Artists
Cantor Mark Childs earned his Master of Sacred Music degree along with an ordination as Cantor in 1991 from Hebrew Union College-Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music in New York City. Cantor Childs has served Congregation B'nai B'rith in Santa Barbara, CA since 1991. His worship services and educational/cultural programming have enriched both Jew and non-Jew alike throughout the greater Santa Barbara area where he resides with his wife Shari. His son Cantor David Childs serves Temple Beth Israel in Port Washington, NY. His son Adam is studying in Lakewood, NJ. He has a particular interest in interfaith dialogue through music and study and serves as a board member of the Interfaith Initiative of Santa Barbara County. He is active as a concert artist, is a prolific commissioner of new Jewish music, and has produced four professional albums, including his latest “The Layered Path” with his son David and pianist Bob Remstein. Cantor Childs is a member of both the American Conference of Cantors and the Cantors Assembly.
Cantor David Childs is becoming a familiar name in the world of Jewish music, noted by The Forward for his “passionate interpretation” of Yiddish song. He took part in the West Coast premiere of Lera Auerbach’s Symphony No. 6, Vessels of Light, reciting Yiddish poetry alongside cellist Kristina Reiko Cooper and the UCLA Philharmonia. David worked on the cantorial staff at Sinai Temple in Beverly Hills from 2018 until 2022, and at Shomrei Torah Synagogue in West Hills from then until 2023. He currently serves as Cantor of Temple Beth Israel in Port Washington.
David is a graduate of the H. L. Miller Cantorial School at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York City, where he received cantorial ordination and a Master of Sacred Music degree. There he studied the art of cantorial music, known colloquially in Yiddish as khazones, under Cantor Jacob Mendelson and Cantor Richard Nadel. He received a Bachelor of Arts in Music from UCLA. During his undergraduate studies, David studied Jewish music with celebrated artists in the field, singing in a Lazar Weiner masterclass given by composer Yehudi Wyner, interpreting Yiddish art song from Poland, and performing songs by Mickey Katz with the UCLA Klezmer Ensemble. David attended the Aspen Music Festival, where he co-founded the klezmer group Mountain Mishpokhe.
In the world of classical music and opera, David has sung with various companies including LA Opera, LA Chamber Orchestra, and Pacific Opera Project. In 2017, David gave a solo recital as part of Boston Court Pasadena’s Emerging Artists series. A five-year stint with the Euro-Latin pop band We The Folk brought him and his accordion to venues such as the Troubadour, Teragram Ballroom, and HopMonk Tavern. In 2021, David collaborated with his father Cantor Mark Childs and pianist Bob Remstein to release an album titled The Layered Path: Jewish Songs for Healing and Respite, available for listening online.
Cantor Jonathan Comisar's eclectic music background includes Eastman School of Music (pre-college), Oberlin Conservatory (piano) and composition with Pulitzer Prize winning composer David Del Tredici. He recently completed his Masters in classical composition at the Manhattan School of Music under the mentorship of composers Richard Danielpour and Reiko Feuting. His work for orchestra, The Hero's Journey, was recently premiered under the director of New York City Opera conductor, Maestro George Manahan.
Comisar is an ordained Cantor with a Masters in Sacred Music from the Hebrew Union College School of Sacred Music and served the Community Synagogue in Rye, NY with distinction from 2000-08. He is a highly esteemed and sought after composer of Jewish themed music throughout North America. He has received numerous commissions and artist residencies from synagogues and Jewish organizations, including Temple Emanu-El of NYC, Central Synagogue (NYC), Congregation B’nai B’rith (Santa Barbara) and Congregation Emanu-El (San Francisco), The American Conference of Cantors, who commissioned Comisar to write a choral work for their 60th Anniversary, premiering it at the URJ Biennial in 2013.
Cantor Jonathan Comisar has served on the faculty of the Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music since 2009, teaching classes on music theory, arranging, and composition. He brings a unique spark of musical creativity to his coaching/mentorship of cantorial students, teaching and encouraging them to bring all of their musical talents to their future congregations.
Jonathan Comisar is also a musical theater composer (Public Theater, Jerry Orbach/Snapple, Don't Tell Mama, TACT) and a member of the prestigious BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop. Comisar's musical theater piece “Things As They Are,” about the life of American photographer Dorothea Lange, was awarded Best of the Festival Audience Favorite Prize at the NY Musical Theater Festival (2010) and was twice nominated for the Fred Ebb Foundation Award, 2009 and 2011.
Daniel Hochman (clarinet) has deep roots at CBB. His favorite pastimes are loving his wife Mandy, music, and pondering the meaning of life. His contributions of leadership (long-time member of our Board of Trustees and most recently the honorary co-chair of our Building Dreams campaign), music, and generational giving have enriched our congregation in crucial ways.
Jakub “Ya” Omsky (cello), Santa Barbara Independent Musician of the Year 2000 and 2001 Local Hero was born in Warsaw, Poland. A graduate of the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw, Oberlin College Conservatory, the USC Thornton School of Music, the Tanglewood and Aspen Music Festivals, and the Music Academy of the West he became the multi-faceted expression of music: classical and sacred European, Jewish, Indian, Sufi, Flamenco, jazz, folk, rock, reggae and electronic. Among his cello mentors were Prof. Arnold Rezler, Peter Rejto, Andor Toth, Eleanor Schoenfeld. OmSky has been a pioneer and champion of transformational properties of sound. As creator of Sound Suspension therapy and certified WRT aquatic therapy practitioner he worked with many patients and trauma survivors transforming complex symptoms and disorders.
He performed as member of many professional ensembles such as Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra, San Luis Obispo Symphony, Wichita Symphony, Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble and Tundi Productions.
Jakub is delighted to return to Santa Barbara where he serves as “Cellist in Residence” at Congregation B’nai B’rith.