''A Cantor's Tale'' is a 2005 documentary by Erik Greenberg Anjou. The film profiles Jacob Mendelson, a practitioner of Jewish liturgical music (a cantor) who has dedicated his life to preserving the form's traditional vocal stylings.

Plot

Anjou follows Mendelson around Borough Park, his old neighborhood in

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

. Mendelson, who carries a

tuning fork A tuning fork is an acoustic resonator in the form of a two-pronged fork with the prongs ( ''tines'') formed from a U-shaped bar of elastic metal (usually steel). It resonates at a specific constant pitch when set vibrating by striking it ag ...

with him at all times, is prone to burst into song. During their journey through Borough Park, Anjou finds that the neighborhood has a fair number of

baker A baker is a tradesperson who baking, bakes and sometimes Sales, sells breads and other products made of flour by using an oven or other concentrated heat source. The place where a baker works is called a bakery. History Ancient histo ...

s with vocal talents as good as their

knish A knish or knysh ( or , ) is a traditional food of Eastern European origin, characteristic of Ukrainian and Ashkenazi Jewish cuisine. It typically consists of a filling covered with dough that is baked or sometimes deep fried. In most tradi ...

es. Mendelson also recalls when cantors were as popular as baseball players. "They had groupies," he tells Anjou, a strong incentive for a chubby teenager in high school. Mendelson's mother, who had been diagnosed with

bipolar disorder Bipolar disorder (BD), previously known as manic depression, is a mental disorder characterized by periods of Depression (mood), depression and periods of abnormally elevated Mood (psychology), mood that each last from days to weeks, and in ...

, was almost obsessed that her son become a cantor. The film reveals an interesting link to celebrity on the part of Mendelson's father: the older Mendelson once co-owned a truck with the father of

Steven Spielberg Steven Allan Spielberg ( ; born December 18, 1946) is an American filmmaker. A major figure of the New Hollywood era and pioneer of the modern blockbuster, Spielberg is widely regarded as one of the greatest film directors of all time and is ...

. The movie's original title was ''Chazz'n'', after the profiled cantor's sobriquet "Chazzan Jack Mendelson." It has also been titled ''A Cantor's Story''.

Subject

Mendelson grew up in the Borough Park neighborhood of Brooklyn. He was given the Hebrew name Yaakov Ben-Zion, after his

grandfather Grandparents, individually known as grandmother and grandfather, or Grandma and Grandpa, are the parents of a person's father or mother – paternal or maternal. Every sexually reproducing living organism who is not a genetic chimera has a m ...

, the rabbi of Newark between the world wars. He has opera and cantorial degrees from

Juilliard The Juilliard School ( ) is a private performing arts conservatory in New York City. Founded by Frank Damrosch as the Institute of Musical Art in 1905, the school later added dance and drama programs and became the Juilliard School, named aft ...

and

Hebrew Union College Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language until ...

(HUC) respectively. He has also taught at both HUC and Jewish Theological Seminary. In 1979, he married Fredda M. Rakusin, a fellow Juilliard graduate, cantor, and opera singer. Mendelson was preceded in his profession by a number of relatives, including a paternal uncle, Nathan, who was cantor at Montreal's Shaar Hashamayim for 35 years, an older brother Solomon "Tucky" Mendelson, and other members of the extended Mendelson family. Sol and Jacob were members of Moshe Koussevitzky's children's choir at Beth-El, and both were later presidents of the

Cantors Assembly Cantors Assembly is the international association of hazzanim (cantors) affiliated with Conservative Judaism. It was founded in 1947 to develop the profession of the hazzan, to foster the fellowship and welfare of hazzanim, and to establish a con ...

References

External links

Jeanette Catsoulis' review in The New York Times
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cantor's Tale, A 2005 films Documentary films about Jews and Judaism in the United States Documentary films about singers Films about Orthodox and Hasidic Jews 2000s English-language films English-language documentary films