Sasha Spielberg Fell In Love With Singing... During Her Haftarah Portion

Sasha Spielberg still has her seventh grade diary. She wrote in it daily, chronicling her crushes, rehashing friend drama, and counting down the days to her bat mitzvah. And when the day finally came, she stole a few minutes between the service and her party to journal her thoughts in real-time. “Ok, it was my bat mitzvah service this morning, I can’t believe it. I feel so accomplished. Even if I messed some things up I really felt loved with all the people there to love me,” Spielberg wrote. “I sang well and made many people cry — in a good way!”

Ahead of her bat mitzvah, Spielberg had three dream professions: a hip hop dancer, an actress, or a fashion designer. (The latter even informed her bat mitzvah theme, which was “Fashionably Sasha.”) But after nailing the vocals of her haftarah portion, Spielberg’s future began to crystalize. “My bat mitzvah was my coming out party in terms of singing. I had a secret passion for it but no one in my family knew I could sing,” she tells me. “Usually I had such stage fright, but I was so focused on getting the Hebrew right that I let my voice do its own thing. Once I saw that I was capable of singing in front of a crowd I was so excited to pursue music.”

The 30-year-old has been singing ever since, now performing under the stage name Buzzy Lee. Over the years, Spielberg’s released an E.P. (Facepaint), formed the band Wardell with her brother, and recorded hit songs like “Coolhand.” But Spielberg’s most recent work is a return to her middle school form. You can catch her on Instagram, playing the keyboard while crooning quotes from her early aughts diary entries like, “I neeeeeeeeed a BF!” 

Because for Spielberg, it all goes back to being that awkward, adolescent bat mitzvah girl who surprised herself with the power of her own talents. “I remember looking around at one point and I was just like, "Fashionably Sasha? I'm a singer now," she says. Read on for her reflections on her big party — and her first kiss. 

sashaspielberg

Diary entry, November 1, 2002

September 15, 2020

On “Fashionably Sasha”: 

I had a fake red carpet and when guests would walk down it they’d be asked, “What’s the most fashionable thing about Sasha?” When I say I was the least fashionable person, my guests were literally grasping at straws when it came to that question. I remember rewatching the tapes of their answers and my aunt being like, "Well what's fashionable about Sasha is that… she accessorizes?"

On dueting with Melissa Etheridge: 

At the party I sang “Greatest Love of All” by Whitney Houston with Melissa Etheridge, who’s a very dear family friend. Growing up I was obsessed with Cristina Aguilera and I wanted to sing like her and one day Melissa was over at our house and I showed her a song I wrote on the guitar. And I started crying after and was like, "But I can't sing it like Christina Aguilera. My voice isn't as good as hers." Melissa was like, "Does Christina Aguilera write her own songs? No, Linda Perry does." She made the case that I wrote my own songs and I could have my own voice, it was very influential.

On feeling beautiful on her bat mitzvah day: 

I really wanted to be pretty when I was younger. I just didn’t feel beautiful. But on the night of my bat mitzvah my mom did my makeup, my hair was blown out, I wore a black strapless little ‘50s Marc Jacobs dress — and it felt like I could possibly, for one night, be really beautiful. Cinderella style. Which is quite Hollywood in its mentality, but also a universal feeling. I just remember how much I wanted to feel wanted and desired. I don’t know if it was wanting to be carnally desired, but I did want boys to think I was pretty. And on that night I really did feel beautiful. 

On being desperate for her first kiss:

At that age all I wanted was a boyfriend. I was obsessed with getting my first kiss. So I had my older brother invite all of his friends to the party and I was just so happy to have 14-year-old boys there. I think that my mom felt for me at that point in my life. I was at an all girls school, I wasn't the cutest gal in the world, so she wrangled the troops and let his friends come. 

I ultimately got my first kiss later that year and it was during 50 First Dates. I went to go see it in theaters with a boy named Madison who I met on Friendster. I found out later that I was a bad kisser and I was so upset. In my diary I wrote, "He said I was a bad kisser, but come on! Cut me some slack, it was my first kiss!"

On her parents’ rules for letting her go to bar mitzvahs: 

In seventh grade I was going to one bar mitzvah a weekend. Which was so, so wonderful, but it also meant that I had to keep my room pristine. If I had a messy room — even if there was dust on the corner of my desk — I was grounded and couldn’t go to the bar mitzvah. And I cannot say that’s the same now. Now I’ve got no social life and no clean room. 

This interview has been edited and condensed.