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Gerald Cohen
Gerald Cohen Music
Lo Alecha Ham’lacha Ligmor (You are not required to finish the work)
A powerful piece speaking to our work on ourselves, and for our community.
SATB Chorus and Piano
This stirring composition sets a short and famous ancient Jewish text, translated as “You are not required to finish the work, nor are you free to abandon it,” with the text sung in both English and Hebrew in the piece. Written in honor of the health care workers, educators, clergy, and others who gave their all during the years of the Covid-19 pandemic, this piece speaks of the need to do the important work needed on oneself, in one’s community, and for the world—even as we know that we can never fully accomplish the task at hand. The music and choral writing powerfully expresses the text—with urgency in speaking of the need to act, and lyricism expressing compassion for our limitations as human beings.
Purchase includes a recording pronunciation guide.
Composer’s Notes
Lo Alecha Ham’lacha Ligmor (You are not required to finish the work) was commissioned by Rabbi Beth Naditch for HaZamir, The International Jewish Teen Choir, through the Mandell Rosen Fund for New Music.
As Rabbi Naditch, a pastoral educator, says, “I regularly use [this quote] when teaching front-line health care workers and chaplains, as it so powerfully speaks to the double-edged sword of excellence, commitment, caring, loyalty without burning out or taking on the weight of the world all on one’s own.”
In setting this text, I chose to set both the original Hebrew and an English translation, with the Hebrew and English each having its own distinctive musical motifs and characters. These sections are joined by the word “ham’lacha”, meaning “the work”—as “the work” and our relation to it is the key idea of the whole piece. That word “ham’lacha”, also ends the piece with a sense of urgency. HaZamir gave the premiere performance of the piece at Rose Theater of Jazz at Lincoln Center, in New York City, March 2023.
-Gerald Cohen
Text
You are not required to finish the work, nor are you free to abandon it.
Lo alecha ham’lacha ligmor, v’lo ata ven chorin libatel mimena.
-Rabbi Tarfon, from Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Sages), Chapter 2
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