Cantors make decisions, one to stay, two to move

Three local cantors have made decisions affecting their status at their synagogues.

The May Three Doors Bulletin of Congregation Beth Israel announced that Hazzan Jeremy Stein has agreed to serve the congregation for four more years, according to the column by CBI president Nat Sattler.

Stein has served Beth Israel for three years. See the September 2009 Chronicle for a feature article about him when he arrived.

The spring-summer 2012 edition of Sinai News, the newsletter of Congregation Sinai, announced that Cantor Rebecca Robins will be leaving to become director of congregational learning at Temple Sinai in Washington, D.C.

She joined Sinai in July 2008. In her Cantor’s Notes column in the newsletter, Robins said the move will allow her to work more intensively in congressional education; enable her husband, Zerek Schwartz, “to work in his chosen field and grow professionally”; and bring the two of them “back to the east coast where our families and close friends all live.”

The synagogue will bid farewell to them at a Kabbalat Shabbat service on Friday, June 15, 6:15 p.m.

Cantor Arlene Spanier of Congregation Emanu-El of Waukesha announced in an email last month that she will be moving to San Antonio, Texas, where her husband’s firm transferred him. Moreover, their son, daughter-in-law, and grandson live in Texas nearby, she wrote.

Spanier has served the synagogue for about 20 years, and will leave after the High Holidays this September.