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Ensemble Meitar
London debut at the Guildhall School of Music.
27 March 2006, 7pm

see also JMI Performances and Events

Premieres of music by composers in Israel and from the St Petersburg Society of Jewish Folk Music, with a World Premiere of the Piano Sonata No.2 by Yehezkel Braun.

An exciting young ensemble from Israel , Meitar, gives their London debut with a programme action-packed with premieres by Israeli and Russian-Jewish composers. The concert, due to take place at 7.00pm on 27 March at the Guildhall School of Music (Silk Street, Barbican, EC2Y 8DT) will be preceded at by a ‘Conversation with the Composers’, featuring Ayal Adler and the veteran Yehezkel Braun, whose 2nd Piano Sonata receives its premiere by its dedicatee Amit Dohlberg. Dohlberg, currently doing postgraduate piano studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, formed Meitar in 1993, since when it has given numerous concerts regularly around Israel , including the Tel-Aviv Museum series, and on Israeli Radio. Meitar is unique in specialising in Jewish and Israeli music, rather than the usual mainstream Classical repertoire, and they have had many compositions written for them by leading Israeli composers, including their Artistic Director, Josef Dorfman, and their Composer-in-Residence Ofer Ben-Amots, a contemporary composer based both in Israel and the USA, who is affiliated to Meitar’s main sponsor, the Centre of Jewish Culture and Creativity. Both Dorfman’s Clarinet Trio and Ben Amots’ ‘HaDibuk’ will be performed at the Guildhall concert, alongside seldom heard music of the St Petersburg Society of Folk Music, which flourished in the first quarter of the 20 th century, including songs by Millner and a piano trio by Gnessin. Amongst the new Israeli works to be played are songs by Zvi Avni, a violin duo by Ayal Adler and the world premiere of the 2 nd Piano Sonata by Yehezkel Braun, who has written several important piano works alongside a vast output of choral music. The ensemble are all Israeli musicians, some based in Europe and the USA, including Tehila Goldstein, soprano, currenly in New York; Assaf Levi, violin, currently in Leipzig, Dan Weinstien-Cello, based in Paris, Yonatan Hadas, clarinet (based in Tel-Aviv), with Amit Dohlberg (London). A smalle group from Meitar will perform at the Jewish Museum at 3pm on 26 March, while the whole ensemble also visits Keele University on 29 March.

Further information about the London concert from the Director of the Forum for Israeli Music, Malcolm Miller, at m.miller [at] jmi.org and Meitar’s website www.meitar.net.