Nicole Raviv, whose rendition of “The Star Spangled Banner” before a US hockey game on June 9 went viral, is trading in that song for “Hatikva” when she moves to Israel next month.
The Canadian-born, New York-based Raviv became an Internet sensation earlier this month as clips of her rendition of the American National Anthem before game six of the Stanley Cup playoffs between the New York Islanders and the Boston Bruins – she is Islanders’ resident anthem singer – were widely shared on social media.
In the previous Islanders’ playoff game for which she sang, game four, she had technical problems with her microphone and it went off for a few moments and the crowd jumped in, singing as loudly as possible to keep the song going and applauding as she was able to sing audibly again. For the sixth game’s anthem, she once again let the crowd have a moment to sing solo, then joined them with soaring vocals of her own, a moving moment of singer-crowd collaboration during a season in which no one is taking anything for granted when it comes to live events.
“We wanted to carry that spirit [of the crowd singing along] into game six. In game six, I actually made it a point to let them sing on their own for a moment, to give the crowd that moment,” she said in a recent interview. “It feels like you’re at the biggest concert of all time, we’re all singing together. Especially after COVID, this was very moving.”
But in spite of her success in the US, Raviv has decided that she would like to settle down in the country where she feels very much at home and is planning her move to Tel Aviv for early July.
“My ultimate home is Israel,” she said.
Her mother is the daughter of Romanian Holocaust survivors and her father was born in Morocco and both moved to Israel as children. She has spent a great deal of time in Israel.
“My parents spoke Hebrew to me at home, that’s why I am so confident in my Hebrew. My upbringing was a melting pot.”
Raviv, who moved to New York City for college, where she studied at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy and the New School University in Musical Theatre, is an independent recording artist and vocalist for live bands, as well as a national-anthem singer. She is currently working on a new song and video that will be released in July.
“I spent a lot of time during the last year working on my own music,” she said. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, professional sporting events took place in most of 2020 and the beginning of 2021 without a crowd and usually with recorded music.
“I just make music no matter where I am,” she said. Given her fluent Hebrew and her knowledge of the Israeli music scene, she is looking forward to continuing her career here.
Asked about Israeli musicians with whom she would like to collaborate, she said, “I love Idan Raichel. I just released a cover of one of his songs. I want to grow my talent and develop an international career.”