A series of special programs with vocalist, scholar, composer, and cantor Dr. Galeet Dardashti 

Mizrahi Kabbalat Shabbat Service: March 12 | 6pm Schmooze and 6:30pm Service
Galeet Dardashti leads a dynamic and participatory Sephardi/Mizrahi Kabbalat Shabbat service, including a unique sermon. This service involves prayers with beautiful melodies from a range of Middle Eastern/North African Jewish communities. A short talk of Dr. Dardashti's own journey as a scholar conducting research on Mizrahim in Israel, women performing Sacred Mizrahi Jewish music, and how this work relates to her own family background. Join the meet and greet and schmooze with Dr. Dardashti and fellow congregants at 6pm, followed by 6:30pm service.

Israeli music goes Mizrahi: March 17 | 7pm
The changes in Israeli music over the country’s short history illuminate significant historical developments. While during Israel’s first few decades its music represented the European tastes of its founders who defined “Israeliness,” by the 1970s this cultural legacy began to be challenged. Utilizing recordings and music videos, Dr. Dardashti will help us explore the ways in which Israeli music has gradually shifted significantly to allow a space for Mizrahim to feel that the nation’s music represents them as well.

Get your Sephardi/Mizrahi Pesach groove on: March 31 | 7pm
As we strive to know more about Judaism as a world culture, and learn more about Jewish cultures outside our “Ashkenormative” communities, we will learn from renowned vocalist and scholar, Dr. Galeet Dardashti, for a Pesach session to delve into some new and familiar melodies and texts from the Sephardi/Mizrahi world to enhance your Pesach experience! 

These events are supported in part by a grant from the Harold Grinspoon Foundation.

Dr. Galeet Dardashti Biography:
Vocalist, scholar, composer, and cantor Dr. Galeet Dardashti, is the first woman to continue her family’s tradition of distinguished Persian and Jewish musicianship. She has earned a reputation as a trail-blazing performer and advocate of Middle Eastern Jewish music as founder/leader of the internationally renowned all-female musical group Divahn, which released its new album, Shalhevet, in 2020. Dardashti received a Six Points Fellowship to pursue her multi-disciplinary project and nationally acclaimed release, The Naming, which interprets some of the compelling women of the Bible. Time Out New York called The Naming “urgent, heartfelt and hypnotic,” and The Huffington Post described it as “heart-stopping.” In her latest commissioned multi-sensory piece, Monajat, Dardashti—accompanied by an acclaimed ensemble of Middle Eastern and jazz musicians—reinvents the reflective musical ritual of Selihot using digital technology to sing with recordings of her famed Iranian grandfather; she will be working on recording Monajat as the Artist-in-Virtual-Residence at Indiana University’s Jewish Studies program in spring 2021.

Since studying with her father, Hazzan Farid Dardashti, she has accumulated over twenty years of professional cantorial experience with Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, and experimental communities; currently she is Cantor & Musician in Residence at Jewish Community Project Downtown in Manhattan.

As a scholar, she holds a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology and her writings  examine Mizrahi cultural politics and Israeli music/media. Her current book project explores the Mizrahi piyyut (sacred song) phenomenon in contemporary Israel. Dardashti has held postdoctoral fellowships at NYU and Rutgers and most recently was Assistant Professor at JTS in Manhattan. She is an Affiliated Fellow at University of Pennsylvania’s Katz Center in 2020/21 exploring the nascent North American Mizrahi movement.

Only one registration required for all events.

Register below for link. Make sure to select the number of people attending in the drop down list or you will get an error message. If you have any difficulties, please call 802.477.2550 or email jcogs@jcogs.org. 

Services can also be watched via Youtube Live the night of Shabbat.