Benarroch Hazzanut Archive

This site contains most of the cantorial repertoire of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews' Congregation of London - "Kahal Kadosh Shaar Hashamayim" - which was established in 1656 and is the oldest Jewish community in the British Isles.

The recordings on this site were made in 1997 by the Senior Hazan of the congregation, the Revd. Halfon Benarroch, who retired in 2008, after many years officiating at Bevis Marks Synagogue. They were converted from cassette to MP3 format in 2010.

This site was initiated and produced by Rabbi Jonathan Cohen (Visiting Rabbi of Bevis Marks Synagogue between 2012-2014) on behalf of the Society of Heshaim, and is maintained by him on a voluntary basis, as a free online resource for those interested in studying our ancient and beautiful tradition.

The various hymns sung during services are not included in this archive, but a sister website with recordings of many of these can be found here: London Sephardi Congregational Melodies

Links allow you to play individual files online, while from the bottom of most pages, and on the Downloads page, you can download ZIP files for off-line listening and creating CDs for private use.

Copyright: All material on this site is Copyright © 1997, 2020, The Society of Heshaim, Spanish and Portuguese Jews' Congregation, London. Individual, not-for-profit use is allowed and encouraged. Commercial use of any kind is prohibited without permission in writing from the Society of Heshaim.Acknowledgements:The task of dividing the digitized content up into individual MP3 files was generously undertaken by volunteers, led by Mr. Lawrence Kilshaw.This website was proposed and created by Rabbi Jonathan Cohen in 2010. Rabbi Cohen also corrects and updates this site from time to time. Last update: 7 August 2020.Contact info:Contact for questions, comments and suggestions about the site: jonathan.e.cohen [at] gmail.com