This is what friendship sounds like

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Am Yisrael Congregation's Cantor Stuart Simon (playing guitar) performs alongside Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken band member Yahath Brazelton during rehearsal for the Hallelu-YAH! performance. | Steve Johnston~for Sun-Times Media

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Updated: April 25, 2011 6:06AM

'Hallelu-YAH! Jewish Music Like You've Never Heard Before'

3 p.m., April 24, North Shore Center for the Performing Arts, 9501 Skokie Blvd., Skokie. $12.50-$25. (847) 446-7215, www.amyisrael.org.

The relationship between the Am Yisrael and Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken congregations was forged many years ago, but it's only now that they're making music about it.

Although they're rooted in different cultures -- Am Yisrael's members are predominantly white and come from North Shore suburbs. The synagogue, on Happ Road in Northfield, is across the street from New Trier High School. Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken, an Ethiopian Hebrew Congregation, is predominantly African-American. Its synagogue is on south Kedzie Avenue in Chicago's Marquette Park neighborhood. However they're similar in many respects.

Both congregations are conservative and egalitarian and are similar in the way they conduct services.

But perhaps the biggest difference is the music.

The friendship and music can be heard in "Hallelu-YAH! Jewish Music Like You've Never Heard Before" on April 24 at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie, where Am Yisrael's cantor Stuart Simon will perform with Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken's band and choir. Proceeds will benefit both congregations.

Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken's Rabbi Capers Funnye and Am Yisrael's Rabbi William Frankel, who is now deceased, became friends in the 1990s and the two congregations have participated in student exchanges ever since. The friendship between the two congregations carries on, now with Rabbi Debra Newman Kamin leading Am Yisrael.

Baseball bond

Cantor Stuart Simon, who has been with Am Yisrael for more than 25 years and leading that congregation's choir, also became friends with Funnye and developed an affinity for the Southwest Side congregation when taking his confirmation class students to Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken to see the similarities and experience the cultural differences. While there, Simon took in that congregation's band and choir, which he calls "phenomenal."

"In the congregation I saw such a spirituality, such an incredible belief, that I found that it was certainly something that I'd love to be exposed to," Simon said.

When Simon and Funnye met, they found they had several things in common, including age and a love for the South Side baseball team. They attended a game together last year and found they even enjoy each other's company in the casual setting of a ballpark.

"For him to be a North Sider and a White Sox fan," Funnye said with a chuckle. "He can't be all bad."

Then, just last year, after an Am Yisrael service where the Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken band and choir performed the music, the friends began discussing a joint performance.

"We thought how pleasant it would be if we combined our talents into one concert," Simon said.

The main difference between the two congregations is the music, the way it's performed and the interaction of members.

Simon said he likes to blend traditional Hebrew prayers with contemporary melodies at Am Yisrael.

Singing along

"I do one of our standard songs and do it to the melody of show tunes," he said. "It truly doesn't matter what melody is going to be used. That kind of flexibility made it very easy for us to collaborate with Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken."

Funnye said his congregation doesn't have a cantor, but it does have many more instruments in their band than is usual for most congregations. Guitars, keyboards, bongos, congas and tambourines are just some of the instruments heard at Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken.

"We incorporate a lot more instruments in the course of our services with our music," he said. "We are there to celebrate the Shabbat."

The energy with which the choir sings is like a Gospel choir, although Funnye prefers the term "spiritual" because the former has a Christian connotation. The lively and demonstrative participation by Beth Shalom B'nai Zaken members is infectious, Simon added.

"It's something we had not really seen in Judaism before," he said. "We thought it was beautiful because here are people who are so emotionally tied to religion and it's the same religion that we have. It was a unique way to look at it and something that really attracted us."

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