My Yism'chu Debut

Many Saturdays during the Shabbat morning service we sing Yism’chu, the translation of which is "Those who keep the Sabbath and call it a delight shall rejoice in your kingdom." Each time we sing this song, our music directory Teddy asks for volunteers to sing the three solo parts and for my 5 years in the choir, I have been saying, “No, thank you. I’m not ready.” When I finally sang by myself this summer for my bat mitzvah, I determined that I could now start volunteering.

Today I initially said no, but then I changed my mind and decided to volunteer for the first verse. I had about 20 seconds of practice time during our pre-service rehearsal and it seemed OK.

During the service as the song began I found myself thinking, “Pretty soon it’s going to be just my voice. Can I really do this?” Then I found myself singing the familiar words to the familiar tune and before I knew it, the first verse was over. I smiled at Richard in the congregation, who obviously recognized that this was my first solo attempt. I was followed by Jennifer, who has a world-class soprano voice, for verse 2 and by Laura, who sees herself as an opera diva, for verse 3.

I’m glad I finally did this. It won’t ever be so hard to volunteer again.