Prayer Festival Workshops
Date: June 22
Time: 10:00–11:30
Title: Reflecting Like Water
Creator: Anat Yaffe
About the workshop: Opening session. We’ll begin with a gentle process of arriving and grounding ourselves in the here and now. From there, we’ll open into new movement filled with energy, vitality, and possibility.
About the creator: Anat Yaffe is a dancer, longtime yoga and Qi Gong teacher, and shiatsu practitioner. She explores the philosophy of yoga as a way of life and is deeply passionate about teaching and creating spaces where people can truly meet themselves.
Date: June 22
Time: 13:30–15:00
Title: Praise Him With Tambourine and Dance
Creators: Ensemble Ka’et
About the workshop: The Book of Psalms describes a creative kind of prayer—filled with voices, music, instruments, and dance. Maybe it’s time for us to explore together what prayer can become when it brings together text, music, movement, and space.
In this workshop, we’ll go on a shared journey of exploration, discovering where prayer can lead when dancers, prayer leaders, texts, instruments, sounds, and musicians all come together in one space.
Prayer Festival 2026 invites Ensemble Ka’et and festival participants into an intuitive, creative exploration inspired by the Psalms
About the creators: Ensemble Ka’et, which operates within the organization “Between Heaven and Earth,” is made up of religious male dancers who sought to find their place within the world of professional dance. In 2010, the ensemble premiered its first work, Highway No. 1, which continues to be performed on stages in Israel and around the world. In 2016, the ensemble was officially recognized as a professional dance company and began receiving support from Israel’s Ministry of Culture.
Ensemble Ka’et creates through a deep connection to both place and society. Based in Jerusalem, the ensemble draws inspiration from the city’s rich cultural and religious diversity, seeking to give expression to its many voices through contemporary Jewish dance.
The ensemble has performed across Israel and internationally, attracting a wide and varied audience—from longtime followers of contemporary dance from secular cultural spaces, to religious and Haredi audiences who may be encountering professional dance for the first time. For many, Ensemble Ka’et serves as a gateway into a new world of embodied artistic expression.
Date: June 22
Time: 13:30–15:00
Title: The Song of the Tribe
Creator: Einav Zahara Zloof
About the workshop: An experiential workshop of shared learning and singing. We’ll learn familiar songs from the Israeli repertoire and gradually set aside the inner critical voices that often accompany how we think about our singing. In their place, we’ll discover the freedom and strength that come through collective singing.
We’ll learn choral arrangements that, for a moment, allow us to sing as a single tribe. This workshop reconnects us to our voice, to a sense of joy, and to a heightened feeling of aliveness. No prior experience is needed—just curiosity.
About the creator: Einav is a singer-songwriter and group facilitator who believes music is a powerful tool for healing and connection.
She is the director of Beit BINA Tel Aviv–Jaffa, a graduate of the Rimon School of Music, and performs at events and festivals across Israel. She is excited to return to creating spaces for encounter, learning, and deepening—places where people can sing and give voice to what is present and alive within them.
Date: June 22
Time: 15:30–17:00
Title: About Prayer & Beauty
Creator: Father Alberto Joan Pari
About the workshop: In this workshop, we’ll explore the spirituality of the Christian tradition through the story and lived experience of a monk. Together, we’ll create a space for beauty, prayer, and meditation through song, accompanied by the sounds of a liturgical zither.
We’ll learn and sing music in rich vocal harmony, and reflect together on prayer, the similarities and differences between traditions, and the role of spiritual leaders in Jerusalem today.
About the creator: Father Alberto is an Italian Catholic Franciscan priest who has been living in Israel since 2007. He studied pedagogy in Italy and completed his theological studies in Jerusalem. Father Pari holds degrees in Scripture and Biblical archaeology, and is also a singer, flutist, zither player, and teacher of Gregorian chant.
He serves as director of the Magnificat School of Music in Jerusalem’s Old City and is deeply inspired by the beauty of interfaith dialogue.
Date: June 22
Time: 15:30–17:00
Title: Prayer in Motion – The Body as a Space for Intention and Transformation
Creator: Michal Sternbach
About the workshop: This workshop explores the connection between body and prayer through movement, sensation, and presence. Together, we’ll encounter physical gestures drawn from worlds of prayer and ritual, developing them into personal forms of prayer that emerge through the body itself.
Inspired by the work of Anna Halprin—a pioneer of postmodern dance who saw movement as a tool for healing and social change—we’ll work with movement “scores”: structured frameworks that invite improvisation within clear boundaries. Through them, we’ll create a movement-based ritual that bridges the personal and the collective.
The workshop will move between individual exploration and shared practice, culminating in the creation of a wordless embodied prayer.
About the creator: Michal Sternbach is a dancer, movement therapist, and teacher of Contact Improvisation. She is a practitioner of the Ilan Lev Method and is currently training to be a trauma therapist through Somatic Experiencing (SE). She facilitates workshops throughout Israel and leads body-based healing rituals in the Jerusalem Hills. Michal explores the deep interface between dance, healing, and personal and social transformation, and believes in the body’s power to lead us into genuine, present, and meaningful encounters. Partner to Roi and mother to Tamara-Lev and Kerem-Shira, she lives and creates in the Jerusalem Hills.
Date: June 22
Time: 17:30–19:00
Title: Before the Mountains Were Born
Creator: Rotem Bar Or
About the workshop: The wondrous creation we call a song—born of sound and carried into the world through the human voice—came into existence long before we, as a human society, developed the ability to write letters and touch the spirit through the written word.
So why do we say that we “write” a song? Perhaps we need a new word to describe the process through which a song emerges and takes shape in the world. Perhaps our songs were there even before we were.
During this workshop, we will set out to encounter sounds, syllables, words, and tones. Together, we will explore that singular, fleeting, and unexpected moment when all of these elements come together. From there, we will move into vocal practice and discover how our voices can serve as a medium through which songs are communicated into the world.
About the creator: Rotem Bar Or is an Israeli singer-songwriter, musician, writer, composer, and producer. He is also the founder, lead vocalist, and guitarist of the indie band The Angelcy.
In March 2025, he released his first Hebrew-language solo album, Ma Yesh Lefached MeHaAviv (What Is There to Fear from Spring?). The album reflects a process of turning inward toward a more local, intimate, and exposed form of creation in response to the events of recent years.
Alongside his work as a performer and songwriter, Bar Or produces music and serves as a creative and musical advisor to other artists. He also teaches and facilitates workshops focused on the craft and practice of songwriting.
Date: June 23
Time: 7:00–8:00
Title: Musical Shacharit – The Dawn of a New Day
Creator: Amalia Zeitlin
About the workshop: How do different melodies illuminate new interpretations of prayer?
What can familiar melodies teach us through their comfort and predictability?
What kind of spiritual journey can a brand NEW melody facilitate?
In this Shacharit tefilah workshop, we will dive deeply into the text of Shacharit through melodic comparison, eventually inspiring us to bring our own spontaneous melodies to our ancient texts.
About the creator: Amalia was raised in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and has lived in Jerusalem for the last two years. She received degrees in violin performance from Boston University (B.M.) and New Mexico State University (M.M.) and studied abroad at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. Amalia has led services and song circles in congregations across the United States and Israel since 2014. In 2024, Amalia founded an all-female Jewish sacred folk duo called Merchav, which is set to release their first studio album in fall 2026. From September, 2025 through February, 2026, Amalia served as an Arts and Culture Fellow at the Pardes Institute for Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. Amalia also plays violin for the Nava Tehila Levite internship makes frequent appearances with the Zamru Ensemble from the Fuchsberg Center in Jerusalem.
Date: June 23
Time: 9:00–10:30
Title: Words for Prayer
Creator: Hadas Gilad
About the workshop: A writing workshop exploring questions like: What is prayer, and how is it different from a wish? Who has the ability to create prayer, and where do we begin?
We’ll start with reflections and readings from modern poetry that reimagines what prayer can be. From there, through attention to breath and body, we’ll search for our own words of prayer.
About the creator: Hadas Gilad is a poet, writer, poetry editor, and writing teacher with a BA in Literature and Creative Writing from Tel Aviv University. She is a longtime practitioner of yoga and meditation and is currently studying yoga instruction at the Wingate Institute.
She translated the book Naked Song by the poet Lalé (Keren Publications, 2012). Her published works include Every Light, Essentially (Pardes, 2013), Days of Action (Locus, 2019), Above the Horizon of Early Mornings (Locus, 2021), and Watermark (Shtayim, 2026). She was awarded the Israeli Minister of Culture Prize for Emerging Writers in 2019.
Date: June 23
Time: 9:00–10:30
Title: Elohima
Creators: Rabbi Sivan Navon-Shoval & Rabbi Dahlia Shaham
About the workshop: The sacred music circle Elohima is an interactive workshop that invites participants into a living spiritual journey seeking to make the Shekhinah present and create moments of connection, comfort, and spiritual renewal through voice, prayer, sacred music, and movement.
Based on poems from Rabbi Sivan Navon-Shoval’s book Elohima, set to music and performed together with Rabbi Dalia Shaham, the workshop creates a unique encounter between liturgical and contemporary poetry, sacred music, and a shared space of prayer.
About the creator: Rabbi Sivan Navon-Shoval is a rabbi, educator, poet, and researcher of Kabbalah and gender based in Jerusalem. Her work moves between prayer, theology, midrash, and poetry. Through her work, she seeks to open new spaces for spiritual, feminine, and healing language within the Jewish tradition. Sivan is the author of Elohima, a collection of liturgical poetry through a journey that revives images of the Shekhinah, body, memory, and lived experience, which has resonated in communities and study circles in Israel and abroad.
About the creator: Dahlia Shaham is a Rabbi, musician, translator and spiritual activist in pursuit of peace among peoples, genders and species. She holds academic degrees in Law, International Political Economy and Inter-faith Theological Studies. Dahlia leads various musical and communal projects, bringing together the various faiths and languages of this holy wounded land, and bringing healing and change through sound, speech, movement and silence. She holds ritual spaces for individuals, families, communities and organizations across Israel; and brings to light original texts and music with various ensembles.
Date: June 23
Time: 15:00–17:00
Title: The Song of the Grasses
Creator: Shlomit Cohen
About the workshop: Some prayers are born through words, while others rise from the scent of the earth, the sound of wind through the trees, and a deep breath.
In this gathering, we’ll explore prayer as a form of inner listening and intuition through the worlds of nature and plants. Together, we’ll encounter healing herbs, incense, and ancient melodies, spend time in the natural landscape, and create space for the heart to open in a simple and organic way.
This is a gentle invitation to reconnect with the inner voice, with stillness, and with the living bond between humans and the natural world. The workshop will take place outdoors in Nes Harim, in the Jerusalem hills.
About the creator: Shlomit is a senior teacher of natural herbal medicine, an aromatherapist, and a wild forager. She guides deep healing processes using medicinal plants and music.
She is the founder of “Gift of the Earth,” a center for natural herbal practice offering courses, workshops, treatments, and natural healing products.
Date: June 24
Time: 7:00–8:00
Title: Modeh Ani – Gratitude in Motion
Creator: Michael Ben Naim
About the workshop: We’ll warm up the body and soften the heart, practicing the Qi Gong sequence “The Six Paths.” Through movement and breath, we’ll explore the inner essence of the Hebrew letter Aleph—an opening to unity, stillness, and creation.
This is a space where prayer meets the body, and movement becomes an inner dialogue. All are welcome to come with an open heart.
About the creator: A practitioner of Qi Gong and Chinese medicine, he is also an Israeli rabbi and co-leader of the “Nigun HaLev” community in the Jezreel Valley. His musical path and compositions create connection and bring hearts closer together.
He accompanies life-cycle rituals and invites processes of renewal, balance, and grounding. He develops Qi Gong practice series and teaches in the “Teima / Tnu’ot” approach—Hebrew Qi Gong—working with the movement of Hebrew letters in the spirit of Kabbalah, inspired by the Sefer Yetzirah.
Date: June 24
Time: 9:00–10:30
Title: “On the Tip of the Tongue”—Poetry and Creation at the Seam Between the Spoken and the Written Word
Creator: Yonatan Kunda
About the workshop: When we feel that ancient and ever-renewing thirst to express ourselves in words—what inspiration rises from the well of speech? And what from the well of writing? In this session, we will draw inspiration for creation through encounters with the worlds, traditions, and forms of poetry, Torah, and oral prayer across generations—from prophecy, the Mishnah, and liturgical poetry to spoken word and rap. We will explore the delicate, surprising, and stirring dance of words as they constantly move from the page—to the body, the voice, the stage, the street, the town square—and back again.
About the creator: Yonatan is a poet, an actor, a playwright, a musician, and an educator. One of the pioneers of spoken word in Israel, Yonatan has published three poetry books, including “Let the Crack Become Light”, which won the ACUM Prize. He leads numerous musical and educational projects that blend traditional sources with original creation, working with diverse communities across Israel and the world – in Hebrew, Arabic, and English.
Date: June 24
Time: 9:00–10:30
Title: Creative Sprint
Creators: Noa Ben Porat/Oran Kalech
About the workshop: A workshop of exploration and creation, where through movement, breath, and words we will meet and dwell in the moment just before. The moment before creation, before emergence, before the magic unfolds.
We’ll create a space to deepen into intention, meaning, and our personal prayer as we prepare for the birth of new creations from within us into the world.
About the creator: Noa Ben Porat is a musician, facilitator of meditation circles, sound healing, and communal singing, and a graduate of spiritual care training. She holds healing spaces that offer a gentle, grounded encounter with life and death.
Together with Oren Kalach, she co-leads the Zamru “Hemshech” group.
About the creator: Oran Kalech is a rabbi and embodied teacher who leads workshops that bring together the depth of Torah with the complexity of inner life. His work seeks to create a mind-body awareness and a space that looks for the Divine within the human. He is drawn to nigunim, piyutim, and music that moves the heart and soul. He is married to Sofi and a father of three: Pe’la Lev, Hinenni Tov, and Keren Ahavi.
Date: June 24
Time: 11:00–12:30
Title: Rituals, Performance and the In-between
Creator: Shiry Journo
About the workshop: In this workshop, we’ll explore the meeting point between ritual and performance. Creation becomes a bridge between inner intention and outward form—between spirit and lived experience. We’ll work on how to take a deep intention and bring it into the body, into emotion, and into real, felt experience.
Together, we’ll experiment with creating new rituals, wild and sublime alongside personal and collective musical expression.
About the creator: Shiry Journo is a multidisciplinary artist, director, founder and artistic director of the Yadit Theater. She develops a visual, ritual, and poetic stage language, and explores forms and structures through theater.
She leads and accompanies personal and group artistic research processes, creating work at the intersection between performance and ritual.
Date: June 24
Time: 11:00–12:30
Title: Weaving East and West
Creator: Reut Amar
About the workshop: A journey through traditions of song, prayer, and Piyyut from East and West, as an expression of a geographical and cultural landscape.
In this workshop, we’ll explore both new and traditional piyutim as a gateway into a sensory, local, and spiritual experience.
We’ll also take part in some creative writing exercises along the way.
About the creator: Reut Amar is a piyyut singer and musician, and a Jerusalem-based cultural entrepreneur. She works with gathering and weaving together traditions from East and West, bringing them into a contemporary Israeli cultural expression.
Date: June 24
Time: 13:30–15:30
Title: Gospel
Creator: Elisheva Young
About the workshop: Gospel music is a musical style that originated in Black churches in the United States. It grew out of spiritual and slave songs that evolved over the years. Gospel combines emotion, energy, and movement, and serves as a powerful vehicle for expressing faith and connection with the community. During the workshop, we will learn to sing in harmony, practice group listening and collective learning, and experience the energy and rhythm that arise from many voices coming together. Most of all, we’ll encounter the joy, devotion, and uplifting spirit of the music, the words, and the shared prayer.
About the creator: Elisheva Young moved to Israel from Detroit, Michigan, USA. She is a choir conductor, singer, composer, and musical arranger. For over 30 years, Elisheva has been teaching gospel and vocal harmony in leading music institutions across Israel and has performed with many prominent artists both internationally and in Israel.
Date: June 24
Time: 16:00–17:30
Title: A Life Journey to the Inner Voice
Creator: Gal Klein
About the workshop: An experiential musical session, led by longing and inspired by Gal’s personal creative work and shared singing. Together we’ll set out on a journey to discover our own prayer of the heart.
We’ll listen, sing, and reconnect with trust in creativity and the inner fire as a gateway to a deep, moving, and honest encounter with life.
About the creator: Gal Klein is a singer-songwriter, and the founder and leader of “Shirim Neshamah,” a community dedicated to singing and new forms of prayer in Israel and Berlin. In recent years, she has been living and creating between Israel and Berlin.
She has released three albums and has been studying and practicing holistic Hebrew spirituality for the past twenty years.
Date: June 24
Time: 16:00–17:30
Title: A Journey to the Temple
Creator: Zalman Stub
About the workshop: We’ll journey together through guided imagination, music, and movement toward Jerusalem and its heart—the temple – the house of Prayer for All Peoples.
The moment is Yom Kippur, the only time in the year when the High Priest—the great healer—enters the Holy of Holies and emerges carrying the Divine Name: the deepest source of healing and connection.
This workshop is an invitation to explore and embody the movement that connects us, in the deepest way, to the whole of creation.
About the creator: Zalman Stub is a Jerusalem-based artist, musician, writer, and wanderer, moving between worlds of searching, faith, and spiritual journey. His work weaves together inner exploration with an honest reflection on life, flowing through poetry, music, thought, and personal storytelling.
Date: June 24
Time: 18:00–19:30
Title: Healing With the Voice
Creator: Amy Chapman
About the workshop: In this immersive 90-minute vocal healing workshop, we’ll explore the voice as more than just a tool for singing — but as a pathway for emotional release, nervous system regulation, creativity, connection, and healing. Through guided vocal exercises, breathwork, resonance practices, improvisational sound, chanting, vibration work, and playful group vocal exploration, participants will experience how the human voice can unlock tension, increase embodiment, and reconnect us to joy and authenticity.
This workshop blends elements of vocal therapy, somatic practice, meditation, sound healing, and artistic expression in an accessible, non-judgmental environment. No singing experience is necessary — this is not about performing “correctly,” but about discovering how your own voice can become a powerful healing modality. Expect a mix of grounding exercises, freeing vocal play, nervous system calming techniques, and moments of deep connection and release.
Perfect for singers, speakers, healers, therapists, performers, or anyone curious about using the voice for wellness, self-expression, and transformation.
About the creator: Amy Chapman, MA, CCC-SLP is a vocal therapist, singing voice specialist, and facilitator whose work explores the profound connection between the voice, body, nervous system, and emotional expression. As a licensed and board-certified Speech & Language Pathologist with a background as a professional singer and performer, Amy blends science, somatic practice, artistry, and vocal exploration to help individuals reconnect to their most authentic and embodied voice.
Over the past decade, Amy has worked with everyone from Grammy-winning artists and Broadway performers to actors, speakers, healers, and everyday individuals seeking greater freedom in their voice and self-expression. While her work is deeply rooted in vocal anatomy and evidence-based voice therapy, her approach extends beyond performance — viewing the voice as a powerful pathway for healing, release, creativity, confidence, and human connection.
Known for creating warm, non-judgmental spaces where participants can safely explore sound and expression, Amy encourages people to move beyond perfection and reconnect with the joy, emotion, and healing potential of the human voice. Her work invites participants to stop overthinking their voice and start experiencing it as a source of vitality, creativity, and connection.
Amy has lectured extensively on voice, vocal health, speech, and vocal rehabilitation at universities across California including UCLA, USC, Chapman University, Cal Poly Pomona, CSUF, and CSULA.
Date: June 24
Time: 22:30–23:45
Title: PrayerParty
Creator: Noa Tal-El
About the workshop: In every culture around the world, rituals, prayers, and music have evolved over generations, shaped by local elements and traditions.
“Mesibat Tefilah” is a body–mind experience that celebrates the richness of prayer across cultures and worlds, connecting us as humanity to a shared universal spirit.
Together—and each in our own way—we’ll embark on an eclectic musical and movement journey that spans tribes, religions, and cultures, all the way to our own local prayers in Jerusalem, the holy city for many faiths.
About the creator: Noa Tal El is a multidisciplinary practitioner who explores the connections between creation, spirit, and community.
She is a DJ, musician, and teacher of an international conscious movement method, and the founder in Israel of Azul Conscious Movement. She is also a social worker and facilitator of family constellations, with many years of social activism focused on shared society. She is a co-founder of the organization “Kulna Jerusalem.”
Date: June 25
Time: 07:00–8:00
Title: Prayer Walk
Creator: Gilad Margalit
About the workshop: In this experiential workshop, we’ll set out to connect with a sense of “flow,” inspired by the practice of hitbodedut (personal meditation), through a morning walk in a nearby grove. Along the way, we’ll practice a range of techniques that form a foundation for a personal, authentic, and dynamic form of prayer.
The approach draws on teachings of hitbodedut and prayer from the Baal Shem Tov, Nachman of Breslov, and Yehuda Ashlag, as well as their followers. It is combined with tools from improvisation practices (spoken word, authentic movement, jazz, and flow), Qi Gong, and mindfulness.
About the creator: Gilad Margalit is a permaculture designer and teacher, as well as a composer and pianist.
He is a student, teacher, researcher, guide, creator, and multidisciplinary artist who is especially drawn to weaving together different worlds and creating new combinations. In recent years, he has been experimenting with creating spaces of prayer through music, singing, and movement.
Date: June 25
Time: 9:00–10:30
Title: Sound Healing
Creator: Roee Ben Ami
About the workshop: We’ll set out on a shared journey where we gradually allow ourselves to soften, release, and surrender into live sound—from our own voices to meditative instruments from different cultures.
Bit by bit, brainwaves slow, thoughts quiet down, and we enter a unique state between sleep and wakefulness. In this space, the imagination can wander freely, and the body naturally finds its way back to balance, listening, and renewal.
About the creator: Roee believes in music and nature as tools for healing, and creates intentional ritual spaces for individuals and groups.
He facilitates prayer circles, vocal expression workshops, and sound journeys using healing frequencies and a variety of instruments and voices. Through his work, he seeks to create spaces where we can feel ourselves and one another more deeply, open our hearts, and soften into sacred presence.
Date: June 25
Time: 11:00–12:30
Title: Open Stage
Creator: Sharon Meyevsky
About the workshop: A space for sharing works in progress, early creations, a song you haven’t yet played for others, or a prayer that is asking to emerge into the world. A space for sharing, listening, and offering feedback that nurtures creativity. Come join us.
About the creator: Sharon Meyevsky is a spiritual companion, wedding officiant and life-cycle ceremony leader, storyteller, and theater creator. For the past three years, she has co-led the “Zamru” Project together with Meir Berman.