Cantor Ira S. Bigeleisen

Our Cantor since 1993, Cantor Bigeleisen came to Adat Ari El after serving at Park Avenue Synagogue in New York.  He received his Cantorial Diploma from the Belz School of Music at Yeshiva University in 1985.  In 1974, he received his Bachelor’s degree from Emerson College.

In addition to the traditional role as Cantor of a major conservative Synagogue, Cantor Bigeleisen is especially proud of his work creating our Friday evening services, our B’nai Mitzvah program and the coveted One Shabbat Morning, the innovative Saturday morning service which he conceived with Craig Taubman and Rabbi Moshe J. Rothblum.  Each of these special programs has won awards from organizations within the Jewish community at large. 

Outside of our community, Cantor Bigeleisen is involved in the Cantor’s Assembly and is a member of the faculty of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies.  He is also the founding director of the LA Zimriyah Chorale that sing and spread joy within and outside of the Adat Ari El community.

Cantor Bigeleisen is a Hazzan’s Hazzan, performing and giving sessions for the Cantors’ Assembly, the American Conference of Cantors and the Israel Institute of Cantorial Art.  He was the first Cantor in Residence for the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism’s International Convention.  A world authority in the Nusach of prewar Germany, he recreated services from Berlin, Frankfurt and Munchen at the Voice of Ashkenaz Conference at the Jewish Theological Seminary and Lincoln Center.  He served as the Cantor at the re-dedication of the Rykestrasse Synagogue in Berlin, Germany in 2007 – its first use as a Synagogue since it was vandalized by the Nazis in 1938.

Cantor Bigeleisen is highly regarded both as a composer with commissions from many Synagogues and as an interpreter of Jewish and Yiddish music.  He was a featured soloist in the ABC-TV national broadcast of a Weekday Maariv Service, At Evening I Seek You.  He is featured as a soloist on: One Shabbat Morning, and In Good Company (compositions by Robert Strassburg and Michael Isaacson with the Los Angeles Zimriyah Chorale), and most recently, B’yad Moshe: the Music of Moshe J. Rothblum.

Ira is married to Debra Yanover and they have a lovely daughter, Tovah.

Email Cantor Ira Bigeleisen
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