The Impact Series, programs for the enrichment of the Jewish community, got off to a rousing start on Sunday evening with "A Galaxy of Music," which featured an Israeli dinner and a sold-out house along with composer and recording artist Sol Zim.
Banquet tables ringing the sanctuary of the synagogue and on the stage were filled with falafel, tabouli, tahini, hummus and baklava. Sarina Kalay and a crew of Israelis fed a crowd of 300, including 6-year-old Daniel Fil-stein and a large contingent of Russian emigres.Zim, descended from five generations of cantors, graduated from the Jewish Theological Seminary where he studied with Salt Lake City's cantor, Laurence Loeb, before embarking on a singing and recording career.
Accompanying Zim was his pianist and conductor, Tova Morcos, who also directed Salt Lake jazz musicians Evan Combs, Mark Chaney and Reed Lecheninant.
Zim's arrangements included "Sim Shalom" - songs of peace - and a Yugoslavian folk song, "Zingarela." He also performed a touching song he wrote called "Papa" about growing up in a Jewish home. It took little coaxing to get his audience clapping to his lively medley of "Am Yisra'el Chai."
Zim's combining of a Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway tune ("You'll Never Walk Alone") with an aria from "La Boheme" ("Che Gelida Manina") showcased his cantorial training and his incredible voice control. As he moved from a powerful tenor that filled the arching spaces of the synagogue to almost a whisper, Zim's opera training was also evident. He was encouraged by Richard Tucker to study opera and has performed 20 operatic roles. Zim delighted the Yiddish-speaking members of the audience with an arrangement of Yiddish theater tunes.
Then Zim introduced Cantor Laurence Loeb and the Kol Ami Adult Choir, conducted by David Asman. They performed one of Zim's most beautiful songs, a prayer for the state of Israel, "Ovino Shebashamayim" - Our Father in Heaven. Loeb's tender treatment of the song's haunting melody brought the audience to its feet in acclaim.
The children's choir, also directed by Asman, sang with Zim several of his tunes including "L'Dor Vador" and "Kad'shenu."
"Shalom Aleichem," one of Zim's songs, won first place in a Hassidic festival in Israel and was sung lustily by the children's chorus. Aaron Peterson and Rachel Safran were soloists who showed no stage fright when Zim approached with the microphone while they sang.
A Jerusalem medley was a slight disappointment in that the beloved "Jerusalem of Gold" was not prominantly featured.
But Zim closed the show on a high note with his "Broadway Showstoppers" medley. Blending old favorites like "Lullabye of Broadway" and "Anything Goes," with "Phantom of the Opera" and "Cats," Zim had feet tapping and a gigantic sing-along as well.
With cantorial, Hassidic, Sephardic and Yiddish melodies, Zim's concert was an ethnic treat spiced with a dash of Broadway.