Try this for a riddle: Name one song that you can hear synagogue youth groups singing in Canada and the USA, Israeli soldiers singing in border outposts, and Kabbala scholars humming while immersed in their learning. Here’s your answer – Yosef Karduner’s Shir Hamaalot. Rebbe Nachman of Breslev is more than explicit about the qualities that [...]

Ehud Banai is an Israeli singer and songwriter. Banai, of Persian Jewish and Afghan Jewish descent, was born in Jerusalem to the actor Yaakov Banai, the eldest of the Banai siblings, and moved to Givataim at the age of  four. At the age of ten he learned to play the cello, and listened to Elvis [...]

In the fall of 2007, a few students at Yeshiva University came to a startling realization: Jewish collegiate a cappella groups had been formed on almost every college campus with a substantial Jewish student community – every campus, that was, except for YU! This realization soon led to the formation of the Maccabeats, YU’s all-male a capella group. [...]

Fueled by a strong, Jewish identity and anchored by thumping beatbox, intricate arrangements, and soulful harmonies, Six13 is a six-man vocal band that brings an unprecedented style of Jewish music to the stage. With songs ranging from hip-hop dance tracks to rock anthems, the members of the New York-based group sound like a full band [...]

The unusual story of  Shmuel Skaist begins when he was a rabbi in a yeshiva high school for boys in New York area. Trying to come up with a way to get his unruly teenage students to stay seated and actually listen, he attempted something unconventional — he brought in his guitar and started playing. [...]

A Chabad Baal T’shuva, Prodezra Beats – L’Shem Shamayim (Reuben Formey) hails from Savannah, GA where he started making beats as a hobby in early high school with just an old Casio board & computer. Being a member of school bands from a young age contributed to his knack for creating hard-hitting tracks early on. [...]

The Klezmatics take one of the wildest approaches to klezmer, the traditional dance music of the Eastern European Jews. Although their music is heavily influenced by the recordings of Abe Ellstein and Dave Tarras in the 1940s and 1950s, their lyrics comment on a wide variety of political and social issues and have led the [...]

Podcasts on Tisha B’Av by David Sacks David Sacks is a television writer and producer. His writing and producing credits  include  The Simpsons,  3rd Rock From the Sun,  Malcolm in the Middle,  The Tick and Murphy Brown.  The only Simpsons episode Sacks has written is the season six episode “Fear of Flying”. Born and raised in New [...]

Mark Olf was for many years one of the best-known singers and composers of Yiddish and Hebrew songs in America. Born in Russia before the revolution, he emigrated to the United States as a boy and lived on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. He became a teacher at the Henry Street Settlement, and he [...]

Willy Schwarz’s vision has always been eclectic. After decades spent absorbing music from around the globe, Willy has alchemically transformed his experience into songs – songs that reflect his love for the dozens of traditions he’s studied, yet maintain the unity of conception and imagination that is the prerogative of a master storyteller and a [...]

Andy Statman is known both for his clarinet and mandolin playing, and he is equally adept at both.  Sometimes his two worlds collide, but East Flatbush Blues finds him sticking to his strings, while the simultaneously recorded Awakening from Above is meant to showcase Statman’s clarinet work. He’s a restless performer with deep roots in [...]

Chassidism are of the mystical branch of Judaism. Besides Talmudic study, a key vehicle is song with dance, which are essentially breathing, sound vibration, and movement meditations. From an encounter with the Lubavitcher order and Reb Meanchem Schneerson and participation with folksinger Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, Mike Tabor carries on the musical tradition, particularly the nigunim, [...]

Matisyahu initially seemed a novelty: a Lubavitch Hasidic Jew rapping and singing over a reggae groove. Except it became clear under further inspection that his music was not a novelty, but a careful construction of the various elements that had influenced the young man as much as his religion. His first volume of recordings from [...]

David Grisman and Andy Statman have made two previous duet albums: the free form Mandolin Abstractions (1982) and Songs of Our Fathers (1995), a tribute to the two musicians’ Jewish heritage. New Shabbos Waltz is a follow-up to the latter, a set of all-instrumental recordings drawn from traditional Jewish repertoire, some quite ancient, some more [...]

World-renowned Brave Old World has set new standards in creating, performing and teaching klezmer and New Jewish Music since 1989.  Combining the soulfulness of Yiddish tradition, the finesse of classical music and the vitality of jazz, the music of  Brave Old World is unique and unforgettable. Klezmer music traces back to the dance music played [...]