This year will be a leap year. Beginning on Shabbos. The two variable months of Cheshvon and Kislev will be with only 29 days each. Pesach will fall on a Tuesday. The Siman will be therefore Zayin- ches- gimmel. 

While on the calendar, we know that Mr. Benno Weis made a handwritten calendar that has hung in the elementary school hallway since forever. After many years he added to the calendar and the newer pages extend into a year that he never foresaw would come about and he would not have returned with Techiyas Hameisim. Or he could not see the ancient Kehilla would be here to celebrate that year. The calendar has about a decade left if I remember correctly. (Someone check, please. This is like our Mayan calendar moment.) 

A note about the Shofar blowing in our circles. I don’t have a recording of our Baalei Tekiah- except on the video of Rav Gelley’s installation in 1987. The shofar was blown and this is a clip of it. 

But a very odd and intriguing set of Shofar blasts is found on the album of Chazan Hans Bloemendahl z’l of the Netherlands. He has a very distinguished voice that is not unlike our own Chazan Frankel z’l- (Chazan Frankel admired Bloemendahl, had all of his records- I am told, and came from Hamburg just like Bloemendahl.)  

Anyhowwww, on the album there is a Shofar interlude that is just as haunting as the Tefillos recorded there. This Shofar has the sound of a clarinet, and all the years I have been listening to this I assumed that they just used an instrument on the album with some poetic license. This week I posted the recording on a forum of Nusach devotees, and two members of the forum who grew up in the Netherlands, both attested to the authenticity of the Shofar used in the recording and that a highly skilled Baal Tokeah was employed in Amsterdam. (They could not remember his name.) They also suggested – and attached a picture- that the Shofar had an extra wide mouth- which allowed for a greater variety of notes and sounds. Amazing!! Audio HERE.