Shlomo Carlebach (1925–1994) was a rabbi, composer, and influential Jewish spiritual figure, widely known as 'The Singing Rabbi' or 'Reb Shlomo.' Born on January 14, 1925, in Berlin, Germany, into a prominent rabbinical family, he was the son of Rabbi Hartwig Naftali Carlebach and had a twin brother, Eli Chaim, and a sister, Shulamith Levovitz. The family fled Nazi persecution, moving through Austria, Switzerland, Lithuania, and arriving in the United States in the late 1930s. Carlebach studied at leading Lithuanian-style yeshivas in the US, including Yeshiva Torah Vodaath, Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin, and Beth Medrash Gevoha, receiving rabbinic ordination from Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner. He became fluent in English at age 26 after studying at Columbia University and a Hebrew ulpan at the Jewish Theological Seminary.

Ordained as a rabbi, he initially worked with Chabad-Lubavitch as an emissary from 1951–1954, using music and teaching to engage Jewish youth on college campuses. He later pioneered the baal teshuva movement, attracting hippies and disaffected Jews through charismatic storytelling, Hasidic teachings from traditions like Peshischa, Breslov, Ishbitz, and Piaseczno, and song-filled services. He founded the House of Love and Prayer synagogue in San Francisco, Carlebach Shul in Manhattan, and Moshav Me'or Modi'im in Israel, where he resided periodically. Traveling extensively across the US, Israel, Europe, South Africa, and Canada, he blended Orthodox roots with neo-Hasidic warmth.

A prolific composer, Carlebach created over 1,000 niggunim based on Torah, Psalms, and prayers, including staples like Am Yisrael Chai and Veha'er Einenu. Unable to read music, he recorded dozens of albums from 1959 to 1994, influencing Jewish music and the 1960s counterculture; he was posthumously inducted into the Jewish Music Hall of Fame in 2022. Native in Yiddish, he was fluent in English and Hebrew, developing a unique Yiddish-English hybrid.

In 1972, he married Elaine Neila Glick, with whom he had daughters Neshama (a musician) and Nedara (Dari). Carlebach faced posthumous allegations of serial sexual misconduct, including harassment, assault, and abuse of women and girls as young as 12, with reports emerging in 1998 and his daughter Neshama addressing the issue in 2018. No formal charges were filed before his death from a heart attack on October 20, 1994, at age 69, at LaGuardia Airport en route to Canada. He is buried in Jerusalem's Har HaMenuchot, and his legacy endures through annual memorials, though communities remain divided on his controversies.