Koleinu

Night of Music and Art

This year's "Night of Music and Art" was a celebration of the diverse talents of the students here at SAR. The night kicked off with artwork on two floors of the school from the art classes and clubs with work from all grades in a variety of visual media, such as paintings, drawings, installation and photography. Highlighted this year was the work of those students who were chosen to participate in the Artist in Residence Program. This year's Artist in Residence was downtown artist David Wander, he has shown his work around the world, as well as numerous galleries and museums including the Museum of Modern Art, the Jewish Museum, the Israel Museum and most recently he traveled to Berlin to speak at Humboldt University about his Pesach Haggadah in Memory of the Holocaust.

Wander had the students create their own visual midrashim in response to two narratives in the Torah, the Akedah and the story of Joseph (to coincide with this year's Hebrew play, Joseph and the Technicolor Dream Coat, which Wander also created the set for employing projections of student art work). SAR is fortunate now to also have him on staff as a member of the art department for the fall.

After students, parents and faculty gathered for a standing room only concert of solo and ensemble performances in the school cafeteria. The musical program began with the Saxophone duo of Alex Katz and Aaron Berk, playing oldies but goodies such as "Fly Me to the Moon" and "Eye of the Tiger", under the expert direction of Ms. Elana Obstfeld. The performances continued with a heart felt violin solo by Jason Weiner, a sweet and tender rendition of "Who is She" by Hannah Wieler, who played the piano while she serenaded the guests. One of this year's highlights was now graduate Talia Cotton's virtuosic and powerful piano playing of the technically challenging, Ballade in G minor, Op. 23 by Frederic Chopin. Talia also accompanied graduate Ronya Annenberg's soulful and bold variation of a song from Dreamgirls.

After these solo performances the SAR Boys Choir and SAR Choir continued to rock the house under the musical direction of Rabbi Kenny Birnbaum. The Boys Choir showed off their impressive pipes with the Blue Fringe version " Lo Irah". Then the choir kept the eclectic mood with songs as diverse as Mendelssohn, to Emerson to Avril Levine. After a short intermission of looking at more art, the crowd gathered in the auditorium for the SAR Band's awesome arrangements of classic rock hits by Aerosmith and Queen, under the stellar direction of Ms. Anat Barak. To bring the evening to a close, Mr. James Andrews' Film and 2-D Design club showed short films and animations with everything from dancing feet, to flying birds, morphing abstract patterns and "Super Tzizit" and lovable squirrels, created by students Douglas Katz, Ezra Benus, Talia Cotton, Joey Katz, Shiran Vashdi, Aaron Rubenstein and more. The evening was uplifting and inspiring, We thank the administration for their support of this event. We also thank students from our graduating class, Talia Cotton for creating the evening's program and Becca Mark, Ronya Annenberg and Shiran Vashdi for helping to hang and arrange the artwork. We will miss you!

Chidon Hatanach

This year, seven students participated in the Chidon Tanach, or Bible Contest. Sharing a love of Tanach and commitment to Torah learning, these students gave of their free time to master about 80 perakim from בראשית, שמואל א', יחזקאל, תהלים. The students are: Leora Apfelbaum (11), Tal Fortgang (10), Adin Goldstein (10), Eliav Grossman (11), Gabriel Metzger (10), Daniel Moskowitz (10), and Tamar Rothstein (10). They, along with about 200 students around the country, studied for regional exams between December and March. Tal Fortgang, Eliav Grossman, and Tamar Rothstein qualified to advance to the National Bible Contest in New York in May. Eliav placed eighth in the country in the High School division.

We congratulate all the participants for their commitment to Talmud Torah.

Senior Trip

Once again the seniors decided on a new destination for their senior trip. One week before graduation, the seniors boarded two Monsey Tours buses and headed for Maine. The trip was a phenomenal bonding experience as the class of 2010 enjoyed each other's company as they reminisced about the past four years and discussed plans for the future. Highlights of the trip included the biggest zoo in Maine (we were all curious what the second biggest zoo looks like or whether there is a second zoo at all), some old fashioned roller skating and especially whale watching off the Maine coast. We actually saw a bunch of whales! We spent our first night in the seaside city of Portland and then ventured to Saco, Maine to camp out for the second night. We pitched our own tents, had a great barbecue and hung out till the wee hours of the night by the campfire. After some kayaking the next day, we made our way back to Riverdale, tired but excited as everyone looked forward to the following night's senior dinner and the graduation which was just days away.

Junior Trip

What a way to begin the senior year for the class of 2011. Last week, the class of 2011 embarked upon Junior trip 2010. We boarded buses early Monday morning and made our way north to Lake George. Our first activity was a grueling hike up Prospect Mountain. The steep rocky climb was quite difficult but the views from the summit were worth it. We made our way down the mountain after eating lunch and davening mincha and then hung out in Lake George Villiage. We spent the evening go-karting, rock climbing, laser tagging and tie dying. It was a great bonding time and a well deserved respite from a long, challenging and productive school year. On the second day of the trip we all went white water rafting. It was quite an adventure- there were plenty of rapids and a great time was had by all. The entire group is looking forward to a great senior year which will also be culminated by the senior trip. We will start planning that shortly.