It’s the most chametz-free time of the year!
That’s right, Passover is coming this year on April 1 — which is maybe too soon to start planning your menu, but soon enough for Kveller to kick off our most beloved annual tradition: our Passover parody contest.
In case you missed it, for the last three years, we here at Kveller have run a super special competition of wit and rhyme. We ask our readers to submit the lyrics of Passover-themed parodies of popular songs, our audience votes on their personal favorites and then we get a special Jewish artist to record their lyrical masterpiece and produce the music video of our Passover dreams.
In 2023, we got Eliana Light to record Adam Singer’s excellent Taylor Swift parody, which turned her iconic “Anti Hero” into “Evil Pharaoh” (we’re still singing “here’s my plea/let my people go free!” to the tune of that impossibly catchy chorus).
In 2024, we took everyone back to Y2K with none other than Broadway (and podcasting) star Jonah Platt making matzah brei in a bathrobe while singing Matt Slater’s wonderfully unhinged “(Matzah) Brei Brei Brei,” a very needed take on N*SYNC’s “Bye Bye Bye.”
And just when we thought we couldn’t possibly outdo ourselves, parody master and rabbi Jaclyn Cohen swung in on her matzah ball and hit it out of the park with her recording of Gordon Lustig’s “Matzah Balls,” a sensational parody of Miley Cyrus’s “Wrecking Ball” that had us howling with laughter (and also completely changed the way we think about certain structures at the playground).
All that to say, this year, we have no choice but to raise the bar, which means we need the best Jewish minds to send us your Passover parodies now!
Can the “Life of a Showgirl” be about Miriam and her timbrels? Is Moses the man Olivia Dean needs? Can Bad Bunny retell the Passover story? Is it a Celine Dion Passover parody that we need near, far, and wherever we are this holiday season? The world of music is your oyster (insert a less treyf metaphor here).
How to Enter Kveller’s 2026 Passover Parody Contest:
Send us the lyrics to your Passover parody — as a Word doc, PDF, or just in the body of an e-mail — to contest@kveller.com. The deadline to submit is March 3. That means it’s time to get cracking (like those seder eggs)!
The Kveller team will choose the finalists, and you, dear Kveller readers, will get to vote for the winning parody, so even if writing songs is not your forte, you still have so much power in your hands!
By submitting to this contest, you are also granting permission for Kveller to include your parody in an upcoming Passover parody songbook. (More details on that very exciting project soon!) Kveller editors will be in touch with all contest finalists and those who will be included in the book in March.
We truly can’t wait to read (and sing) what you come up with.
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