His compositions— youthful and earnest, sincere but not overly-intense— were perfectly suited to the young voices of a boys’ choir
Each year, so many continue to be inspired by his classic “B’ein Meilitz Yosher,” and baalei tefillah raise their voices in the ardently pleading lines of his “Ezkerah Elokim” in Ne’ilah. Both niggunim were associated with the London School of Jewish Song, on whose first two albums Mr. Craimer partnered with London Pirchei creator, Yigal Calek.
As a child, Mr. Craimer absorbed the nusach of a much-admired neighbor, Reb Hershel Goldstein, who led the tefillos in the Manchester yeshivah. Reb Hershel’s nusach was based on the nusach of Yeshivas Chevron, where he had learned, but it was uniquely musical. Mr. Craimer remembered when Rav Sholom Schwadron, the maggid of Jerusalem, travelled to England and visited Reb Hershel Goldstein, his old chavrusa; they sang together, and Reb Hershel gave Rav Schwadron his niggunim for “Veyesoyu chol le’avdecha” and the famous tune for “Ki hinei kachomer beyad hayotzer,” which spread throughout the yeshivah world (and was adopted by Abie Rotenberg for his sefer Torah song, “The Place Where I Belong.”) Jeffrey owned several private tapes of Reb Hershel’s nusach, which Reb Hershel recorded especially for him.
Living in London after his marriage, Jeffrey — who played piano — got a call from Yigal Calek, asking if he could assist with Sunday rehearsals of his new project, a boys’ choir. “He needed someone to help work out the phrasing of the songs and in general, to provide another musical ear,” Mr. Craimer told Mishpacha in an interview several years ago. The two of them formed a partnership, working together on the first two London Pirchei albums, until the Craimers moved to Eretz Yisrael in 1972.
Although he wrote the lyrics for “Children of Silence,” composed “Hamavdil,” “Bamarom,” “Be’ein Meilitz Yosher,” and “Ezkera Elokim” (recorded on a little-known mini album that never took off) among others, Mr. Craimer liked to remain in the background, saying, “I just played piano at the choir rehearsals for accompaniment and to fix the scale, and I also worked a bit on the harmonies.”
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