Jordan Wax / טײַטש [The Heart Deciphers]

For many years I have been entranced with the idea of Yiddish music translated into current musical vernaculars. What I didn't expect was the Tex-Mex and Americana richness of Jordan Wax's debut album, טײַטש [The Heart Deciphers]. I expect that it will take me longer, still, to feel that I know the recording well, despite listening to it for months and being deeply in love with hearing Yiddish in this new context.

The recording has been a long time coming. Wax had a klezmer band listed on this site over a decade ago. In between, he played in bands ranging from Neutral Milk Hotel to local Tex-Mex. That makes it no surprise Wax features klez-bluegrass pioneer Margot Leverett on clarinet, or violin master Jake Shulman-Ment in this debut release. The band rarely steps out insrumentally—"Nokhspil to Democracy Now" may be the only instrumental. But they make each song matter.

I am also bemused by he "krechts" quality of Wax's voice and the way that he interposes modern words into his Yiddish, as on the opening "Tfiles Geshem" (Prayers for rain), which notes, in the penultimate verse, "Un me shraybt komentarn un me treft zikh af zum" (That we should write some more comments and schedule a Zoom). Or, in the next song, "Basherte Mayne" (My destined one), in a tango to inevitabile love merging metaphors of the past with the modern meat market and the inevitable "let me buy you a drink."

Like his older contemporary, Daniel Kahn, Wax touches frequently on the politics of our time, as in "Makht" (Power): Who gets a word, in whose language? / Who gets a seat at the table, who gets the power?"—which also pops back and forth between English and Yiddish. But there is a more personal note to many of the pieces as well, as in the bedtime tale of "In veyte berg" (In the faraway mountains), the plaintive title track, "Does harts pruvt deshifrirn" (the heart deciphers), "What good are plans when the world has so obviously its own intentions for us?" or in "Der Eybik-Griner Vald" (The forest leafs out) which connects our dreams to the forest, and the roots we set therein.

At this past December's Yiddish New York my wife and I commented to each other than we were generations now beyond the klezmer "revival". What we were now experiencing was that Yiddish encounter with modernity, re-engaged, despite the Holocaust, despite assimilation, a vital part of our time. This recording exemplifies that re-engagement. With a commitment to "living in Yiddish," and with a commitment to address contempoary issues ranging from Israel/Palestine to the Climate Crisis, Wax gifts us amazing music, amazing lyrics.

Reviewed by Ari Davidow, 28-Sep-2025/5-Mar-2026

Songs

1. Tfiles Geshem—Prayers for Rain 2:41
2. Basherte Mayne—La Inevitable 3:14
3. In Vayte Berg—In the Faraway Mountains 3:49
4. Makht—Power 3:20
5. Di Velt iz Avek—The World Went Away 3:38
6. Zingendikerheyt—Singing as You Go 4:22
7. Dos Harts Pruvt Deshifrirn—The Heart Deciphers 5:17
8. Nokhshpil to Democracy Now—Postlude to Democracy Now 4:28
9. Keler fun Ash—Voices of Ash 5:33
10. Der Sof—The End 4:21

Music and lyrics by Jordan Wax

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