Shabbat Shirah
Unlike the other special Shabbatot, Shabbat Shirah does not have an additional reading, but rather is dictated by the presence of a standard reading. Shabbat Shirah is the Shabbat when we read Parshat Beshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16), which is the Torah portion that includes the Song at the Sea.
Tradition teaches that there are only ten true Songs (Shirot, the plural of Shirah) in the history of the world. These true Songs are not mere melodies; they are expressions of the harmony of creation and mark monumental transitions in history. Another of these Songs appears on the haftarah portion for the week (Judges 4:4-5:31): the Song of Deborah. The Song of Songs is, of course, one of the Ten Songs. Interestingly, the Tenth Song has not yet been sung: it is the Song of the coming of the Mashiach, which will be sung at the End of Days (see Isaiah 26:1).
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That would have been this past Shabbat, in which I skipped Torah study because I was tired and cranky and saving my energy for the Tu B'Shevat seder. (I shouldn't skip Torah study for those reasons, since it's usually quite renewing; even when I go in cranky, I usually come out calmer.)
I'll try to remember for next year.
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Further research brought me to this (footnote indicators removed for readability):
We don’t sing when we are frightened, despairing, sleepy, or after a heavy meal. We sing when we are pining after one we love, when we are yearning for better times, when we are celebrating an achievement or anticipating a revelation.
We don’t sing when we are complacent. We sing when we are striving for something, or when we have tasted joy and are climbing it to the heavens.
Song is prayer, the endeavor to rise above the petty cares of life and cleave to one’s source. Song is our quest for redemption.
The Midrash enumerates ten preeminent songs in the history of Israel—ten occasions on which our experience of redemption found expression in melody and verse. The first nine are: the song sung on the night of the Exodus in Egypt, the “Song at the Sea,” the “Song at the Well,” Moses’ song upon his completion of writing the Torah, the song with which Joshua stopped the sun, Deborah’s song, King David’s song, the song at the dedication of the Holy Temple, and King Solomon’s “Song of Songs” extolling the love between the Divine Groom and His bride Israel.
The tenth song, says the Midrash, will be the shir chadash, the “new song” of the ultimate redemption: a redemption that is global and absolute; a redemption that will annihilate all suffering, ignorance, jealousy and hate from the face of the earth; a redemption of such proportions that the yearning it evokes, and the joy it brings, require a new song—a completely new musical vocabulary—to capture the voice of Creation’s ultimate striving.
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I do sing when I'm frightened and despairing, sad and anxious, depressed and lonely. To sing, you have to breathe, and remembering to breathe lets me release at least a little bit of whatever pressure's weighing on me. I think I've mentioned before, one aspect of our congregation that really drew me in was all the singing. I agree completely with the above that "song is prayer"; it's long been easier for me to pray in music instead of (or in addition to) words.
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