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Friday March 2, 2007

Faces

by suzan berns

Shalom & goodbye

Roberta Bear, who wears two hats at the Jewish Community Federation of the Greater East Bay, is retiring and moving to Southern California and the company of her children and grandchildren, writes Arlene Burbank, the federation’s marketing director. Bear worked at the East Bay federation for 15 years, most recently as planning director and program officer of the federation’s foundation, where she works with family foundations. A highlight of her tenure, Bear said, was “bringing together East Bay Jewish organizations with overlapping agendas to see themselves as partners capable of wonderful collaborative programs.”

Hong Kong connection

Rabbi David Kopstein, a rabbi for 20 years in North Bay congregations, and his wife, Rabbi Patti Kopstein (also a North Bay rabbi), are in Hong Kong, reports Dani Fisher, their daughter and regional political director of our local AIPAC. The rabbis left the Bay Area to work first in Auckland, New Zealand, and then in Adelaide, Australia. (Who knew there were Jews in Auckland and Adelaide?)

Making Jewish music …

… Or at least spinning it. Ray Zion reports that each Friday from 9 am to noon on Stanford University’s KZSU (90.1 FM), Sarah Bellum (aka Lois Kellerman) presides over a program called the Jewish Alternative. Cantor Doron Shapira of Peninsula Sinai Congregation is the “Israeli music maven” on the show, which Zion periodically co-hosts. Zion also is working with Shapira on a March 17 concert sponsored by the Chen Shapira Jewish Culture Fund featuring Israeli singer Yehoram Gaon. Zion reports that Chen, father of Doron, was the “Bill Graham of Jewish music in the Bay Area.” Contact Shapira at the temple for concert information.

In other Jewish music notes, clarinet player Ben Goldberg of the New Klezmer Trio and jazz guitarist John Schott will offer insight into the symbolic power of Jewish music with Henry Shreibman on A Jewish Perspective, Sunday, March 11 at 5:30 a.m. on KRON-4. The two will delve into the same subject at the Jewish Music Festival this month. Visit www.JewishMusicFestival.org for details.

Short shorts

Landscape designer Warren Lieber of Congregation B’nai Shalom in Walnut Creek has been named a garden designer for the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show. When he’s not creating beautiful landscapes, he teaches midrasha in Contra Costa County and volunteers with the East Bay federation’s Young Leadership division, where chairs the group’s Sukkot in April program … Stephanie Brown is the new Young Adult Division director at the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation. Among other things, Brown put together the Peninsula’s “To Life” festival and this year’s Wedding Fair.

Rachel Levenson of Mountain View was elected to United Synagogue Youth’s International Executive Board. Her region won awards for the highest membership growth for all USYs in the country… Jane Jacobson of Saratoga and Linda Glesser Morris of Walnut Creek were among Hadassah National Board members traveling to Israel to dedicate new projects and visit the organization’s medical and educational facilities.

Rabbi Camille Angel of Congregation Sha’ar Zahav was among several community leaders presenting Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s “Report on Children’s Health” in San Francisco in February … Seventeen Jewish Home artists, including 102-year-old Lucille Viargues, will have their paintings and ceramics on display at the San Francisco Women Artists Gallery from March 7-31.

This columnist can be reached at faces@jweekly.com.

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