Concert of Female Cantors

The Jewish Culture Festival in Krakow has a long tradition of producing annual cantors’ concerts, and for the first time in its 30-year history it is female Cantors who will bring their voices, prayers and songs to the stage at the progressive synagogue – Tempel Synagogue. Cantors Sveta Kundish, Aviv Weinberg, and Rachel Weston, together with music director Patrick Farrell and accompanied by a unique ensemble, will present for the guests of the festival a beautiful and exceptional mosaic of musical styles and languages. From traditional khazones, Yiddish songs and Hasidic nigunim to modern Synagogue music and Hebrew melodies, this special concert will celebrate female voices, the principles of equality, and the continuing development of Jewish liturgical tradition. We have the pleasure to invite you to the first concert of three female Cantors, endowed with strength and beauty of voices that open the gates of heaven which is also the first one in the history of the festival and the first one in Poland.

Cantors: Sveta Kundish (Berlin) Aviv Weinberg (Berlin) Rachel Weston (London)  Patrick Farrell, accordion/piano (Berlin) Christian Dawid (Berlin), clarinet/saxophone Sebastian Flaig (Berlin), percussion

Krakow: Irena Czubek-Davidson – harp Bartosz Sałdan – marimba/vibraphone  Justyna Chmielek – trombone Małgorzata Tracz – French horn Martyna Bachowska – double bass

Born in Israel, Cantor Aviv Weinberg now lives in Berlin and is active across Europe as a cantor. She is the cantor of the Celle Community and continues officiating at the Reformed community of Beth Haskalah in Berlin, as well as at the Community in Esch-sur-Alzette (Luxemburg). Cantor Weinberg has had the privilege of studying with renowned cantors from Israel and the USA, such as Eliyahu Schleifer, Josée Wolf, Danny Maseng, and Israel Goldstein. Cantor Weinberg is a graduate of the Cantorial Arts Seminar at Abraham Geiger College and the Master’s programme at the School of Jewish Theology at Potsdam University. Prior to her Cantorial studies, she received her Bachelor’s degree (B.MUS) at the Rubin Academy for Music and Dance in Jerusalem and studied at the Rimon School for Jazz and Contemporary Music.

Sveta Kundish was born in the Ukraine in 1982, and began studying music at the age of seven. After settling with her family in Israel in 1995, she continued her voice studies with Ella Akritova and the legendary Soviet-era Yiddish singer Nechama Lifshitz.  In 2007, Kundish received a B.A. in Musicology from Tel Aviv University, and in 2011 she graduated from Prayner Konservatorium in Vienna as an opera singer.  In 2012 Kundish began studies at the Cantorial Department of the Abraham Geiger Kolleg in Berlin, graduating in 2017.  Since March 2017 she has been employed as a Cantor in the Jewish Community of Brauschweig, making her the first female Cantor in the history of the Jewish Communities of Lower Saxony. As a soloist, Sveta Kundish performs a wide variety of Jewish music, and is a frequent Artist-in-Residence and teacher at many festivals around Europe.

Rachel Weston is a London/New York based song-collector and performer of Yiddish song. She has a master’s degree in performance and ethnomusicology, and is currently training for cantorial ordination at New York’s Hebrew Union College School of Sacred Music, where she is the recipient of the Koret Foundation Scholarship and the Atara Scholarship for Merit. In the UK she has coordinated and taught Yiddish song, niggunim and choral workshop programmes for the Jewish Music Institute, SOAS, Kleznorth,  Klezfest London, WOMAD festival, and several U.K. Yiddish choirs. She has performed internationally, in Montreal, Toronto, New York, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Weimar, Efurt and Berlin, and hosts the all-night cabarets for KlezKanada and Yiddish New York. Rachel is also a performance coach and community workshop facilitator, specialising in music workshops for people with dementia and their families and caregivers. Like many musicians, she is currently performing and teaching online, and serves as student cantor at Garden City Jewish Center in Long Island, Manchester Reform Synagogue in the North of England, Edgware & Hendon Reform Synagogue in London, and The Kohenet Hebrew Priestess Institute U.K.    Patrick Farrell is a United States-born, Berlin-based accordionist, composer and bandleader. He is an active part of the international klezmer community as a performer and teacher, and has appeared onstage with many of the world’s best-known klezmer bands and performers, as well as on dozens of recordings, including with Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, Never Enough Hope, and Adrienne Cooper.

Polish musicians:

Irena Czubek-Davidson – harp
Bartosz Sałdan – marimba / vibraphone
Piotr Nowak – trumpet
Justyna Chmielek – trombone
Małgorzata Tracz – French horn
Martyna Bachowska – double bass

Commissioned by the Jewish Culture Festival.

Concert is dedicated to the memory of Jan Kulczyk and organized in partnership with Kulczyk Foundation. 

JCF would like to thank the Jewish Religious Community and  JCC Krakow for their cooperation. 

Concert of Female Cantors

Rachel Weston

Aviv Weinberg

Sveta Kundish