Jordan Shai Franzel

CANTOR JORDAN S. FRANZEL serves Congregation Or Ami in Lafayette Hill, PA. He received his Masters of Sacred Music from HUC - JIR - Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music and was ordained as a Cantor in 1996. Prior to his pulpit in Pennsylvania, Cantor Franzel served Central Synagogue in New York City and the Touro Synagogue in New Orleans, Louisiana. He has been on the faculty of the URJ east coast Kallah and was a guest faculty at the Hava Nashira Institute, a retreat for Jewish songleaders and musicians. Jordan has written numerous Torah commentaries for the Union for Reform Judaism, has served on the editorial board for the Union Songbook, Shireinu and the complete Shireinu. Cantor Franzel can be heard on CD's: "Soul On Fire," and "Labor of Love," the two CD's of Danny Maseng's liturgical music. Jordan can also be heard on his own CD's of liturgical music, The Music of Cantor Jordan S Franzel volumes 1 & 2.

Cantor Franzel is a serious devotee of meditation and Jewish mysticism, specifically Kabbalah and Chasidut, and has been studying the writings and spiritual systems of several Kabbalah masters, including Rebbe Nachman of Breslov, for the last 25 years. Like his Rebbe, Jordan loves to tell stories as a means of facillitating spiritual experiences and believes that his liturgical musical compositions, in a similar way, does the same. Cantor Franzel is a member of the American Conference of Cantors and is a fellow of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality.