What a Wedding!

It is interesting to note that “Baruch Hu Elokeinu” was composed by the Bobover Rebbe, Rav Shlomo Halberstam ztz”l, and “Uva’u  Chulam” was composed in 1923 by his father, the Kedushas Tzion of Bobov ztz”l. What’s even more fascinating is that today’s Rebbe, Rav Ben Tzion Aryeh Leibish Halberstam, was actually the child soloist for “Baruch Hu Elokeinu” on the 1968 record New Bobover Niggunim, a collection of Rebbe Shlomo’s compositions, sung by Cantor Dovid Werdyger.

When it came time to choose a Shavuos song for Avraham Fried’s Around the Year 2 album, we picked “Akdamus.” At that time, we didn’t realize that it’s actually the same tune as “Kiddush” on the MBD Around the Year album, which preceded it. If you jog your memory, you’ll also realize that it’s the same tune the gabbai uses to call up chassan Torah on Simchas Torah. We loved the tune so much that Suki used all the versions on an assortment of different albums.

I decided to do a little research into the Shavuos dancing minhagim of other yeshivos. Reb Abish Brodt told me that when he was in Ponevezh in the 1960s as a bochur, they would stop the learning every hour, and from their seats, they would sing for about two minutes. The songs he remembered were “Uva’u Chulam” and “Kad Yasvin,” which was composed by the saintly Chazon Ish to words that come from the Zohar Hakadosh. The song says, “Look at My beloved children, as they forget their own pain and difficulties and instead engage in My joy that is Torah.”

In Chevron, it was similar. At 2 a.m., they would sing from their seats. When it was time to daven in the morning, they would all get up and dance to “Uva’u Chulam,” and many of them would sing their way to the Kosel to daven Shacharis. (Today, because of the mixed crowds, the custom, as is with many yeshivos, is to go to the Kosel on Motzaei Yom Tov instead.)