Laurel Shader, a member of Temple Emanuel since 1985, has been a High Holy Day cantorial soloist at TE since 1996. She has also been the music director/arranger for the Temple Emanuel house band since its debut in the fall of 2009. By day, Laurel is the chair of the Department of Pediatrics at the Fair Haven Community Health Center. She lives in Orange with her husband, Jon Zonderman, and is the mother of two musical young adults, Anna and Jacob Zonderman.
Anna Zonderman has been a cantorial soloist at Temple Emanuel since 2004. She also leads the children’s High Holy Day services at TE. She was a member of the Elm City Girls’ Choir from 1994-2006 when she graduated and became a member and section leader of the Clark University Choirs as well as a founding member and director of FOURtissimo, a women’s acappella quartet.
Susan Pinsky Bleeks has spent her entire adult life involved in her twin passions of Jewish Education and Music. She & her husband Tom joined Temple Emanuel in 1979 and within a few years she started teaching at the Religious School. Two years later, she became the Education Director of the school – a role she maintained for the next 25 years until June 2009. In 1996, she was asked to be a Cantorial Soloist for the High Holidays, as well as Soloist for the Bnai Mitzvah services. While she retired from singing at the High Holidays in 2005, she continues singing at “her” children’s special days, and is honored to have been part of 185 Temple Emanuel simchas.