Program Description
Event Details
Join us at Collected Works Bookstore for a Yiddish sing-a-long and concert with Jordan Wax!
Jordan performs both traditional songs and his own original compositions in Yiddish, the traditional language of Ashkenazi Jews. His debut full-length studio album of original Yiddish songs, The Heart Deciphers | טײַטש, is out now on Borscht Beat (Visit borschtbeat.bandcamp.com/album/the-heart-deciphers).
This concert is intended for adult ages but all are welcome to attend!
Jordan Wax is a multi-instrumentalist, singer, composer, and traditional musician based in New Mexico. For the past twenty five years he has studied intergenerational music traditions with elders from a variety of cultural lineages in the Missouri Ozarks, Central Mexico, Ecuador, Northern New Mexico, and Greater Yiddishland, and directed his own collaborative ensembles in the context of Ashkenazi, Ozark, and Indo-Hispanic cultural revitalizations. He performs traditional Yiddish songs and new compositions as a soloist, norteño and Central-Mexican traditions with Mariachi Sonidos del Monte and his own ensemble, Lone Piñon, and creates bilingual children’s programming that helps families and infants establish a positive context around linguistic diversity and regionalism in partnership with the Santa Fe Public Libraries.
Wax’s innovative compositions are rooted his own deep Diaspora communities and in three decades of friendships with elders who have imparted the subtleties of spoken secular Yiddish and the musical sensibilities of the of the professional klezmer–not as heirlooms to be preserved, but as pathways to Yiddish continuity, vitality, and relevance which must be be renewed in each generation through radical creativity and cross-cultural pollination with the rhythms of Yiddish’s diasporic homes. The linguistic and musical dialects of his work align his original songs with the stories and embodied memories of his ancestors, voices which are summoned to reflect on climate collapse, perpetual war, the epidemic of abuse, the moral ambiguity of social media, and the complexities of cultural resistance and objectification in late-stage Capitalism. His debut album, The Heart Deciphers, released in January 2025 by Borscht Beat, blends the sounds of klezmer/lautari ensembles from Moldova with rock aesthetics from the American Southwest. As the first full-length studio album of songwriting to come from his generation in America, the album and live show are testaments to the magic that has sustained secular Yiddish creativity and cultural continuity in the face of incredible odds and a prayer for its availability to future generations.
In 2024 Jordan participated in the Center for New Jewish Culture’s year-long fellowship with an interdisciplinary cohort of groundbreaking Jewish artists, and in 2025 received the Freed Fellowship for rising leaders in Yiddish and Jewish culture in conjunction with his work performing and curating programs for KlezKanada’s summer retreat in Montreal. In 2024 he served as a New Mexico Humanities Council Speaker and, along with his fellow Lone Piñoneros, present in rural communities across New Mexico about cultural abundance and complexity in New Mexico’s traditional music legacy. In 2022 his work to revitalize creativity and community around a rare Northern New Mexico figure dance called el taleán was funded by the Northern Río Grande National Heritage Area, and his effort to renew community dances based on the unique repertoire of Northern New Mexico social dance figures was sponsored by New Mexico Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2019 Jordan received the Parsons Award from the American Folklife Center, which brought him to the Library of Congress in Washington DC to study the Library’s collection of field recordings of Northern New Mexican musicians, and was invited to teach and perform Northern New Mexico fiddle and dance alongside traditional masters from across North America and Europe at Centrum’s Festival of American Fiddle Tunes in Port Townsend, WA. In the same year his work with Lone Piñon was endorsed by the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures, who described the project as “Truly exceptional… A leading ensemble committed to the preservation and elevation of the traditional musical forms of the Northern New Mexico region….an ensemble that embodies cultural integrity for the purpose of continuing treasured art forms that keep our communities thriving.” To learn more about Jordan Wax visit jordanwax.com.
Presented as part of the Yiddish Book Center's Public Libraries Program, in partnership with the ALA and funded by the Lilly Endowment, Inc. Made possible by the Friends of the Santa Fe Public Library.
This event is presented in partnership with Collected Works Bookstore & Coffeehouse.
For 47 years, Collected Works has served as Santa Fe’s source for all things literary. As the city’s oldest locally owned independent bookstore, they're just a few blocks from the historic downtown Plaza—an inviting space where book lovers gather, ideas flourish, and stories come to life. Visit collectedworksbookstore.com.
The Yiddish Book Center’s Public Libraries Program brings Yiddish literature in translation to public libraries across the United States to deepen their engagement with Yiddish literature and Jewish life, religion, and culture, and to foster vibrant cross-cultural dialogue and discussion in their communities.
Each year, the Center works with 40 libraries in communities across the United States. The current theme is Between Two Worlds: Exploring Jewish Culture and Religion through Yiddish Literature. Visit yiddishbookcenter.org.
The Friends of the Santa Fe Public Library is an independent non-profit organization whose mission is to support the public library by providing funding, advocacy, programming, services, and materials that enrich the diverse community it serves. Visit santafelibraryfriends.org.