Just 17 days before Rosh Hashanah, Israeli singer Ishay Ribo electrified a sold-out Madison Square Garden audience with a heart-swelling performance on September 15, 2024 (12 Elul 5784).

Ribo’s second sold-out performance at the world’s most famous arena united a fanbase spanning the entire Jewish community—young and old, Orthodox and secular—for an evening of unity, belonging and Jewish pride after a painful year. “After so many sleepless nights and days filled with tears, we’re here together to sing a new song,” Ribo said. “Our unity tonight is the most profound response to the pain we’ve experienced.”

Bnei Akiva of the U.S. and Canada co-hosted the evening, aiming to provide a much-needed experience of unity after a trying year for the Jewish community.

As part of Ribo’s “Elul” tour, the performance featured a pulsing blend of chart-topping hits, soul-stirring melodies of prayer, and a song from a new album released just hours after the concert, “Yehi Ratzon,” devoted to hope for brighter days. Throughout the evening, the crowd danced, sang and celebrated their Jewish pride. Halfway through his song “Porchim Leshuvam,” Ribo paused after the words “return our captives,” turned to the parents of hostage Omer Neutra, and led an emotional prayer for their son’s return home as the arena-sized audience stood, applauded, and erupted in chants of, “Bring Them Home!”

Ribo vanished midway through the evening, reappearing amidst the audience with only his guitar to lead an intimate set of deeply emotional songs the crowd knew by heart. For a moment, the sound system fell silent as Jewish music’s largest audience poured their voices together as one into the vastness of the world’s premier concert venue.

Ribo was joined on stage by leading Israeli artists Eviatar Banai—who, like Ribo, attracts a fanbase spanning the entire Jewish community—and Idan Raichel, who, in 2013, became the first prominent singer to invite Ishay Ribo—then a young soldier from Jerusalem—to perform for a significant audience. Now, 11 years later, Ribo’s voice cracked with emotion as he welcomed Raichel to the world’s premier venue. “We’ve come full circle,” he said. “I don’t have words.”

At the height of a meteoric career that has now included two historic, sold-out concerts at New York’s most prestigious arena, Ribo humbly expressed his hope that this evening of unity would herald more joyful days ahead. Reinforcing the message of hope, Ribo ended his record-breaking performance by leaving the audience with a new album, “Sof Chama Lavo—The Sun Will Rise in the End.” “We pray the coming year will bring us all goodness, blessing and deliverance,” Ribo said.