Jewish Group Wins Canadian Music Award

Image by Courtesy Jaffa Road
Toronto-based Jewish world music group Jaffa Road keeps racking up honors. Most recently, the band was named World Group of the Year at the 2013 Canadian Folk Music Awards, which took place over the weekend in Calgary.

Image by Courtesy Jaffa Road
Jaffa Road’s second album, “Where the Light Gets In” (2012) was nominated for a JUNO Award this year. The group’s debut album, “Sunplace,” also scored a JUNO nomination, and the group has won Best World Music Artist at the Toronto Independent Music Awards.
“Jaffa Road blends Jewish, jazz, Indian and Arabic music with electronica and dub. The result is fantastic,” said CBC Radio One.
“I am thrilled, Jaffa Road just won WORLD MUSIC GROUP OF THE YEAR, at the Canadian Folk Music Awards (CFMA). There is so much great roots music at the CFMAs and in Canada in general. It is such an honor to even be nominated, so glad to get this acknowledgement,” posted Jaffa Road member Aaron Lightstone, who plays guitars, ud, saz, synthesizers, on Facebook Sunday night.
The other members of the group are vocalist Aviva Chernick, bass player Chris Gartner, percussionist Jeff Wilson and saxophonist Sundar Viswanathan. Guest artists on “Where the Light Gets In” include Aaron Bensoussan (Arabic voice), Mike Rennie (voice and violin), Yair Dalal (violin,) and Amir Amiri (santoor).
Chernick’s solo project, “When I Arrived You Where Already there,” an album of devotional music, garnered her a nomination for World Music Solo Artist of the Year at the CFMA’s.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
- 2
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 3
Fast Forward The invitation said, ‘No Jews.’ The response from campus officials, at least, was real.
- 4
Opinion A Holocaust perpetrator was just celebrated on US soil. I think I know why no one objected.
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward J.B. Pritzker accuses Trump of ‘disparaging the very foundation of Judaism’
-
Fast Forward Trump on Iran: ‘If we don’t make a deal, I’ll be leading the pack’ into war
-
Opinion No, Pete Hegseth and Itamar Ben-Gvir don’t look alike — but that’s where the differences end
-
News Why Zohran Mamdani believes he’ll win over Jewish voters, as Israel critic surges to second behind Cuomo in NYC mayoral race
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.