The Daily Hampshire Gazette Covers Project Rehovot: (Archived 2015)

Project Rehovot presents a concert for a cause

By STEVE PFARRER Staff Writer

Last modified: Friday, March 20, 2015 For more than 20 years, volunteers from the Jewish Community of Amherst have been lending a helping hand for an educational and social cause nearly halfway around the world. Project Rehovot, as it’s known, is dedicated to helping young immigrants to Israel build a secure footing in their new country; through art projects and special classes, these elementary school students get additional help in acclimating to the land, language and culture.

The “hand” these volunteers have lent is a considerable one. They annually raise between $10,000 and $15,000 — enough to fund the salary of a part-time teacher/art therapist who works with immigrant children at an elementary school in Rehovot, Israel, a city about 12 miles south of Tel Aviv.

It’s always a challenge to come up with these funds, organizers say, so they periodically look for special events to help the cause. This Sunday, they’ll offer a benefit concert at the JCA featuring jazz master Jeff Holmes, his wife, Dawning, and an eclectic mix of other performers.

“The concert is really in keeping with the spirit of [Project Rehovot],” said Marilyn Kushick, a key organizer of the event. “All the performers have donated their time for free. It’s a very generous gesture.”

The benefit concert, which also offers a buffet food table with Mediterranean specialities like falafel, humus, stuffed grape leaves and Israeli salads, as well as pizza and desserts, begins at 3:30 p.m. at the JCA, 742 Main St. Kushick and other organizers say it will conclude in plenty of time for fans of the New England Patriots to get home to watch the Super Bowl that evening.

In addition to Jeff and Dawning Holmes, who will make a rare appearance as a jazz duo (Jeff on piano, Dawning on vocals), the concert includes performances by Mak’hela, the Jewish Chorus of Western Massachusetts; the Old Time Band, a group specializing in Klezmer and Appalachian music that includes JCA’s rabbi, Benjamin Weiner, on banjo; and Sephardic music by a quartet led by singer Elise Barber.

Jeff Holmes, the director of the jazz and African-American music studies program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has long staked out a national name in jazz as a composer and arranger, a pianist and a trumpet player (and a Grammy winner). He’s written music for John Ambercrombie and Max Roach, among others, shared stages with many musicians — last September he gigged at UMass with the Paul Winter consort — and he performs in several groups himself, including The Jeff Holmes Big Band.

His wife, who has sung jazz in New York and London, is a regular singer with The Big Band, though Holmes says the two don’t perform often as a duo. But when Kushick — she’s the director of publicity and fundraising for the UMass Department of Music and Dance — approached the couple about performing together for the Feb. 1 concert, both liked the idea.

“We were interested in being part of something bigger,” said Holmes, who’s not a member of JCA. “This is a really good cause.”

He said he and his wife were contemplating a number of songs they might perform, including some blues and jazz standards like “What a Wonderful World” and “Summertime,” but were still figuring out the repertoire. “It’s great to be part of a such a varied show,” he added.

Adjusting to life in Israel

Project Rehovot dates back to around 1989-90, when many Russian Jews were finally allowed to leave the tottering former Soviet Union and immigrate to Israel. At that time, JCA member and Amherst resident Yaffa Gunner was in Rehovot with her husband, Haim, then a UMass professor of environmental science who was working at a science institute in the city.

Since many of the Russian families came to Israel with limited means, Yaffa Gunner coordinated with friends and volunteers back in Amherst to donate books, computers and other educational materials for Russian children entering Rehovot’s elementary schools, and volunteers also sent money to rent an immigrant center in the city to help get newcomers better oriented.

Over the next few years, the effort blossomed into Project Rehovot, Kushick says, with the Amherst volunteers funding the hiring of a part-time teacher whose job was to work specifically with immigrant children. Many of those children came (and continue to come) from poor families that have had a hard time adjusting to life in Israel, Kushick noted.

Today, the teacher/art therapist, Tal Kahan, works in the Ma’alot Meshulan elementary school in Rehovot, primarily with Ethiopian children, the sons and daughters of Ethiopian Jews who fled their country for Israel “with literally the clothes on their back and nothing else,” Kushick said. “[The children] need lots of help — they tend to feel isolated and can be timid in their regular classes.”

But the core group of about 17 JCA volunteers, who have raised the funds for the teacher’s salary over the years, has stayed in touch with school officials and the teacher via email and an occasional visit to Rehovot — and the reports are that “the kids do better with this extra help,” Kushick added. “It’s really encouraging to us to feel that we can do something that has a positive impact.”

Raising money

JCA volunteers like Kushick have used various means to raise money for Project Rehovot over the years. Kushick, for instance, writes grant proposals, while Karen Loeb, an Amherst chef, caters weddings, bar mitzvahs and other events. There’s also an annual appeal to JCA members, Kushick notes.

The Sunday fête promises to offer varied entertainment in return for donations. Mak’hela, the Jewish Chorus of Western Massachusetts, has been performing songs in several languages, including Hebrew, Yiddish and English, for over 10 years. Rabbi Weiner’s Old Time Band, aside from him on banjo, includes guitar, uke bass, fiddle and mandolin, five-string banjo, and vocals by Elise Barber, Weiner’s wife.

Barber, who is the cantor at Beth El Synagogue in Springfield, will also sing in Ladino — a Judeo-Spanish tongue — when she performs Sephardic music, which originated with Jews who once lived on the Iberian peninsula before the Spanish Inquisition drove them out. Barber will be accompanied by a percussionist, a guitarist and an oud player.

Young children will not be neglected: Henry Lappen of Amherst, aka Henry the Juggler, a longtime regular at Northampton’s First Night celebration, will do his gravity-defying thing at the show,

“We like to think there’s a little something for everyone,” Kushick said.

Steve Pfarrer can be reached at spfarrer@gazettenet.com.



Tickets to Sunday’s JCA concert, which begins at 3:30 p.m., will be available at the door starting at 3 p.m. and cost $10 for adults, $5 for students and children. Plates for the buffet table cost $7; pizza is $1 a slice, desserts are $2. You can also contact the JCA at www.j-c-a.org.