Going Up With Joy: V’sham nashir

V’sham nashir shir chadash u’vir’nana na’aleh
Going Up With Joy Hebrew text
And there we will sing a new song; with joy we will go up. (from Tzur Mishelo)

KZ5 Chant (7/2012)

These words are from the last stanza of Tzur Mishelo, a Shabbat hymn that was composed and compiled between the 11th and 16th centuries under the guidance of Rabbis Isaac Luria and Israel Najara. It is a reflection upon and praise of Shabbat and is thought to be an introduction to Birkat Hamazon (Grace after Meals) on which the first three stanzas are clearly based. Some believe this zemer to have originated with the Tannaim, the rabbinic sages whose views are recorded in the mishna, from approximately 70-200 CE.

This is a practice of letting the joy in our voices raise us up into sacred space.

To hear the chant, use the audio player. To download the chant, right-click the note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Going Up With Joy

To download the PDF file for this chant, click Going Up With Joy PDF. For the musical notation, see The Magic of Hebrew Chant, page 251.