Chayala Neuhaus's newest composition, a powerful, inspiring single with a timeless musical style and message

"You needed to repeat the chorus like another three times — I wanted to hear it and absorb it some more...” one listener wrote back to CHAYALA NEUHAUS about her newest composition, a powerful, inspiring single with a timeless musical style and message. Simply named “A YID,” it’s sung by Benny Friedman, with arrangements and production by Doni Gross.

As we rise to greet another day and the sun is still bright in the sky/ always a reason to hope for better times, though it seems like the answer’s worlds away,

We’ve got enough, just enough, to keep us going/ we’re holding on to unbroken simple faith

‘Cause A Yid never breaks and a Yid never bends/ and a Yid never gives up in the night/ A Yid perseveres through the deepest despairs — his emunah strengthens him for the fight

Chayala originally wrote the lyrics and the tune for a school production at Bais Yaakov of Lakewood. “In the play, the song comes in the aftermath of a Cossack attack that struck down an entire village,” says Chayala. “After the performance, I had some prospective buyers for the song, but found myself holding on to it. When COVID hit us all, the message about our inborn resilience suddenly felt so relevant.”

She sat down to rewrite the song in Elul, during a lull in the pandemic when uncertainty and change still hung so heavily over us all, and found herself shifting the tempo from its original kumzitz style to a more driving emotional pace, conveying a sense of hope and knowledge that Hashem always has our back.

Chayala was thrilled with the final results. “The heartfelt quality of the vocals is very striking, and I think that’s because there is heart here, on all sides — from the arranger to the singer and even the video editor. That truly comes across.”

The Song I Can't Stop Singing

The chorus of the “Chasam Soifer Song” from Lipa’s newest album Gevaldig, which retells how the Chasam Sofer stated he would be willing to give away a portion of his Olam Haba in order to be able to sing. In the original, Lipa sings the chorus without words — “Yaaa ma ma ma maaa, oy ma ma maaa, ma ma ma oy oy oy oy…” — creating a moving interlude that’s also, in a sense, the essence of the song.

—Singer SHIMMY ENGEL

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 852)