As of July 1, Cantor Rebecca Robins, 28, became the new cantor at Congregation Sinai in Glendale, her first full time position after graduation and ordination from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion School of Sacred Music.
On July 7, she met with The Chronicle to give it the opportunity to introduce her to the community. Edited excerpts from the conversation follow.
What is your background?
I grew up in a Reform synagogue in Jericho, N.Y. That’s where I became a bat mitzvah. And soon after becoming a bat mitzvah, I started working with my cantor, Cantor Marvin Antosofsky … and singing on the bimah. He really encouraged me to combine my love for singing and my love for Judaism in that way.
How did you discover you had a love for singing?
I loved singing since I was a very small child, but I was very poor at it. My parents like to tell the story about asking me to go to my room and to shut the door when I would sing. It was around the time of my bat mitzvah that Cantor Antosofsky said, “You don’t have such a terrible voice, you just don’t know how to use it.” When I was 16, I started private voice study.
I take it your singing improved by the time you were 16 that your parents began to support you?
They bought into it, absolutely.
What is your voice?
I’m a soprano.
Why become a cantor as opposed to a pop singer or opera singer or something else?
I did my undergraduate degree in vocal performance and music education at the State University of NY College at Potsdam, Crane School of Music. (Isn’t that the longest university name ever?)
When I was in school, there was a very small Jewish population. I became more and more involved in Jewish leadership.
Soon after graduating while I was teaching public school, I was deciding what to pursue a master’s degree in. And the things that interested me — which included teaching, singing, counseling, and creating community — were all encapsulated in the cantorate. So the things that had been planted in my mind at 13 re-emerged ten years later.
You enjoyed being at HUC?
I did. I think there are few times in your life where you get to totally immerse yourself in the things you are interested in. That’s what I did.
It was not the easiest road because it’s not a typical graduate program. You’re really taking almost 17 credits a semester, Monday through Thursday, and then working at an internship on Shabbat.
How did Congregation Sinai and you hook up?
The American Conference of Cantors [the Reform movement’s cantorial organization] has a unified search process where congregations apply and Reform cantors certified or invested through the Reform movement apply.
I was looking for a congregation that seemed like the congregation I would join if I were just looking to become member… A singing congregation, really committed to being musical together. That had high educational values for children and adults. That had strong rabbinic leadership and a strong clergy partnership between rabbi and cantor.
Primarily I was looking for a congregation that truly had a sense of community, inter-generationally, and also within all avenues of congregational life, whether worship, social events, social action projects, commitment to Israel…. As I got to know Sinai through my interview process, I really felt all those things to be true [there].
As I began [the job search] process, I have a friend in Washington, D.C., where I was living, and his mom is a Jewish educator in Virginia Beach. And she said to me “Are there any jobs in Milwaukee? Because I think you’d really like it there.”
[Moreover,] my friend Benjy Bar Lev grew up there, and he said, “Oh, check it out. You’ll totally love it.” (He’s now a rabbi in Columbus, Ohio.) And when I came here for an interview, I really did absolutely love it. And it was cold and raining, so I figured if I loved it then, I would love it in the summer, too.
Anything in particular you want to accomplish while you’re here, a goal you’ve set for yourself?
One thing I’d really like to do maintain and uphold the high value that Sinai places on its musical life in worship, and also outside of worship, through cultural programming and the like, while continuing also to grow that. Hopefully we will create a choral tradition here at Sinai…
And I really look forward to becoming an active member of the Milwaukee Jewish community.… I know that this community has an outstanding reputation for its pro-Israel action and its commitment to social justice. Those are things that are extremely important to me.
Do you have family as yet? You are single?
I’m not totally single. My significant other is still in D.C., and he is looking to come to Milwaukee as soon as he can.
How would you describe your approach to the musical part of the cantorate? Did you like traditional nusach [melodic motifs], do you like the folk stuff…?
Can I answer yes to all? Interestingly enough, I have no favorite time in the development of synagogue music. I’m not saying that just to be all generic and happy for any of your readership.
Rather, I think that each kind of generation of music that has become our collection and our body of synagogue music has its own sense of strengths and weaknesses and I think, as we look to the future in building musical programming for worship, the cantorate has a commitment to honor all of this tradition…. That means, in one service I think you can marry successfully nusach to Debbie Friedman to Louis Lewandowski and maybe even on occasion to Ganchoff as well.
To who?
Moshe Ganchoff [1905-1997]. He is my favorite traditional cantor….
I’m also a huge fan of the folk tradition and a great lover of what the camp movement has brought to us musically as well.
Do you do classical? Are you also involved in other musics?
I used to be. I would love to be again at some point when I have come to understand how to marry the lifestyle between classical music and what I love about being a cantor.
My favorite composers really are [Franz] Schubert and his German art song; and I’m a major, major [Giacomo] Puccini opera nut. When I was in college I studied in Lucca, Italy, which is Puccini’s hometown. I auditioned for a program through Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, called Opera Theater in Lucca. And I was accepted and studied there for two summers consecutively.
Yet you still want to be a cantor and not an opera star?
Absolutely.
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