Nusach San Diego with Jeremy Gimbel

June 18 @ 7:30 pm | Congregation Beth Israel

Can San Diego have its own unique Jewish music? Nusach San Diego is a musical evening rooted in Rabbi/Cantor Jeremy Gimbel’s original research on the unique sound of prayer in San Diego. This evening traces the historical progression of Jewish sacred music from ancient melodies to modern chazzanut, and it will span the breadth of our local musical landscape—from Kumeyaay Bird Songs, to rhythmic Baja Californian beats, to laid back surfer grooves. This program will explore the music and sounds that are part of this community, culminating in hearing original compositions inspired by the themes of the evening.

Nusach San Diego offers old tunes and new prayers that are all rooted in home.

A Note From Becca Myers, Adapter of Nusach San Diego

“When I first read Rabbi Jeremy Gimbel's thesis on Nusach San Diego, I didn't expect it to send me down a wild rabbit hole of surf rock, Hawaiian falsetto, and corridos from across the border. But the further I went into my own research, the clearer it became: the music we already know and love is built on the same bones as Jewish prayer music. The same impulse to take the sounds of a place and make something that moves people.

My research has kept going down new paths because I kept finding connections to my own Judaism in unexpected places--and especially in the secular music that I grew up with.

Nusach San Diego is a concert built around those discoveries. The show traces Jewish prayer music from its ancient roots through centuries of diaspora and reinvention, before finally landing here.”