Dushan Mihalek, Israeli Music Center, Tel-Aviv

The Echo of the Russian Musical Avant-Garde in Israel

After the Wolf Award ceremony in Jerusalem in 1995, Ezer Weizman, who was then the

president of Israel, reportedly asked the winning composer Gyorgy Ligeti in an off-the-record

conversation: “When you left Hungary in 1956, why didn’t you come to be a Jew in Israel?”

Ligeti replied: “You know, Mr. President, I wanted to be a composer.”

Whether an anecdote, a joke, or the bitter truth, this story is frequently told by Israeli composers.

Indeed, how could one be a composer in a country with a population just slightly larger than that

of an average European city, a country situated in the Middle East, with a million other problems,

and no time for the creative work of its musical composers?

Israel is a typical immigrant country. In Israel they prefer to use the term “repatriation” to

describe how, after the Diaspora and two thousand years of exile, Jews from all around the world

are coming back to their country. According to this the Jews coming to Israel are neither

immigrants, nor “newcomers” but “repatriates.”

This return commenced long before the State of Israel came into existence. From 1882 to 1914

65,000 Jews came to this area of the world, which was then part of the Ottoman Empire. Between

World War I and the foundation of the State of Israel under British Rule, there were an additional

500,000 newcomers.

Since the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948 another 3,000,000 “new repatriates” have

arrived. After the social and political turbulence of the past decade in the former USSR, another

1,000,000 Jews came to Israel from that country.

“Russian” Jews make up 34% of the immigrants in Israel, which makes them the largest group.

Jews from Romania are next at 10% (275,000), followed by approximately the same number of

Moroccan Jews. Polish Jews constitute 6% (170,000), and Iraqi Jews are 5% (130,000.)

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Next on the list are Jews from Iran, the US, Turkey, Tunisia, Yemen, Ethiopia, Argentina,

Bulgaria, Egypt, Libya, France, Hungary, India, Great Britain, Algeria, South Africa, Yugoslavia,

Syria, Canada, Lebanon, and another 100 countries from around the world.

The biggest problems in Israel’s absorption of new immigrants have been caused by the irregular

waves in which these immigrants have come. Another problem is that large numbers of people

arrive at the same time from countries with very different cultures. Only one year after it was

founded, Israel, with a population of 650,000, received 240,000 immigrants. (This is as if today

the US received 80,000,000 immigrants in one year.) At that time, most of the “old” and “new”

immigrants were exhausted by the horrors of World War II, and Israel was in a state of constant

war with its neighbors. Under these conditions, new immigrants still had to be given jobs and at

least a tent to live in. In 1955, seven years after its creation, the state of Israel had 1,590,000 Jews

living in it -- two and a half times as many as when it was founded. (This is as if the US

population were to grow to 500,000,000 between now and 2008.)

In Israel’s cruel and waterless desert, lacking even the oil that is ever-present in the surrounding

countries, nobody had time to think about music much less to compose music.

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It is well known that the Jewish people in Europe prior to WWII were well educated. They had

been forbidden many activities (especially agriculture) for centuries, so Jews turned to

professions they were allowed to do, and many time this meant art.

Inspired by Zionist ideas, fleeing pogroms and later the Holocaust and the “Final Solution to the

Jewish Problem,” many Jewish intellectuals came to their “Promised Land” determined to make

it livable for their people. They tamed the desert with their bare hands. A possibly apocryphal

anecdote from the 1930s tells that as new immigrants passed bricks from hand to hand they

would murmur: “”Bitte, Herr Doktor.”, “Danke Herr Professor.”” Many forgot their “European”

professions forever as they wholeheartedly built their country. Chaya Arbel, who was born in

Germany in 1921 and immigrated to Israel in 1936, is typical. She started her musical education

in Germany, and was only able to continue it in 1961, after the Kibbutz she helped build had

become established. Then she started composing, and today she is one of the leading composers

in Israel.

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The first Israeli composers developed from the generation known as the “Second Wave of

Repatriation,” who came to Israel in the 1920s. One of the things that helped these people was the

foundation of the Palestine Orchestra (today the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra) in Tel-Aviv, and

the Palestine Broadcasting Orchestra (today the Jerusalem Symphonic Orchestra) in Jerusalem.

Coming from different Musical Schools (Russian, German, French, Hungarian, Romanian,

Polish) disciples of Rimsky-Korsakov, Hindemith, Kodaly, Schoenberg, and Milhaud, these

musicians tried to unite their styles into what they called the “Mediterranean Style.”

Among the pioneers of Israeli music, especially in pedagogy, were many people from the former

Russian Empire, later the former USSR. We do not know whether any of these early composers

had any contact with the “First Russian Avant-Garde” or with ASM1. Even if they by some

chance had, it is not reflected in their work. Their goal was to create a Jewish, Israeli,

Mediterranean music. Among the composers of this modern expression were Yoachim

Stuchevsky (who lived from 1896-1982, came to Palestine in 1938 and was educated in Vienna),

and Verdina Shlonsky and Mordecai Setter, (who came to Palestine as children).

The post-1989 wave of immigrants from the former USSR included a large number of composers.

There is a kind of “statistical joke” among Israeli composers: Anyone not carrying a violin off the

plane when he arrived in the “Promised Land” had to be either a pianist or a composer!

Official statistics are naturally more precise and rational, but they too confirm the fact that this

wave of immigrants can be called the “Intellectual Repatriation.” A large number of these new

immigrants to Israel were highly educated. This small Middle-Eastern country suddenly received

a huge number of new engineers, physicians, teachers and professors, scientists, and artists. There

were – and there still are – immense problems in the absorption these people.

Between January 1990 and May 1992 around 12,000 immigrants identified themselves as artists.

Some 7,000 of them passed examinations qualifying them as professionals– and 4,000 of those

received the title “Outstanding Artist.” Of the people who came as immigrants in those years,

60% were musicians. In 1989 there were 1,500 musicians active in Israel, and between 1989 and

1991 they were joined by 5,500 more! Some of these returned to their countries of origin, some

went on to other countries, and some transferred to other professions. But after all this there were

still many musicians who needed jobs.

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Among those with the title “Outstanding Artist” 73 identified themselves as composers. The

Israeli Composers’ Union has 198 members, 54 of whom came in this latest wave of immigrants

from the former USSR.

Israel’s Ministry of Absorption works actively to involve immigrants in society, declaring them

the “country’s greatest treasure.” Immigration is not painless, or quick, nor is it is always

successful – but Isrealis work at it diligently, wholeheartedly and with experience spanning many

decades.

Unlike the composers who came to Israel from Western Europe, South America or the US,

composers from the former USSR have been significantly handicapped in their ability to

“survive” the competition that faces the more than 200 Israeli composers who struggle for every

chance they can get to promote or publish their work.

Members of the USSR Composers’ Union had many benefits that made their lives quite easy

compared to those of other composers around the world. Following the official musical line

dictated by the Management of the Composers’ Union, and composing using official themes and

styles, these composers received a salary for their work, along with titles and decorations that

were very important in the USSR (“People’s Artist” etc.) They also received state apartments,

vacations at special “creative houses”, and opportunities for advanced training. Their work was

performed at “composers’ congresses.” The state funded the publishing of their scores as well as

the recording of their work. Even trips for study abroad were financed (something only dreamed

of by other Soviet citizens). Naturally, this had its own price - known as “work in the name of the

spirit of Socialist Realism.”- the official style that was forced by the Communist Party of the

USSR after the Harkov Congress of writers and the breakup -- the physical destruction -- of the

core of Soviet “Modernists.”

Composers with this background came to Israel inspired perhaps by Zionist, nationalistic and

patriotic ideas. (Perhaps they were looking for a better life after the disintegration of the USSR.)

However, in Israel, which is a “Land of Milk and Honey” only in biblical texts, they had a very

difficult time finding a place in the (desert) sun.

There is a funny anecdote about a now-famous composer who came in the 1960’s from one of the

countries of the Eastern Bloc. When he arrived in Israel his highly patriotic, Zionist work made

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him popular, and was well received in Israeli political circles. People who knew his earlier work

claimed that in his previous country he had also written patriotic songs - but from the other side.

A patriot will always be a patriot.

There were composers who, in response to the new conditions in which they found themselves,

changed directions accordingly. As the new wave of immigrants from the former USSR came,

Israel was flooded with “Jewish Sonatas” “Jewish Symphonies” “Jewish Concertos,” - music of a

sort that had been written 50 years before by the founders of Israeli music. However, in the 50

years of the existence of the Israeli State the work of Israeli composers had gone through a

metamorphosis, finding a place in the music of the world. Trained in Israel and at important

musical centers, Israeli composers – together with their audiences– had joined the general course

of world music, in which national flavor can and should be interesting, but what matters most is

the individual strength of the composer.

Composers from the former USSR who had been brought up to repeat in chorus the dictated

themes, educated and drilled to write odes to ideas that fortunately failed the test of history, could

not remain competitive. People liked some of their work but that was all. Individuals who had

forgotten their individuality (or perhaps had never had it) could hardly count on being successful

in a free society.

It is very hard to change one’s way of life, come to a new world, and build a new perspective on

life, especially for a person advanced in years… There are some real masters among the

composers from the USSR, people who know their trade. The fates of some of them have been

truly cruel.

Those who came to Israel when they were close to retirement have the hardest time. According to

Israeli law, every immigrant more than 65 years old automatically receives a state pension. Not a

big one, but sufficient for a modest life. This pension is a necessity for those who earned their

retirement in the USSR, because when they left the Soviet Union, they had to renounce their

Soviet pensions. (These pensions were miserable anyway and irregularly paid.) It is not realistic

to expect someone at that age to learn a foreign language, especially when that language is

Biblical Hebrew, which is unlike any other language in the world. This language barrier makes it

difficult for older immigrants to communicate as well as to earn extra money or make contact

with Israeli musicians.

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Elderly composers who are not yet eligible for retirement are in a particularly difficult situation;

the language barrier closes all doors to them. Shut up in their “Russian Ghetto” using Russian

language radio, TV and press, they have a hard time understanding the Israeli mentality. Not used

to the harsh desert climate many of them live off social welfare. Some of them (like a former

Conservatory professor from Alma Ata) clean garbage in a factory; some of them try to play

music, even on the streets. In the worst years, when it was almost impossible to find a job as a

musician in Israel, one could have, on Tel Aviv’s popular Disengoff Street, assembled a decent

symphony orchestra from the people playing music for small change.

Anatoly Boyarsky was a summer instructor of several generations of young Soviet composers at

the “creativity center” in Ivanovo. He came to live in Kiryat Shmona, a provincial city on the

border with Lebanon. The infrastructure of Kiryat Shmona is not developed enough to allow a

musical life, because it is often bombed by the Lebanese Hezbollah. Anatoly travels occasionally

to Central Israel, and less frequently to performances in Haifa, Tel-Aviv or Jerusalem. These

travels and his quiet compositional work at home are his entire life.

Even more tragic is the destiny of Amnun Yagdarov, a former professor at the Music High

School in Dushanbe (Tajikistan.) He came to Israel at the age of 52, and worked as a night

security guard to support his family, receiving a miserable salary. The wet sub-tropic climate of

Tel-Aviv ruined his health, causing asthma, and later a severe heart condition that required

surgery. Now partially handicapped, he lives on welfare, and the only contact Israeli audiences

have had with his music is a single show on Israeli radio.

The story of the composer Eduard Gazarov is a real tragedy. A disciple of Kara Karayev in Baku

(Azerbaijan), he was sent to spread musical culture in Nagorno Karabakh. There, in Stepanakert,

he founded a music school and an orchestra. He developed the musical life there, and wrote the

first orchestral compositions based on Karabakh folk themes. He was also an internationally

acclaimed accordion player.

When the Nagorno Karabakh war broke out he found himself the target of both the Azerbaijan

Army and the Armenian Army, and later of criminal gangs and mafia clans. One of those gangs

kidnapped him and asked for a high ransom from his wife. She sold the house, car, furniture,

everything she owned; she was left alone with two small children – and he was freed after

enormous suffering. As an aftermath of the beatings he received his neck started to swell. The

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Jewish Agency intervened and helped them get to a center from which they could be sent to

Israel. That center was in Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, and they arrived just about the time

the war broke out there. They spent several months in Grozny, without medication or medical

assistance, waiting to be transported to Israel. When they eventually made it to Israel in 1996,

they found that Gazarov’s swelling was due to cancer, which was so advanced that even surgery

did not help. Without knowing Israeli law, Gazarov tried in his weakened postoperative state to

play the accordion for the Professional Qualification Commission. He was not able to play, and

so he was not awarded an “Outstanding Artist” subsidy. Only after the intervention of the

Composers’ Union did he receive financial help, which came right before his death. He died

before the first anniversary of his coming to Israel. His daughter recorded for the radio some of

his work and to this day only 10 minutes of this have been played on the air.

However, let us return to our theme, New Music and the ASM. In the early 1970s, even before

the “Big Wave” of immigrants, the borders of the USSR opened enough to allow a certain

number of Jews to come to Israel. Among them was the first disciple of Khachaturiyan, Lev

Kogan, who was later erased from all Soviet encyclopedias. Two composers from this period are

particularly interesting: Mark Kopytman and Joseph Dorfman. Kopytman and Dorfman began

their work before one could speak of New Russian Music; young contemporaries of Denisov,

they moved to Israel as their careers were just beginning to develop. And they have developed.

Kopytman and Dorfman became good, modern composers, and later made contact with Russian

Modern Music. (That, however, is the subject of a separate study.)

The “Big Wave” of immigrants included only one real representative of ASM2 - Mikhail

Liebman. This wave also included Joseph Bardanashvili, who had been close to ASM2 but

geographically remote as he lived in Georgia; the significant avant-garde Soviet Jazz musician

Vyacheslav Ganelin and Valentin Bibik from Silvestrov’s Circle.

This leads to the conclusion that New Music was not very popular among Jewish composers in

the USSR. Perhaps they felt they had enough to contend with with the “Jewish Curse.” Why

would they want to incur further rage from the Communist Regime for also being “Bourgeois

Avant-Garde” or for “Formalism”?!

Mikhail Liebman, a disciple of Denisov, is very rigorous in his work. His pieces are based on

discovering harmonics and multiphonics, and are written in a hermetic form strict in its

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extremeness. In the Israeli musical scene, which is quite conservative, this music is appreciated

by only a handful of experts. Liebman earns his living even today by washing stairs in buildings

in Tel-Aviv, playing for weddings and occasionally teaching at music schools.

Vyacheslav Ganelin was a legend of Soviet Jazz before coming to Israel. He was the leader of the

famous Ganelin Trio, which played in many countries around the world. Today he is a professor

at the Tel-Aviv Academy, and a successful composer who has worked in many musical genres,

including theater and movies.

From Georgia, Josef Bardanashvili successfully blends elements of Georgian and Jewish folk

music with postmodern ideas. Though he came to Israel only a few years ago, he is one of the

best and most performed composers in Israel.

Prior to his arrival, Bardanashvili served as an Assistant Minister for Culture in the Province of

Adzariya. In 1995, after the economic breakdown of Georgia, he moved to Israel accompanied by

his sick parents and a teenage daughter. His absorption was not easy. He earned his living as a

helper in a shop – and he “earned” himself a hernia. His first musical success, which spread his

name throughout Israel, was with music that he composed for a play directed in Tel-Aviv by his

old collaborator from Georgia, Robert Sturua. He has received commissions from Musica Nova

and the Israeli Contemporary Players, and for the Haifa Theater. His Adagio was given a

spectacular performance at the Eilat Musical Festival (by the St. Petersburg Kirov Theater

Orchestra, conducted by Valery Gergiev.) He was named “Composer-in-Residence” of the

Ra’anana Orchestra, and given a position at the Israeli Musical Center; later he taught

composition at the Tel-Aviv Music Academy.

Jan Freidlin, one of the “Odessa School” and an expert in postmodern music, arrived in Israel just

as his music was gaining attention from having been aired on Israeli Radio. In 1993 he received

the Israeli Authors’ Agency Prize; in 1995 he won the Liberson Award and the prize in the Set

Piece competition in the US. He works as a professor at the Levinsky Pedagogical Institute in

Tel-Aviv.

Valentin Bibik came to Israel just three years ago, as a mature composer, having already written

11 symphonies and gained international recognition. He immediately received commissions from

the Musica Nova Ensemble and violinist Nitay Zory. Today he is a lecturer at the Tel-Aviv

Academy.

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Eliyahu Perez, Benyamin Yusupov, Boris Pigovat, Ariel Davidov and Iliya Dimov are members

of the younger generation; the countries they came from are exotic in themselves and interesting

for their music: Perez is from Dagestan, Yusupov, Davidov and Pigovat come from Tajikistan,

and Dimov is from Uzbekistan. These composers were educated in the period of the liberalization

of Soviet Music. Very knowledgeable in the folklore of the countries from which they come, they

are postmodern composers with a basis in “World Music” and they write compositions that excite

considerable interest in the Israeli public. Pigovat, Perez and Yusupov received their doctorates

from Bar-Ilan University in Tel-Aviv; Perez works with the Institute for Oriental Music at Bar-

Ilan University, where Yusupov organizes lectures and courses. Pigovat and Dimov are

professors and “Composers-In-Residence” at music schools where they teach some outstanding

young composers.

Finally, Uri Brener, a 27 year old multi-talented musician, emigrated as a boy from Moscow to

Germany where he earned a degree as a composer, pianist and a bassoonist from the Düsseldorf

Academy. Coming to Israel for religious reasons, he joined Jewish Orthodox Society, and lives

by its strict rules. Even so he has managed to compose many pieces that are full of energy and

have been well received by Israeli audiences. He frequently performs his pieces himself, and he

has received commissions from the Musica Nova Ensemble and the Huberman Quartet.

“Repatriates are the greatest treasure of Israeli Society.” This is not just a political slogan - it is a

reality of Israeli life. Coming from more than 100 countries from around the world, persecuted

for more than 2000 years, destroyed as no other people in the history of mankind, Jews in their

“Holy Land” are building a society of repatriates. One can see this in their music, in the lives of

their composers and even in the “Big Wave” of immigrants that flooded the country in the last

decade.

The abovementioned composers brought with them to Israel much knowledge, but also huge

individual potential. In their work one can find Jewish and Biblical themes as well as attempts at

writing in Hebrew, a language they could not even understand a few years ago. All of this work

passed through each composer’s strong individual prism; the result of contemplation and

expression of a free personality, freed from ideological barriers. This is the reason we see in them

the future of Israeli Music.

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I came to Israel 10 years ago with my wife, a small black suitcase and four small children; I

started by cleaning a parking lot and sorting garbage; now I am the Director of the Israeli Music

Center. I conclude this work with the hope that perhaps one of the composers I have written

about, or perhaps Ilya Heifetz, who started off as a security guard, or Ariel Davidov, who is one

now, will one day be for Israeli Music what Xenakis is to Greece, Takemitsu to Japan,

Andriessen to Holland, and Denisov, Schnittke and Gubaidulina are to Russia.

© 2002 by Dushan Mihalek

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