Yom Kippur 5770: Writing Your Own Symphony

Ask anyone the following question and you will likely get a different answer each time. “What is your favorite symphony?” Some would respond with certainty Beethoven’s 9th. Others would no doubt go with Mozart’s 38th Symphony in D Major, his “Prague” symphony. Or perhaps your personal taste lies more with the compositions of Brahms, Shubert, or Vivaldi. But even if you prefer the searing electric licks of Jimmy Page’s guitar to the graceful bow-strokes of Yo-Yo-Ma, nonetheless, you still probably have your own favorite piece of classical music. Such is the power of the symphony; a good symphony is eternal; its melodies echo throughout the generations.

Well for me the choice is clear; in fact I have known my favorite symphony since I was just a small child. It is a modern symphony written by a practically unknown composer. It blends modern elements of jazz with the influences of the classics and the result is an avant-garde composition with a brave and unique style. It is called “An American Symphony” and it was written by Martin Kramer, and all my life it has been my absolute favorite; despite the fact that I only heard it for the first time last March.

But how could this be? How could I have known that this American Symphony was my favorite even if I had never heard a single note of the piece itself? How could I have known that the music from this symphony would stir me to my soul even if it had never even been played aloud before? The answer is simple; it is because Martin Kramer was my great-grandfather and it is because “An American Symphony” was his life’s work.

I was fortunate enough to have known my great-grandfather well into my early adolescence which meant that not only had I heard stories of his musical escapades, I experienced them first hand. My father and my grandparents told stories of his days as a band leader in the hay-day of Atlantic City, playing alongside the greats of the era. But I also knew of his musical talents from personal experience. Each time I visited his apartment he would take out a different instrument from his collection and dazzle me with a display of prowess previously unknown to me. To this day my memory is clouded with visions of an obsidian piccolo, a tarnished trumpet and the time I sat at his piano bench as he taught me the circle of fifths.
But one memory that remains crystal clear to me is the time when he first told me the story of his American Symphony.

“Joel,” he said in his raspy voice, “Did I ever tell you about my symphony?”

“No pop-pop, you wrote a symphony?” I asked with wonder.

“Yes, but it was never played,” he replied with a tinge of sorrow. “I sent it around to some places without much response, until this one time I received a call from the concert master of the Philadelphia Philharmonic that he wanted to play part of my symphony, one single movement.”

“Really pop-pop?” I said, “that’s amazing, and did they play it?”

“No.” he replied with a smile. “I told him he could either play the whole thing …. or he would play nothing at all!”

“Wow,” I said, amazed at his commitment to his principles, to the integrity of his art, “good for you pop-pop,” I said, feeling proud to be his great-grandson.

“Joel,” he responded, “It was the dumbest thing I ever did!”

My great-grandfather died a few years after he told me that story, never once having heard the result of the many midnights spent pencil in hand, at the piano. His life’s work, “An American Symphony,” never to be heard from again.

That is until this past March. My grandmother, Gerry Seltzer daughter of the unknown, unrenowned composer Martin Kramer was turning eighty years old and the entire family gathered together for a special surprise party in her honor. A string quartet played her favorite pieces softly in the corner and an unexpected performance of a family choir serenaded her with some of her favorite Jewish melodies. But one surprise remained. Generous family contributions had paid for my great-grandfather’s symphony to be entered note by note into a computer program, which could then, for the first time since its composition, play back the symphony for all to hear.

There was only one problem. Although the computer technician had plugged in all the notes and measures into the program, it still lacked a personal touch, a sense of style that the composer had originally intended. It needed someone who could pore over the handwritten symphony looking for all the moments of crescendo and decrescendo, someone to fix the tiny mistakes in the meter, someone to decipher the inkblots which obscured the author’s intent. So the two best musicians among my cousins, Jeremy and Jacob pulled an all-nighter before my grandmother’s party, endlessly balancing, editing and perfecting the digital copy of my great-grandfather’s symphony.

Finally, the moment came and the entire family anxiously anticipated the opening measures of our pop-pop’s unplayed masterpiece. Tears welled up in the eyes of my grandmother and her sisters as they remembered the sound of his pencil scratching on the page and as they awaited the moment when they would first hear those notes come to life. The symphony began with a start, hurried drums and frantic digital violins pierced the air, and everyone who was present strained to hear the long lost voice of a family member long gone.

Since it’s Yom Kippur, and so therefore I feel the need to be completely honest with you, I must say, it didn’t really sound so good. It was difficult to say whether the dissonance I heard was a result of the digitized and therefore hollow sounding instruments, the lack of a good sound system, or whether it was just the result my great-grandfathers composition in the first place. But despite our first visceral reactions, we all smiled at the end and said, “That Pop-Pop, he was truly ahead of his time!”

But the reason I am telling you this story today, before our Yizkor service has nothing to do with the quality of the symphony. It does not concern me whether it is the most moving piece of music that has ever existed, or simply another example of a composition that was destined to remain forever unheard. What me the most was the metaphor.

Here were my younger cousins, the great-grandchildren of this man they had hardly known, reading and interpreting his symphony. Martin Kramer had left us a legacy, an inheritance; and here we were, now three and four generations removed from this man and we were still able to read his music. Despite the years, we still retained the keys necessary to unlock his message. We still had the tools which were needed to interpret his symphony. This, I learned, is the meaning of legacy; this is the definition of eternal.

Which brings me to an important question we all should be asking ourselves on this Yom Kippur: Will the symphony of our lives, our life’s work, written in the ink of our ethics and our values, be legible to our great-grandchildren? Will they be able to speak our language, relate to our wishes and understand our definition of a life that is meaningful, admirable and spiritual? Or have we been writing a symphony that is destined to remain unplayed by future generations.

Allow me to tell you two stories which might help us understand the important question of creating a lasting legacy. The first is a popular Hasidic tale and the second is a story told to me by a congregant. The first story I want to look at is a well known one which centers on the founder of Hasidism, the Baal Shem Tov:

When the Baal Shem Tov had a difficult task before him, he would go to a certain place in the woods, light a fire and meditate in prayer – and the task he had set out to perform was done. When a generation later the “Maggid” of Mezritch was faced with the same task he would go to the same place in the woods and say: I can no longer light the fire, but I can still speak the prayers – and what he wanted done became reality. Again a generation later Rabbi Moshe Leib of Sassov had to perform this task. And he too went into the woods and said: I can no longer light the fire, nor do I know the secret meditations belonging to the prayer, but I do know the place in the woods to which it all belongs – and that must be sufficient; and sufficient it was. But when another generation had passed and Rabbi Israel of Rishin was called upon to perform the task, he sat down on his golden chair in his castle and said: We cannot light the fire, we cannot speak the prayers, we do not know the place, but we can tell the story of how it was done. And, that must be sufficient, and it was.

Something has always bothered me about this story. I mean, I get the message, things are bound to be lost from generation to generation, but telling our sacred stories has a value in and of itself. But nonetheless it bothers me. I always wonder, why did the Baal Shem Tov not teach his student the Maggid of Mezrich how to light the fire? Likewise, why did the Maggid not teach his student, Rabbi Moshe Leib the correct way to vocalize this important prayer? Finally, why did Rabbi Moshe Leib fail to point out this sacred place in the woods to his students so that it would be kept safe for generations to come? Isn’t it the job of any teacher to ensure that our legacies survive throughout the generations? Surely telling the story alone cannot always be sufficient?

Far from being a metaphoric Hasidic tale, the second story which I hope will help us understand our task as legacy makers came to me from an extremely wise congregant in our wonderful community. We were talking several months ago about the importance of creating positive Jewish identity amongst our children and he relayed this very personal story to me.

“Rabbi,” he said, “fifty years ago my wife and I moved to Providence to raise a family. We wanted everything for our children, every wonderful opportunity that would help them become successful adults, this was our number one priority.”
“You see Rabbi,” he said, “At that time; some of the finest private schools on the East Side had very strict systems of quotas determining how many Jewish students were allowed per class. But I was determined that this institutionalized anti-Semitism would not prevent my children from receiving a fine education. So I lobbied from within this private school and got all of my children admitted. In later years, I worked tirelessly as a member of the school’s board to remove the quota system entirely, and I succeeded!”

“Rabbi,” he said intently, “my number one goal in raising my children was that they would be happy, intelligent, successful and fully assimilated Jews.” “And Rabbi,” he said with a look of deep understanding, “I was so successful in achieving this goal, my goal of assimilation, that only two of my ten grandchildren are Jewish.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” he said, “I love each and every one of them, but Rabbi, if I had to do it all over again, I would have a very different set of priorities. I succeeded in my goals, yes; but in retrospect, I guess I would say I didn’t have the right goals.”

Now I am not trying to criticize this man for the way he chose to raise his children, in fact I want to praise him. I think that his story was one of the most profound examples of wisdom I have ever heard. Here is a person, who is clearly blessed with the insight that many years spent in self-reflection can grant us. What this wise man was saying, was that the legacy we leave behind to our children is so precious, so lasting, we must make certain that we are laying down the correct foundation for our children and our grandchildren to build their lives upon.

I found an unattributed quote once which said “Each human life is like a new symphony heard for the first time. It can't be understood or fully appreciated until after the final cadence.” Indeed our lives are like fine symphonies. Although our lives meander through different movements of varying length and style, nonetheless, they should be bound together through a central theme or motif. Our personal priorities in life are reflected in these themes which accompany us as we compose our own personal symphonies.

This brings me back to the important question we started with today. As I watched my cousins sit and read this long unplayed, long unheard symphony, interpreting note by precious note, deciphering my great-grandfather’s pen strokes, this thought occurred to me: will my great-grandchildren be able to read my symphony? Will they be able to connect with the legacy I leave behind for them? Will it stir their souls, will it even matter to them?

My friends, I don’t know about you, but I do not want my children to forget how to light the fire. I do not want to see my grandchildren struggling to remember the prayer, nor see my grandchildren lost in the woods. I want to give them clear instruction on what matters in life: their character, their relationships and their faith.

And so I have an assignment for each of you today. Today, while you are in shul, on this holiest of days when we are confronted with our own mortality, I ask you to spend some time reflecting on the content of your personal symphony. Are you happy with the legacy you have so far created, are there things that you feel have been left undone or unsaid? Then, I ask you to go home after yuntiff and write your symphony. Take out a pen and create an ethical will, a legacy of personal priorities that you will leave behind for your children and your children’s children. Spend the rest of your life teaching them, how to start the fire, how to say the prayers, how to find the place in the woods. If your Judaism matters to you, then send your children and your grandchildren to Jewish schools, to Camp Ramah, and teach them to love their faith as others have taught you. Leave for them the many legacies of life that were left to us by those we now memorialize through our Yizkor prayers. As Simon Dubnow, the great historian who perished in the fires of the holocaust uttered with his last words: yidn, shreibt un fershreibt, Jews, record this, write this down!

For if we do not, our own personal symphonies might never be played; and the fire, the prayer and the place will lost forever.