Humans of Hebrew College Cantor-in-Training

“Growing up in the URJ camp circuit, Dan Nichols was (and still is) a huge name. Debbie Friedman – she was like the Beatles of the Reform Jewish music — Noah Aronson, Elana Arian, and Alan Goodis are big musical influences of mine. So is my good friend Jacob ‘Spike’ Kraus, who is one of the newer folks bursting on the songwriting scene; he writes really cool, contemporary Jewish music. You hear it, and it sounds like top-40 pop music that you’d hear on the radio. Those folks have been big influences on the way that I share music, and they also empower me to try my hand at writing music. I’ve never been brave enough to write my own songs — I do a ton of arranging and sharing of other folks’ melodies — but these talented contemporaries and predecessors in in the Jewish songwriting world give me the courage to give writing my own stuff a try.”

— DJ Fortine, Cantorial Ordination for Spiritual and Educational Leadership (COSEL) student