrew Union College.
“He inspired me so much,” Black said. “I felt as soon as I left that full day of learning, I knew that it was time to go to cantorial school and really learn my craft correctly and focus on my education.”
Black is married to Eric Moore and has a daughter, Cora Edyka Blackmoore.
“(Cora) can be whatever she wants to be,” Black said, “but she does show quite a few signs of being a singer. There are many videos surfacing of her sort of imitating me Zooming, and she really sounds like quite the cantor.”
