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March 21, 2003/Adar2 17 5763, Vol. 55, No. 30
Artistic expressions
Hillel at ASU presents award winners
LEISAH NAMM
Managing Editor
David Frazer, right, poses with the winners of the Joan Frazer Memorial Award in the Arts at Hillel, from left, Tyler Miller, Adrienne Turner and Jessica Mushkatel-Burnquist.
Photo courtesy of David Frazer
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Against the backdrop of a nighttime view of the city of Phoenix, the three winners of this year's Joan Frazer Memorial Award in the Arts at Hillel presented their talents during a March 12 reception.
The presentation, in a house on Mummy Mountain, included a Yiddish song performance, poetry readings and an original composition performed by a jazz band.
David Frazer established the award in 2000, in memory of his late wife Joan Frazer, a community leader who served as a Hillel board member for several years.
The award is designed to connect Jewish students in the arts with Hillel, link artistry and Jewishness, and showcase students' talents to the Jewish community on campus and throughout the Valley.
Adrienne Turner, 18, a musical theater and opera singer, sang four Yiddish songs: "Eili Eili" by William Scher, "Varnishkes" by Harry Anik, "Es Brent" by Lazar Weiner and "Rumania Rumania" by Shalom Secunda.
"I chose them because they each represented important aspects of Jewish culture," Turner says. "Faith and religion, appreciation of humor, the importance of remembering the dark past that so many of our ancestors experienced, and the joys of the 'good old days.' "
Even if one didn't understand the Yiddish lyrics, Turner conveyed the emotion of each piece through her expressions.
Originally from Calgary, Alberta, Turner moved to Tempe to study music at ASU. The Joan Frazer award introduced Turner to Hillel and she plans to increase her level of involvement with the group.
"I felt that this was a huge opportunity for me to not only learn new (for me) music and expose it to my professors and peers, but also a wonderful push to learn more about my Jewish ancestry," she says.
"I also believe in keeping the arts alive in the world today, and it is with many thanks to David Frazer for helping encourage young artists like Jessica, Tyler, and me to continue our passions."
Turner plans to finish her degree in musical theater and then move to New York to pursue dreams of performing on Broadway and eventually in opera houses. She will perform at Hillel's fund-raiser at 4 p.m. Sunday, May 4, at the Arizona Historical Society.
When Jessica Mushkatel-Burnquist applied for the award, she first considered writing poetry with Judaic themes but then decided "the best way to approach it would be through the eyes of children."
"I was considering my own role in the Jewish community because my children were starting to grow up in it," Burnquist explains. Her two children, Andrew, 4, and Lilly, 2, attend preschool at the Tri-City Jewish Comm-unity Center.
Once a week, over about three months, she worked with fifth-graders at the Temple Emanuel of Tempe religious school, where she teaches, with the goal of linking poetry to something tangible.
"Within all of this Judaic theme, the first theme I really gravitated to was the idea of tzedakah and mitzvot," she says.
The children wrote a group poem (see box) and each line was placed on a different granite tile; the tiles will eventually be on display at the Tri-City JCC. The children also wrote individual poems, with accompanying illu-strations, on a mural that will be displayed at Temple Emanuel. A dedication ceremony will be held during religious school on Sunday, April 13, at Temple Emanuel, where she and her family are members.
"It was very interesting to hear children talk about Judaism because their identities were strong," but they expressed the same feelings she had as a child, Burnquist says.
"There was a lot of attention these kids gave to the idea of being different," she says. "But what was beautiful about that thought is that they all agreed that they were different together, that they weren't alone in their separation - that there was this community they could be different with and that it made it special."
In addition to her work with children, Burnquist also wrote and recited her own poetry, including a poem about Lot's wife - "I found it interesting that she didn't have a first name" - and about Yehuda Ha-Levi, a Spanish poet and physician. Another poem, titled "Dance with Locking Arms," referred to the Hora. "That was probably my biggest attempt at writing a poem about what it means to be Jewish," she says.
She is currently working on her master's degree in creative writing and teaching part-time at New School for the Arts, a performing arts high school in Tempe.
For his presentation, Tyler Miller created an original musical composition com-bining elements from jazz, electronic music and funk.
He came up with the idea by listening to modern Jewish composers and says he was heavily influenced by John Zorn, David Krakauer and The Klezmatics.
"This project was very important to me because I have never autonomously composed a work with several movements, and I felt it was a prime opportunity," he says.
Each of the four movements represented a different time in Jewish history: slavery in Egypt, the Temple period in Jerusalem, darker periods in Jewish history and the future. Miller played guitar and was accompanied by Kellen Sutherlan on bass, Justin Kipp on drums and Lin Li Wein-traub on keyboard.
Miller's involvement in Hillel has mostly been social and he has traveled to Israel with the Birthright Israel program.
He has been studying jazz performance for three years and has performed in several restaurants and clubs in the Valley. He plans to graduate in May.
The reception took place in the home of Marlene and Lanny Lahr, former president of the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix.
"I thought the evening was as magical this year as it was last year," says David Frazer. "I felt that the talent was outstanding."
For more information, call Hillel at 480-967-7563.
Contact the writer at leisah_namm@jewishaz.com.
We are a large family
Without our family,
we would be lonely
Without our community, we would be nothing
Together we must build community to help
those in need
We are special because we are chosen
Together as Jews
we can make a better world with mitzvot.
- A group poem written by fifth graders at Temple Emanuel's religious school; part of Jessica Mushkatel-Burnquist's project for the Joan Frazer Memorial Award in the Arts at Hillel.
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