Josh Breitzer
Cantor
Congregation Beth Elohim
Brooklyn
Age: 33
Nominated by: Rachel Timoner
Song: “Da Mei’ayin Bata,” Joshua Breitzer
As a classically trained musician, I have experienced art’s power to inspire. As a Jew, nowhere have I felt this more potently than during worship. In my cantorate I hold myself to the highest artistic standards, to use my voice to enable others’ voices, and to delve into the vast canon of Jewish music to enhance prayer, engage in study and expand our sense of the sacred. Whether by composing original liturgical settings, presenting timeless repertoire in contemporary ways, or teaching traditional melodies to the next generation, I seek to create meaningful opportunities for encountering God in the everyday. Ultimately I find Jewish music to be any music that, paraphrasing Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, makes the old become new and the new become holy. — Josh Breitzer
INFLUENCES: Mozart, Simon & Garfunkel, James Taylor, John Denver, Joe Raposo, Fred Rogers, Billy Joel, Eliyahu Schleifer and Lawrence Avery.
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
