Album: Vehakohanim
Composer: Shlomo Katz
YEAR: 2004
One Erev Shabbos in April 2004 Shlomo Katz found himself near his grandparents’ kevarim in Passaic New Jersey. Standing as close to the gravesites as halachah permits (he’s a Kohein) he thought longingly of wishing them Good Shabbos. And then and there the melody of his Shabbos Kodesh song came into his mind fully formed with Yiddish words: “Oy yoy Mamme zisse / Oy yoy Tatte zisse / Oy yoy alle Yidden / Oy Good Shabbos Good Shabbos.”
Back home in Efrat Israel he changed the words to the current version a heartwarming song that is guaranteed to get any crowd singing and clapping along to “Yismechu b’malchuscha Shomrei Shabbos v’korei oneg ” and then the repetitious “Oy yoy Shabbos Kodesh Oy yoy Shabbos Kodesh.”
The new song debuted in Yeshivas Lev Hatorah in Beit Shemesh. “It was a Thursday night and I was looking to share a new niggun with the bochurim so I taught them “Shabbos Kodesh.” We sung it for a full 45 minutes then on the following Shabbos they used it for Lecha Dodi too.” But Katz immersed in learning for his semichah at Yeshivat HaMivtar didn’t get around to recording the song professionally for another two years.
As befits a devotee of Shlomo Carlebach’s musical style the key to Katz’s most popular song is its simplicity. “It’s such a simple niggun with such simple words but a Jew needs to say nothing more about Shabbos than “oy yoy Shabbos Kodesh ” he says. “Maybe maybe hopefully it’s some of our generation’s version of “Yiddelach shrei Shabbos — a scream for the holy gift of Shabbos.”
