eSefarad Noticias del Mundo Sefaradi
In a few more days, on Sunday night, September 25th, 2022, we will begin the celebration of Rosh HaShana, the Jewish new year. The most important and significant Mitsva of Rosh HaShanah is hearing the sound of the Shofar. And before we explain the reason for this important precept, we will learn the basic technical aspects of the Shofar: What are the voices of the shofar? How are the sounds of the shofar produced? what animal or animals the Shofar comes from?
יוֹם תְּרוּעָה יִהְיֶה לָכֶם
HOW TO MAKE A SHOFAR?
The most important Mitzva of Rosh HaShana is listening to the Shofar. The Shofar is an animal horn (usually a ram’s horn) that has been modified a) by removing the horn’s stuffing and b) opening a mouthpiece at the narrowest end of the horn. In this video (in Hebrew) you can see the entire Shofar production process.
TUTORIAL
Now, how do you produce the voices of the Shofar?
You should not place the Shofar «inside» your mouth between your lips, as if you were blowing up a balloon. If you blow air into the Shofar in this way the Shofar will not produce any sound. The Shofar should be placed «on the closed lips», on one side of the mouth (if possible, the right side) or in the middle of the mouth. Once the Shofar is resting on the lips, you have to blow air with the lips tightly pressed, emitting the sound of the letter «P», while your lips are vibrating
Do not inflate the cheeks too much. Do not force the lungs inhaling too much air. You have to breathe as normally as possible. The most challenging point is adjusting the mouthpiece of the Shofar on your lips, preventing air from escaping from any other point of the mouth, finding the best angle. This requires practice.
Again, the steps to effectively blow the Shofar are:
1. Closing the lips.
2. Make the lips vibrate with the letter «P».
3. Place the mouthpiece of the Shofar on the lips.
4. Keep moving and pressing the Shofar on the lips while you blow, until you find the right angle.
THE VOICES OF THE SHOFAR (qolot)
Each Shofar has a unique voice, like human beings. And each Shofar emits a single musical note. In Rosh HaShana we produce that note in three different ways, which the Sages call «voices» (or «sounds», qolot) The first «voice» is called teqi’a. Teqi’a is the longest, uninterrupted and simplest sound. Second, we have shebarim, dividing the sound of the Shofar into three short voices, interrupting the air that reaches the Shofar by tapping the mouthpiece from inside with our tongue. Finally, we have the teru’a , a continuum of very short voices. To produce the sound of teru’a we tap rapidly the mouthpiece of the Shofar with our tongue, approximately nine times.
In this video (between 6-9 seconds) we can see the most common way to produce the sound of the teru’a
According to other ancient traditions, in order to produce the teru’a, instead of “tapping” with the tongue (similar to the sound of the letter «T»), you «rub» the mouthpiece of the Shofar (imitating the sound of the letter «L») with the tongue creating “waves”. The sound here is a little less intermittent. This video shows this way of sounding the teru’a, typical of the Jews of Yemen and many Syrian Jews.
THE 100 SOUNDS
The combination of the Shofar sounds for Rosh haShana is as follows:
teqi’a / shebarim-teru’a / teqi’a (4 voices).
teqi’a / shebarim / teqi’a (3 voices)
teqi’a / teru’a / teqi’a (3 voices)
This formula as you can see consists of 10 voices. And it is repeated 10 times during Rosh haShana. 3 times before the Musaf prayer, 3 times during Musaf prayer, 3 times during the Musaf repetition, and one more time after Musaf. Thus, in total, during each day of Rosh haShana we hear the voice of the Shofar 100 times (מאה קולות).
Rab Yosef Bitton
Fuente: halaja.org
