Blending folk and liturgy
By Richard Houdek
Special to The Eagle
Excerpts from an article published: Friday, July 23, 2004

She was only 2 years old, but Deborah Lynn Friedman already had discovered that she liked to sing. So she did what seemed perfectly natural to her: While visiting a restaurant with her parents on that particular evening, she launched into her version of "How Much Is That Doggie in the Window?" a tune so pervasive on the airwaves that it could not be missed by anyone, least of all little Debbie.

"Sure, I got attention," recalls Friedman, "but not much recognition."

That recognition, of course, eventually arrived. Fifty years later Friedman is revered by many as "the Queen of Souls."

Now on a very secure plateau in her career, Debbie Friedman enjoys a special niche in America's world of music, something that has been called Living Judaism. Some who have come to know Friedman's music say that her songs help them to focus and prepare for the day; others, in lonely hospital rooms say they find respite and hope in a tune like her "Mi Shebeirach."

Her plaintive timbre, which recalls the vocal tradition of her heroines -- Mary Travers of Peter, Paul & Mary, Judy Collins, Joan Baez and Joni Mitchell -- gathers adoring crowds in large concert spots such as Carnegie Hall and the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Southern California, as well as in synagogues and community centers.

Friedman will be singing with, and for, some new people in her first Berkshire concert this Sunday evening at 7:30 in the Duffin Theater at Lenox Memorial High School. The event is sponsored by the Jewish Federation of the Berkshires as a benefit for the Israel Emergency Campaign.

She is no stranger to the area, having visited friends on several earlier occasions. Among these friends is Tamara Cohen, whose parents have a house, she believes, in Great Barrington. The two have collaborated on several songs, among them "The Blessing After the Meal," part of the feminist seder.

"It's one of the most interesting things we've done," Friedman said. "Writing with Tamara is a pleasure. She is a beautifully gifted writer, a poet. When we collaborate it's a fabulous experience."

Friedman has established her own style and she has 19 albums to demonstrate this. Her music is so fully integrated into synagogue liturgy, according to her published biography, that in many congregations it is regarded as "traditional."

Churches, schools and camps have discovered useful additions for their teaching and worship in Friedman's extensive variety of music. Her melodies and lyrics are licensed for recordings, videos, songbooks, prayer books, haggadahs, textbooks, teaching manuals, children's books, healing publications, new ritual and self-help volumes. Tree of Life, a division of Hallmark, offers a dozen holiday cards using her lyrics.

Asked about all this franchising, as well as her albums, the Web site and the fan club that has emerged to surround her, Friedman demurred during a telephone conversation one afternoon last week.

"Oh, I really don't know anything about those things," she replied genially. "Really, you have to ask other people about that. My interest is that I go out and am with the people. I sing with the people -- that's my big interest in life."

Friends occupy her life when she is not on stage, preparing for an appearance or composing.

"I have a very full life," she said. "I have many friends, I work with the Jewish community, and I have my own work in terms of writing." This can mean as many as 15 new songs each year. Her musical ideas, she said, come from friends. "They are about friends or people I care about."

Aside from the big Rosemary Clooney hit about the canine for sale, Friedman's first singing occurred with choirs in high school in Saint Paul, Minn.

"It's a fabulous place to grow up," she said. "It was cold, so I think it was conducive to staying inside and working on whatever your gift might be."

Friedman took up the guitar at 17 and matters of career began to move along at that point.

Just for the record, Friedman's newly engaged publicist reports that CD sales have reached 302,820 and about 150 fans have signed up for the fan club, but more are anticipated. The obvious problem, of course, is air play.

Friedman's recordings receive occasional attention on specialty programs, usually on public radio. But the immense network of Christian radio probably is not going to offer performing time for her work, for she concedes her audience is primarily Jewish. Still, she said she believes that Christian radio fulfills a need in this country.

"It's a great thing that people can listen to religious music on radio. It's important for people to be in touch with their spiritual inclinations, whatever they might be," Friedman said. "I don't think we concentrate on that very much in this country, or encourage that very much."

Friedman said that at the end of her performances "I like to leave people knowing that they are strong, and powerful; that they have the power to effect change, even though the media would imply otherwise, and though there are forces at work that try to scare the hell out of us and make us think that the world is in a total state of chaos.

"When they [audiences] walk out of there, I want them to think that they are solid and that there is a whole part of the world and life that is solid, and that we, each one of us, can make a difference and turn the world around."

Friedman believes that people "really have to listen to what people are saying, to what's coming at us -- how they are saying it -- and then we have to be able to discern what is happening.

"We have to take the risk to speak out and to speak and act from our consciences, knowing that our actions will make a difference."

"I think people in their hearts know what is right, and people ultimately act according to their consciences."

"We need to know that there are enough of us standing together, that we're not going to fall apart."