Sick of Dancing Hasidim Playing Violins? Meet the New Baal Teshuvah Artists of Brooklyn.

 Orthodox Jews new to insular traditions try to integrate the two worlds of strict religion and artistic self-expression

By Sara Trapper Spielman for Tablet Magazine

Just a few miles from the central Chabad-Lubavitch community in Crown Heights, fashionably dressed Orthodox men and women in their 20s and 30s mingled in the candle-lit hall of the Roulette Theater last week, tasting wine from the bar and food from waiters’ stations to benefit Lamplighters, the borough’s Chabad Montessori school. The entertainment spotlighted performers who are baal teshuvahs—a small but influential movement of incoming Chabad artists who are reinventing the arts in the Hasidic community. Noah Lubin, a 33-year-old musician, painter, and art teacher living in a Chabad community in Boston, unveiled 15 original paintings that evening inspired by the children of Lamplighters, which has been revolutionizing educational standards in Crown Heights with its focus on art, Montessori materials, and a dual curriculum that integrates Torah and secular subjects. Headlining the show was musical performer Levi Robin, who just completed a 25-city North American tour this year opening for Jewish reggae star Matisyahu. His solo performance at Roulette, the first one since his tour, included an acoustic guitar and original tunes sung with a raspy voice and ethereal sound that held the audience captive for almost an hour.

During an interview after he left the stage, Robin described his music as “simple songs of a simple man,” reflective of an inner journey he took as a 17-year-old after his band that played in Hollywood clubs dismantled. “I looked deep inside myself, and everything changed dramatically,” Robin said. “There’s a direct correlation between my songwriting and becoming religious.” He admitted his poetic songs are not the typical Jewish sound of stars in the Orthodox world, whose music is often based on traditional European melodies, but he added that he “can’t put my finger on anything not Jewish” about the songs. “Being a Jew is an inner experience of growing in this context. I’m trying to tap into my American roots and express my American Jewish journey.” Robin’s performance followed a mixed-race band (two Hasidic singers and guitarists in the center with an African-American violinist and cellist on either side), led by Hasidic singer Moshe Hecht, whose son attends Lamplighters.

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