Echoes of song, fragments of emotion, wisps of memory. It’s a melody that still replays in your mind, years after its chorus first captured your heart.

What’s that tune that, when you hear it, brings you back to another place, time, and association? Or perhaps it’s an old, long-forgotten Jewish song, maybe one that never conquered the limelight but conquered your neshamah?

We asked readers and public figures to share some of those memories intertwined with old and forgotten songs — because when it comes to a niggun, past and present merge into a timeless inspiration

Shlomo Yehuda Rechnitz

Song of My Heart: “Shimru Shabsosai”

Composed by: Rav Yisroel Belsky ztz”l

Recorded by: A-Team, Levi Falkowitz and Shira Choir

A song that I wish the world knew? “Shimru Shabsosai.” My shver, Rav Chaim Yisroel HaLevi Belsky, composed several songs, and this is one of them. A flicker of his tremendous love and depth of avodah for Shabbos Kodesh can be felt in this zemer. It was one of his many compositions, which he sang every Shabbos. Fortunately, the niggun was made public after his passing in 2016, so those of us familiar with it could hold on to the memory.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha Issue 710)