SEARCH FOR SOOTHING SOUNDS.

Byline: Brent Hopkins Staff Writer

When Len Lawrence mourned his father, his mind wandered in its search for solace.

An observant Jew, he stayed home to sit shiva for a week. He paced around at home, looking for something spiritual to fill the long days of remembrance. Nothing fit the bill.

``The first few days are easy, but by the fourth one, I was sitting home, alone, and wanting some music,'' Lawrence recalled. ``I couldn't find anything.''

That was 13 years ago, back when he ran a carpet company in Long Beach and had just watched his father buried in Mount Sinai Memorial Park. He couldn't do much to find some nice Jewish music for a time of contemplation.

But now the gregarious New Yorker with the booming voice and the sharply pressed shirt is the general manager of the cemetery on a hillside south of Burbank and its companion facility in Simi Valley. He made some calls and got a CD made. And far beyond his expectations, that 11-track compilation, ``Scores of Memory,'' has become a sensation for Mount Sinai.

This isn't funeral music, Lawrence stresses. It's songs to use to contemplate and celebrate life. A mix of instrumental and vocal tunes, the album also incorporates both English and Hebrew lyrics, many based on traditional prayers.

The park originally printed 5,000 copies of the disc, which combines both traditional prayers and more contemporary tunes, figuring that it would give the album away for two years. It got so many requests that the discs were gone in six months, leading to a second pressing, a booklet celebrating Elul, the month before Rosh Hashanah, and an entirely new way of marketing the 50-year-old cemetery.

``Consumers tell us: Don't put the cemetery in our face,'' Lawrence said. ``Our job as a marketing organization is to be in people's consciousness when they need us.''

Spreading the word about a cemetery is a delicate task. Lawrence separates his business into two categories: at need, for the currently bereaved, and pre-need, for customers planning ahead. For the first group, Mount Sinai provides the disc free of charge as part of its mourning package. For the latter, it gives them out, also for free, but then follows up later on to inquire if the recipient has any need for a burial plot.

Though clearly popular, even producing an album presents an interesting challenge for the cemetery.

``What's ironic is here's another way that this cemetery's trying to help people after death, which is part of the Jewish tradition,'' said Jody Myers, a professor of religious studies and coordinator of the Jewish studies program at California State University, Northridge. ``But they're doing it in a way that goes against the tradition itself. You don't attend concerts, you don't play musical instruments for the first month (after someone dies), since it's a symbol of joy. That's regarded as disrespectful to the dead.''

But Jewish culture is hardly monolithic, Myers noted, with vast differences between the Orthodox, Conservative and Reform movements. While an Orthodox Jew might not take well to being offered music at a time of mourning, she said, other followers would likely welcome it.

``This is an attempt to provide people with a resource that aids them in the healing process,'' said Craig Taubman, a prominent Studio City-based figure in the Jewish music scene who produced the disc. ``This CD has provided people with options. If you're going through the mourning process, you don't have a ton of time to research this kind of music.''

Given the strong response so far, Lawrence hopes to eventually do a second disc with different tunes. While they cost only a nominal fee to distribute, the albums spread the word about Mount Sinai in a much more targeted way than a traditional advertisement. With an average funeral cost of between $8,000 and $10,000, the cost of producing and mailing out CDs seems almost inconsequential.

``When my father died, somehow Mount Sinai came to my head as the place to bury him,'' Lawrence said. ``He was from New York, I was in Long Beach, but someone did a good job of marketing to me. I'm trying to do the same thing, to provide a service to the Jewish community.''

Brent Hopkins, [phone]

brent.hopkins(at)dailynews.com

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Photo:

(color) Len Lawrence, general manager of Mount Sinai Memorial Park, has produced ``Scores of Memory,'' a CD of Jewish music.

Evan Yee/Staff Photographer