Marimba Magic

‘Sometimes people come up to me after a performance and say, ‘We don’t understand much about music, but what you did moved us,’” says marimba player Ziv Eitan, who will present a concert for kids and the entire family on Saturday at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. “But there’s nothing to understand about music; you either manage to reach your audience’s heart or you don’t.

Taking it to the max

Renowned musician Maxim Vengerov has his hands full with a lot more than a virtuoso violin.
 
‘These last three years of my life were extremely interesting and productive,” says violinist cum conductor Maxim Vengerov, speaking from his Monaco home prior to his performance in Tel Aviv on September 18. The concert will take place at the Smollarsh Auditorium (which serves as a temporary home for the Israel Philharmonic during the Mann Auditorium renovations) with a program that features Beethoven’s Violin Concerto and Brahms’s Fourth Symphony.

Don’t be a no-show to Snowshow

The Kremerata Baltica Ensemble joins Slava Polunin’s whimsical circus for a rare and wonderful performance experience.

Neither acclaimed violinist Gideon Kremer nor beloved performance artist and clown Slava Polunin needs any introduction. Kremer travels the world as a soloist and with his Kremerata Baltica Ensemble, while Polunin (who made Paris his home and experimental lab) tours the globe with his circus, in addition to his Broadway show.

נס גדול לא היה שם

לגבי ביצוע של מוסיקה קאמרית קיימות שתי דעות מנוגדות. יש המאמינים שרק אחרי שנים של נגינה ביחד, כשחברי ההרכב לומדים את אורח הנגינה והאישיות של הפרטנרים שלהם לעשיית המוסיקה, הנס קורה – ההרכב הופך לכלי מופלא אחד, בעל צליל מיוחד ומרתק. אחרים מחזיקים בדעה הפוכה הסוברת שדווקא תוך כדי מפגשים – לרוב בפסטיבלים – בהם מוסיקאים שונים, חוברים לביצוע משותף, ומגיבים זה לזה באופן ספונטני, אז קורה הנס, קצת בדומה לג’ם סשן הג’אזי.

An intimate circle

On September 21 at the intimate Felicja Blumental Center in the heart of the old Tel Aviv, a group of Israeli musicians, which has adopted the name The Israel Chamber Club, will present an intriguing In the Jewish Spirit program. The concert, which features pieces by Prokofiev, Darius Milhaud, Bloch, Ben-Haim, Stuchevsky, Shulamit Ran and Paul Williams, will be performed by pianist Michal Tal, cellist Hillel Tzori, violinist Ya’akov Rubinstein, clarinet player Gilead Harel, together with their younger colleagues and student pianist Netanel Grinstein and violinists Gili Radian Sade and Noa Sarid.

Four to Tango

Israeli quartet Pitango members violinist Hadar Cohen, bandoneon player Amijai Shalev, pianist Shahar Ziv and double bass player Rinat Avisar are making their annual tour of the country, giving chamber concerts and a joint program with the Netanya Kibbutzim Chamber Orchestra under its artistic director Yaron Gottfried.

In her own right

Although music is now her life, in her early days concert pianist Elena Bashkirova was not sure that it was going to happen. Living in Berlin with husband Daniel Barenboim, she was born in Moscow,

Celebration of the human spirit

Veteran director Roman Viktiuk actually does bring us two plays from Russia, with love.

Russian stage director Roman Viktiuk returns to Israel with two of his most famous works – The Maids by Jean Genet and Salomé, after Oscar Wilde. This is not the first time that Viktiuk’s theater company will visit our shores, but until recently it appealed only to the local Russianspeaking community. .

Stepping Out

‘The festival program features mainly Israeli premieres of international productions, based on world music or what I should call ’music of the roots,’ as well as original Israeli danceperformances,” says veteran Israeli artistic producer Eli Grunfeld. Together with dancer/choreographer Ido Tadmor, he is co-directing the annual Spring Festival, which takes place in Rishon Lezion from May 12 – 21.

The triumph of good over evil

Brundibar, a fully staged children’s opera by Hans Krasa, will be performed today by the local Moran Children’s Choir, together with the Pueri Guadentes Choir from Prague and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, in a special concert dedicated to commemoration of the victims of the Holocaust.