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Mazal Tov to our Kallat Torah and Hatan Bereshit, Dova Marder and Matan Marder Friedgood!

This year, we are thrilled to honor Dova Marder and Matan Marder Friedgood by naming them the Kallat Torah and Hatan Bereshit, respectively. Mazal Tov to Dova and Matan!

Dova Marder grew up in Great Neck, the middle of three sisters. She is married to Stephen Friedgood and Mom to Matan, with whom she is both proud and humbled to share this honor. Dova is, also, a Public Psychiatrist, who loves music, the Mets, nature, and spending time with family and friends. Since joining BJ in 1998, Dova learned how to leyn (recite Torah) and teach others to leyn from Lizzie Kraiem, to lead Morning Minyan, and to volunteer with the Hevra Kadisha, including performing Tahara. A “Regular” at Minyan since 2010, she especially loves leyning with her “Rosh Hodesh Sisters,” and there learned from Peggy Moss how to be a gabbai. Since 2013, she has served as Head Gabbai and Usher for High Holy Days Family Services under Rabbi Anne Ebersman, and, since 2019, has been the Gabbait and main Torah reader for Early Childhood Shabbat services. Dova also assists Freddy Goldstein, her treasured mentor, with both the administrative work of the “Holy Rollers,” including drafting the “High Holy Days Torah Deployment Spreadsheet” for Hazzan Ari Priven’s approval, and with the rolling of Torot for Shabbat and holidays.

Matan Marder Friedgood has been a member of B’nai Jeshurun since birth. He started participating, with support from BJ clergy and leadership, at age six, by playing cello for Children’s Services, and then graduated to Junior Congregation where he participated for years. For the last five years he has led parts of the High Holy Days Family Services and was in the band, including for Kol Nidre both as service leader and cellist, and was an on-call BJ musician, playing keyboards for Hitoreri, Kulanu, and the BJ Theater Company. He spent two years on the BJ Teen Executive Board and loved working at Jewish day camps for the past two summers. This fall Matan started college at the University of Southern California, joining the Trojan Marching Band on tuba, and was the High Holiday Cantorial Soloist at Temple Shalom of the South Bay, in addition to being an active member of the USC Jewish community.