last word
Cantor Charles Davidson
Jarrad Saffren | Staff Writer
I n the early 1990s, following the
fall of communism and the birth of
the Czech Republic, Cantor Charles
Davidson’s musical number, “I Never
Saw Another Butterfly,” was performed
at the former site of the Terezin ghetto.

Davidson’s piece was based on
poetry written by children who were
prisoners of the Nazis in the ghetto. He
wrote it in the late 1960s, and it’s been
performed thousands of times since.

But on this day, it was played for
about 150 Terezin survivors on the
50th anniversary of the creation of the
ghetto. New Czech Republic President
Vaclav Havel was also in attendance.

“A trip I have long remembered,” the
cantor said.

It remains the highlight of a cantorial
journey filled with them. Davidson, 94,
is the hazzan emeritus at Congregation
Adath Jeshurun in Elkins Park, where
he served for 30 years, according
to his daughter, Miriam Davidson. He
also taught at the H.L. Miller Cantorial
School in New York City for 27 years.

Now, the cantor will be honored with
a tribute concert at First Presbyterian
Church in Philadelphia on June 4.

Three local choirs, the ANNA Crusis
Feminist Choir, the Nashirah Jewish
Chorale of Philadelphia and Zachor
Keneseth Israel Youth Chorale,
will perform “I Never Saw Another
Butterfly.” Tickets, which range from
$10 to $45 depending on your ability
to pay, are at annacrusis.org.

Davidson’s daughters, Miriam, the
director of the ANNA Crusis Feminist
Choir, and Alyssa Davidson, leader
of the Zachor Keneseth Israel Youth
Chorale, organized the concert. Both
women, as well as their brother Michael
Davidson, a musician and artist, and
their sister Ilana Davidson, a cantor in
40 JUNE 1, 2023 | JEWISH EXPONENT
New York, followed their father into the
music field.

“I think Dad’s commitment to commu-
nity and to bringing people together is
something that he instilled in all of us,”
Miriam Davidson said. “I feel like the
way that I move through my musical life
really centers around bringing people
together.” As they planned the tribute concert,
the cantor’s daughters asked him to
write a reflection on his career. In
it, he wrote: “Regarding my feelings
about the piece, if I had not written
anything other than ‘Butterfly,’ I would
be content.” He repeated that senti-
ment in an interview.

“I would be very happy to be known
only as the composer of ‘Butterfly.’
It’s very important to me, and I feel
that that’s what I’ve been here for,” he
said. “I feel that I represent children. It
wasn’t anything out of the ordinary that
I did. But it had more meaning to me
than anything else.”
Davidson’s journey with the song
began in 1966, as he explained in his
reflection. His friend, Cantor Solomon
Mendelson, called to tell him about
a “recently published book of poems
by children who had been impris-
oned” in Terezin in Czechoslovakia.

The children “subsequently had been
murdered by the Nazis.”
“When I read the poems, I knew that
I had to try to set them musically,” the
cantor wrote.

It took him two years. With a normal
song, his process might take a day.

But with “Butterfly,” Davidson had to
make sure that he was getting the
piece right. The poems were bright
and optimistic despite the situation.

The cantor had to try to keep that
feeling alive, even though he knew
how the story ended. One was about
a little boy who wandered down a path
and saw a rosebud.

Davidson finished the piece and
published it. In the ensuing years and
decades, it was performed more than
4,000 times at synagogues, churches
and other locations in the Philadelphia
area and beyond.

“The music has had a good journey
so far,” Davidson wrote.

On that trip to Terezin about three
decades ago, the cantor rode in a bus
with the choir kids who performed the
song that day. They traveled through
the countryside and continued through
the gates of the town. It was the
same journey that the kids who had
composed the poems had taken a
half-century earlier.

As the choir kids rehearsed on stage
on a cold, rainy October day, a butter-
fly flew over the stage. ■
jsaffren@midatlanticmedia.com Photo by Mike Davidson
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