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Jordan and I meet at Lost Sock Roasters in Takoma Park one beautiful summer afternoon. Jordan, hailing from DC, chats about what keeps him coming back to the DMV, his passion for acapella, why he’s looking for DIY energy in his emerging Jewish community, and the memoir he’s finishing for his grandfather!
Samuel: You grew up in Forest Hills in DC. What’s kept you in the DMV?
Jordan: I live [near Takoma Park], but I’m moving to about a ten minute walk from my parents in Van Ness with my girlfriend. I went to preschool at Adas Israel’s preschool, then went to Milton, then Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School for high school. Just about all the Jewish schools in the area. Then I was in New Orleans for grad school, but got a job in DC and came back. I love DC, and having my network and a lot of family around.
Samuel: What was it like, moving away and then coming back? Did you feel like you were returning to your community, or building something from scratch?
Jordan: I was not tremendously involved in Jewish life. I had lots of friends, and a great network, and was involved in some stuff, but didn’t have what I’d call a community.
Samuel: What’s the distinction between a network and community?
Jordan: I had friends, and did stuff. That’s my network, I’ll say. But there wasn’t an overarching structure to it, which I guess is how I define community – being part of a larger organization, whether that’s a synagogue, or volunteering, or something else. A place where you have a group of people who meet regularly with some sort of structure to it. And I didn’t have that.
This time around, I’m being much more purposeful about wanting to join groups that align with my values. I want to join a synagogue. I want a little more structure to my life. I’m 33. A lot of my friends are married and have kids, so now you need more direction to create openings for people to get together. We’re not just sitting around waiting for a text to do something anymore.
Samuel: What does that searching process look like for you?
Jordan: I’ve talked to my partner a good bit about it, I talk to friends, and have just started hearing about all the different organizations that young Jewish people go to. One thing that attracts me to the sort of punk rock, DIY Jewish spaces is the concept of “zero-basing” something. Adjusting your budget year-over-year you might say: Here’s the budget from last year, and we’re going to twist the knobs a bit. Shrink here, grow here. Or, instead, you can start over and take nothing for granted.
Samuel: Like, if we were starting over from scratch, what would we include? What would we emphasize?
Jordan: Exactly. And you can still pull on the same traditions, the same ideas, but we can decide what we want our Judaism to look like. We’re trying to do all the things we love – coming together, praying, singing songs, and just being in space together – but also knowing that we can approach those things from a new baseline, where we’re sharing this space and also asking: Why are we getting together? What’s the point of this? What do we want Judaism to be for the next thousand years? What should we be doing with our time?
Samuel: I know you’re part of JewKvox, and you mentioned singing as a piece of your Jewish practice. Tell me about the group and how music has figured into your Jewish life.
Jordan: I’ve played music since I was ten years old – guitar, bass, a garage band in high school. I joined my high school’s acapella choir, which did both Jewish and pop music. I was in an acapella group in college – shoutout to the University of Rochester Yellowjackets. That was a special time. It happened to be the moment where Pitch Perfect was coming out and acapella hit this fever pitch. We auditioned and got on this TV show called The Sing-Off. We had crazy talented people in the group, and it pushed me to another level. Not just talented, but also ambitious people, who said that we should go out and try these crazy things. I learned so much about music, and also got ready to lead and be ambitious in my hobbies. If there are cool things you can do, you should try and do them!
Then I came to DC and JewKvox didn’t have a beatboxer anymore, so I joined that group. I was 24 at the time, and the next youngest person was maybe in their 50s. I was “the young guy,” but it was fun having a social outlet with some people who were older than me. We performed at all sorts of Jewish functions, and I was gone from the group in New Orleans for three years, and then Covid happened, but we’re really starting to pick it back up again this year as everything’s gone back to normal.
Samuel: What’s the religious resonance of music for you?
Jordan: Music is just the most universal human language. It’s innate. You don’t need to speak the same language or understand the words, but you can walk into a synagogue and sing the same melodies people have been singing for hundreds of years. There’s something really beautiful about that. Spirituality and music is like peanut butter and jelly. I love it.
Samuel: Okay, a few quick ones to close. What’s something you’re bad at?
Jordan: Planning. I’m a feelings-y, in-the-moment guy.
Samuel: What is something you’re feeling proud about right now?
Jordan: I’ve been working on my grandfather’s memoir for the past two-and-a-half years. Both my grandmother and grandfather survived the Holocaust under false documentation in Berlin for basically the whole war. He kept diaries, and I’ve been working with a ghostwriter and my aunt to finish it and send it out.
Samuel: What have you learned in that process?
Jordan: I wish I’d known this when I was younger: Ask your grandparents, your parents, your aunts, your uncles, about their lives. Don’t be shy or sheepish. I would encourage everyone to do that.
The other thing is that my grandfather got very involved in social justice, having been persecuted in his life. He felt like it was his responsibility then to fight against any type of persecution in the world. That’s the more heady takeaway.
Samuel: You can invite any three people to Shabbat dinner. Who are you bringing?
Jordan: Jimi Hendrix – one of the fathers of modern rock’n’roll. I’m sure he has some crazy stories. This is hard…I’d invite Matthew Berry — my fantasy football ride or die — and my grandfather, Ernest, to show him his finished book.
Samuel: Last one. Finish the sentence: When Jews of the DMV gather…
Jordan: Great things happen!
PS: Want to get in contact with Jordan and his acapella group? Email them here!
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