Clergy
Meet our clergy.
Rabbi Adam Baldachin
Rabbi Baldachin joined Shaarei Tikvah in July 2016, drawn by the community’s energy and warmth. He previously served as the rabbi of Montebello Jewish Center in Rockland County. There, he founded the Rockland Clergy for Social Justice, a group of Jewish, Christian and Muslim clerics advocating for fair and equitable education for the public school students of East Ramapo, a district controlled by an ultra-Orthodox school board.
Rabbi Baldachin has also served communities as close as Riverdale, NY and Frederick, MD, and as far as Israel and Uganda. In Uganda he worked with the Abayudaya, the local Jewish Community, teaching Hebrew, leading services, and helping to build sustainable businesses.
A native of New Providence, NJ, Rabbi Baldachin earned his undergraduate degree from the Joint Program of Columbia University and the Jewish Theological Seminary. He then completed his Rabbinical Degree with an M.A. in Midrash at the Seminary, where he received the prestigious Gladstein Fellowship in Entrepreneurial Rabbinic Leadership. He also completed extensive training in community organizing with JOIN for Justice and in pastoral care, interning as a chaplain at Self Help with Holocaust survivors.
Contact Rabbi Baldachin via email (rabbi@shaareitikvah.org) or through the synagogue office or directly at 914-472-2013 x301.
cantor josh ehrlich
Cantor Josh Ehrlich is a composer, lyricist, arranger, accompanist, music director, music educator and, as of July 2023, the newest member of the clergy team at Shaarei Tikvah.
Born and raised in Highland Park, NJ, he first developed a love of Jewish music while singing z’mirot around the Shabbat dinner table with his family. Cantor Ehrlich earned a B.A. in linguistics from Yale University and an M.A. in music composition from Rutgers University. Before receiving cantorial ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary, he served as music director at Golda Och Academy, Leffell High School, and Camp Ramah in the Berkshires.
Cantor Ehrlich has written nearly a thousand musical theatre orchestrations and a cappella arrangements. He made his Off-Broadway compositional debut in 2017 with The Imbible: Day Drinking—an all a cappella musical—which enjoyed an open-ended run at New World Stages for three years. In 2019, he composed The Choral Torah: Five Books in Four Parts, a song cycle of fifty-four eclectic choral settings of biblical text (one for every Torah portion) that was published in May 2021 by The Cantors Assembly. Finally, he is the director and co-founder (with his partner, Leilah Rosen) of The Choral Torah Collective, a choir of Judaeo-musical educators that performs and promotes musical and biblical literacy.
He is thrilled to be joining the warm, spiritually curious and musically creative community at Shaarei Tikvah. As a cantor, he hopes to continue using fresh four-part harmony to reanimate our most ancient words and to create interfaith choirs which transcend religious boundaries through shared harmony.
Contact Cantor Ehrlich via email (cantorehrlich@shaareitikvah.org) or through the synagogue office or directly at 914-472-2013 x304.
Cantor Gerald Cohen
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Cantor Gerald Cohen is a cantor, teacher and composer whose life and work are infused with his love of music, Judaism and family. He has been the Cantor at Shaarei Tikvah (and one of its predecessor congregations) since 1987 and feels so fortunate to have participated in the lives and life cycles of our families over the course of so many years. He adds a rich musical dimension to our community, with annual concerts and the introduction of his beautiful new melodies for traditional prayers. Cantor Cohen also serves on the faculties of the Jewish Theological Seminary and Hebrew Union College and has taught so many in our own community as they learn to read Torah, Haftorah and lead prayer. As a composer, he has been praised for his “linguistic fluidity and melodic gift” (Gramophone Magazine) and has earned critical accolades for his chamber, choral, opera, solo vocal, and sacred music. He received his B.A. in music from Yale University, and his doctorate in music composition from Columbia University. Recognition of Cohen’s body of work includes commissioning grants from Meet the Composer, National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, and American Composers Forum. www.geraldcohenmusic.com
He can be contacted at 914-472-2013x304 or cantor@shaareitikvah.org