Beaufort to 'Ode': No thanks

"Ode to Beaufort," a song penned by cantor Sheldon Feinberg and Lady's Island resident Marian Lipton, was rejected last week in its bid to become Beaufort's official song.

Every Sabbath for decades, cantor Sheldon Feinberg sang Psalm 92, a hymn of thanks and praise for God. But it didn't sound right.

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"The composer Louis Lewandowski wrote a melody for this psalm, which is sung throughout the world," Feinberg, 87, said Thursday inside the Port Royal Center of Jewish Life and Learning, a historic caboose filled with religious books and information. "But it never appealed to me as fitting with the words. It has a plaintive sound, a yearning."

Feinberg altered Lewandowski's melody to give it a sunnier feel, which Feinberg sings with a hint of an Irish brogue ("Didn't you ever hear 'When Yiddish Eyes are Smiling?'" he asks with a wink), though he was raised in Brooklyn, and his parents were born in Russia and Palestine.

"I took (Lewandowski's) melody and changed it, and it became more in keeping with modern Israel -- the spirit of Israel as a prophet would want it, but not in this Germanic, European style of composing," he said.

Feinberg, who served as cantor and religious leader at Beth Israel Synagogue in Beaufort before founding the Port Royal learning center in 2006, led the synagogue in his version of Psalm 92 many times before a congregant, Marian Lipton, presented him with new lyrics in 2001.

"When I sang it over and over in Beth Israel in Beaufort, Marian Lipton came to me and said, 'I took your melody and created a song about Beaufort,'" Feinberg recalled. "She gave me the words, and I saw how they fit with the music, and I said, 'From now on, we'll call it 'Ode to Beaufort.''"

Since that day, Feinberg has appeared before the Beaufort City Council numerous times to deliver an opening prayer for the council's meetings. And while many others have performed that duty, none has punctuated the prayer quite like Feinberg: with a recitation of "Ode to Beaufort."

"He's sung that song to us a dozen times," said Councilman Mike Sutton, who was elected in 2006. "We obviously have a soft spot for cantor Feinberg and all he has done for the community."

Or, as city manager Scott Dadson said, "(Feinberg) is a peach of a dude."

But that wasn't enough to persuade the City Council last week to designate "Ode to Beaufort" the city's official song, which Feinberg proposed when the city asked him to deliver the opening prayer for the council's Tuesday meeting. Feinberg said he asked for the designation because he feared his "Ode" would disappear when he stops singing it, and the words are very meaningful -- "That's what Beaufort means to me."

"(The council members) love the cantor, but they are not as excited about the city having an official song or an official tree or those types of things," Dadson said. "They're considering a resolution that could recognize the contribution (the song) makes to the city."

Sutton said he supports the idea of naming an official song for Beaufort, but Feinberg's "Ode" is too new, and there are likely better choices out there.

"That song has great sentiment to it," he said. "But we have a lot of diversity and a lot of history that goes back -- there were probably songs written through history that would better reflect the overall heritage of Beaufort."

Mayor Bill Rauch pointed out that the city has no official dance or tree or bird -- only an official seal.

Nonetheless, he said the city likely will have an official song one day, and he likes Feinberg's "Ode" -- well, most of it. Rauch said the line, "Shalom little Beaufort, take your ease," would likely need to be changed for city approval.

"There's one line -- that "Shalom, little Beaufort," -- that I would say gets a little close to mixing church and state. ... I'm sure he could come up with a somewhat more secular line," Rauch said. "The 'little' part is also just a little, sort of -- that one line needs a little work."