Magevet

Magevet
Magevet in November 2006 after a performance for Shimon Peres, former President of Israel.
Background information
Origin	Yale University
Genres	A cappella
Years active	1993–present
Website	http://www.magevet.com
Members	Zoe Aridor Joe Blumberg Daniella Cohen Sam Gross Julia Kahn Madeline Lemberg Nora May Lindiwe Mayinja Jacob Middlekauff Reed Morgan Jacob Prince Alex Lindsay Roth Jae Shin Leah Salovey Michelle Yancich

Magevet is a collegiate Jewish a cappella singing group at Yale University. The group's repertoire includes liturgical, traditional, and modern arrangements of Jewish, Hebrew, and Israeli songs. Each year, Magevet conducts two major domestic or international tours and numerous weekend-length tours throughout New England and the mid-Atlantic states. The group has also performed special concerts for Israeli statesman Shimon Peres and Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks. It has been called "one of the finest collegiate a cappella groups in the nation."

Name

The group's name is the Hebrew word for "towel." The group was allegedly founded in a sauna in the basement of Calhoun College, one of the undergraduate residential colleges at Yale, in the spring of 1993 by four Orthodox Jewish men who enjoyed the acoustics of the sauna and decided to form a singing group. "Magevet" was chosen as the group's name to remind its members of their early experiences together.

Membership

Members join the group through the a cappella rush process at Yale University. This process begins when freshmen arrive on campus in late August and culminates in mid- to late-September with tap night. The entire process vaguely resembles the rush process for fraternities or sororities. Members audition and are selected for membership based on their singing ability and the musical needs of the group. Students typically join during their freshman year and sing in the group for their four years as undergraduates at Yale.

Tours

Each year, the group embarks on two major tours. Past tour destinations have included Los Angeles,^[1] Berlin,^[2] Prague, Florida, Chicago, Las Vegas, London, Glasgow, New Orleans, Phoenix, Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, San Francisco, Madrid, Valencia, Toronto, Ann Arbor, Nashville, Memphis, St. Louis, Cape Town and Johannesburg. In May 2012, the group took its first tour of Israel. Throughout the Yale academic year, the group also embarks on weekend tours of the Northeast, including New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, and communities throughout Connecticut and New Jersey.

On May 25, 2014, Magevet joined in solidarity with the Belgian Jewish community in the wake of the tragic shootings at the Brussels Jewish Museum.^[3]

In January 2017, Magevet will tour Los Angeles and San Diego, and in March 2017, the group will tour to Atlanta and Savannah.

Repertoire

The group's repertoire is selected by the group's musical director (affectionately known as the "pitch"). Each new musical director chooses songs to add or remove from the previous year's repertoire. The 2016-17 musical director is Madeline Lemberg '18. Many pieces in the group's repertoire were arranged by members of the group. The repertoire includes music from Jewish communities around the world, from the Israeli national anthem, "Hatikvah," to a version of "L'cha Dodi" based on a Jewish melody from Calcutta.^[4] The group sings in six languages, including Hebrew, Yiddish, Ladino, Hindi, Luganda and English.

Discography

Magevet has released eight albums to date:

• Mem's the Word (1995)
• Ekh Hu Shar (1997)
• Amen, Selah (2002)
• K'mei Nahar: A Shabbat with Magevet (2003)
• Mik'tze Olam (2004)
• Divrei Shir (2008)
• Aranen (2011)
• Naveh Katan (2016)

External links

• Magevet
• Yale University

References