Choir Notes

Elliot Burman  

Another year has passed and the choir continues to adorn the services at the New West End Synagogue. We greatly appreciate your comments about the compositions we sing, and the many compliments we receive, especially from visitors, are very encouraging.

This hides the fact that we are working through a time of difficulty. We really need one, or even two choristers to make the sound we would like. While we can produce a good service when everyone is there, enforced absences through holidays, illness and family functions leave the choir very thin on some lines, even with Rabbi Shisler’s invaluable assistance.

In April we sang at a very prestigious Masonic Service, and look forward to the Yomim Noraim and an important fundraising concert on 13^th October. So please join in, and if we are not singing the melodies which YOU like, please tell us!

May I, on behalf of the NWES choristers wish everyone at our shul a happy and healthy 5763

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The Central London Selichot Service.

The Central London Selichot Service, held this year at the New West End, was a great success – all credit to the splendid singing of Cantor Jeremy Lawson, Cantor Israel Singer of Western Marble Arch, Rabbi Geoffrey Shisler and the New West End Choir, plus our very own boy cantor Sammy Talalay and Cantor Singer’s son Yair.

Elliot Burman and his team tackled the Selichot Service with enthusiasm and vocal dexterity, filling the Shul with powerful and moving renditions of the traditional melodies.

It was an occasion to remember, and we should recognise the immense amount of time and hard work everyone put in to make Selichot a unique evening of choral performance leading us up to the New Year.