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Music of Israel

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Modern Israeli music is heavily influenced by its constituents, which include Jewish immigrants (see Jewish music) from more than 120 countries around the world, which have brought their own musical traditions, making Israel a global melting pot.

History

From the earliest days of Zionist settlement, Jewish immigrants wrote popular folk music. At first, songs were based on borrowed melodies from German, Russian, or traditional Jewish folk music with new lyrics written in Hebrew. Starting in the early 1920's, however, Jewish settlers made a conscious effort to create a new Hebrew style of music, a style that would tie them to their earliest Hebrew origins and that would differentiate them from the style of the Jewish diaspora of Eastern Europe, which they viewed as weak. This new style borrowed elements from Arabic and, to a lesser extent, traditional Yemenite and eastern Jewish styles: the songs were often homophonic (that is, without clear harmonic character), modal, and limited in range. Examples of this emerging style include "Shadmati שדמתי" by Yedidia Admon, and "Shibbolet Basadeh שיבולת בשדה" by Matityahu Shelem. "The huge change in our lives demands new modes of expression," wrote composer and music critic Menashe Ravina in 1943. "... and, just as in our language we returned to our historical past, so has our ear turned to the music of the east ... as an expression of our innermost feelings."[1]

Parallel to the emergence of this new style, many composers continued to write songs in the more familiar styles they brought from the Eastern European diaspora - songs with a distinctly Russian or Slavic character. And some composers succeeded in merging the two trends; notable among these were Mordecai Zeira ("Hayu Leylot היו לילות", "Shney Shoshanim שני שושנים"), David Zehavi ("Hekhalil החליל") and Moshe Wilensky ("Hayu Zmanim היו זמנים").

The youth, labor and kibbutz movements played a major role in musical development before and after the establishment of Israeli statehood in 1948, and in the popularization of many of these songs. The Zionist establishment saw music as a way of establishing a new national identity, and, on a purely pragmatic level, of teaching Hebrew to new immigrants. The national labor organization, the Histadrut, set up a music publishing house that disseminated songbooks and encouraged public sing-alongs (שירה בציבור). This tradition of public sing-alongs continues to the present day, and is a characteristic of modern Israeli culture.

From the 1930s to the 50s, Yemenite Jews made up some of the musical stars. Bracha Zefira, Shoshana Damari and Esther Gamlieli were some of the most famous singers, due to Yemen's long history as a center for the preservation of Jewish traditions. Yemenite Jews remain popular, and performers like Ofra Haza, Noa, Gali Atari and Dana International have some international fame.

The first few years after Israel's creation saw an attempt at forging a unique Israeli cultural identity by melding the constituent cultures. This failed, however, as the disparate musical traditions did not blend well together. After 1948, explicit policy encouraged Hebrew language songs instead of Ladino or Yiddish ones. Hebrew is thus the language of choice for most Israeli musicians, though many also include an occasional song or album in Yiddish or Ladino.

Sephardic Jews have also played a major part in Israeli popular song. Sephardic musicians include Yehoram Gaon, Emil Zrihan, Jo Amar, Haim Louk and Ruth Yaakov.

More recent singer-songwriter traditions have produced an Israeli tradition, with musicians like Chava Alberstein modelling themselves after Americans Joan Baez and Pete Seeger. The 1980s and 90s saw a wave of roots revival and fusion musicians arrise, fusing Iranian, Turkish, Greek and Moroccan traditions with rock and roll, pop music and jazz. Habrera Hativeet is perhaps the most influential of these groups; they began performing in the 70s and have included influences ranging from American blues to African folk music and Hassidic songs. Even more recently, hip hop has made some inroads into mainstream Israeli audiences. The upsurge in American aliyah (immigration) is starting to bring popular American rock artists like Bradley Fish into the local Israeli mix.

  1. ^ Menashe Ravina, "The Songs of the People of Israel", published by Hamossad Lemusika Ba'am, 1943

Styles

The Israeli music is very versatile and combines elements of both western and eastern music. It tends to be very eclectic and contains a wide variety of influences from the Diaspora and more modern cultural importation. Hassidic songs, Asian and Arab pop, especially Yemenite singers, and hip hop or heavy metal.

National/Folk Music

Termed in Hebrew שירי ארץ ישראל ("songs of the land of Israel"), folk songs are meant mainly to be sung in public by the audience or in social events. Some are children's songs; some combine European folk tunes with Hebrew lyrics; some come from military bands and others were written by poets such as Naomi Shemer and Chaim Nachman Bialik.

The canonical songs of this genre often deal with Zionist hopes and dreams and glorify the life of idealistic Jewish youth who intend on building a home and defending their homeland. A common theme is Jerusalem as well as other parts of Eretz Israel. Tempo varies widely, as do the content. Some songs show a leftist or right-wing bent, while others are typically love songs, lullabies or other formats; some are also socialist in subject, due to the long-standing influence of socialism on Jews in parts of the Diaspora.

Patriotic folk songs are common, mostly written during the wars of Israel. They typically concern themselves with soldiers' friendships and the sadness of death during war. Some are now played at memorials or holidays dedicated to the Israeli dead.

Also common are songs discussing the longing for Peace.

Well-known singers:

See also: Patriotic songs and Category:Israeli songs about Peace.

Classical music

Just as writers of popular music sought a new, "Hebrew" style, many classical composers sought new modes of composition that would give expression to their new national identity. "... One cannot continue in this country writing works which are based on purely western concepts," wrote music critic David Rosolio in 1946. "The landscape, the lifestyle, the environment, all require a change and fundamentally different approach."[1] Alexander Boskovitz in his "Semitic Suite" for piano (1945) writes in a homophonic style with a drone accompaniment and repeated notes, immitating the sound of the Arabic Oud and Kanun. Paul Ben Haim wrote "Sonata A Tre" for cembalo, mandolin and guitar (1968) also has a distinctly Middle eastern sound. Many Israeli composers in the 21st century, such as Betty Olivera and Tzippi Fleisher, also draw on Jewish and Middle Eastern origins for style and inspiration.

Israel is well known for its famous classical orchestras and the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra under the management of Zubin Mehta has a worldwide reputation.

As the Holy land, Israel is full with ancient churches, and holy music of various sorts, including liturgical music and Gregorian chanting, either remain popular or have been revived.

Notable Israeli classical musicians:

  1. ^ David Rosolio in a review of the Semitic Suite by Alexander Boskovitz, Ha'aretz, March 1, 1946.

Rock

Israeli rock is more soft and quiet than American or British rock'n'roll and tends to feature soft vocals more often than heavy riffing and guitar virtuosos.

Well-known bands:

  • Kaveret, known in English-speaking countries as "Poogy",

also the nickname of the drummer, Meir Fenigstein [1].

Soft rock artist are:

Israel is also one of the leading creators of Goa trance and psychedelic trance. The most popular artists are Astral Projection, Infected Mushroom, Astrix and Skazi.

Pop

Heavy metal and alternative rock

The first artists to mention whenever discussing the alt-rock scene in Israel are, of course, Rami Fortis and Berry Sakharov. One cannot overstate the importance these two musicians bear in Israeli music.

Fortis, known affectionately to diehards as "Fortis HaMeshuga" ("Fortis the nutcase"), first with his pioneer album "Plonter" (1978), and later along with the more soft-spoken Sakharov on albums such as "Sipurim M'Hakufsa" and "1900?", singlehandedly defined the harder Israeli rock/punk sound. Later the two moved on to international projects such as Minimal Compact. Over the years since, the duo has intermittently split up and rebanded, but both continue remain staples on the rock scene in Israel.

Since the 1980s, Israel has had an active underground scene of alternative artists playing death metal, doom metal, black metal, punk rock and Gothic rock. The best known Israeli metal bands are Salem and Orphaned Land; both combine Gothic metal and oriental elements with hard-edged guitar riffs and lyrics focusing on Israeli issues such as the Holocaust and the Israeli-Arab conflict. The fusion between oriental Jewish music and doom metal is called Oriental metal.

Israel also has a rich punk rock scene. While Israeli punk rock bands have formed as early as the 1980s, the Israeli punk scene was formed in the 1990s, with the increase in the number of hardcore punk fans, Some fans consider Nekhei Na'atza as the "godfathers" of the scene, influencing other bands with their anti-Zionism texts.

Bands:

Punk rock bands:

Ethnic music

Mizrahi music

Mediterranean music, known in Hebrew as Mizrahit מזרחית ("Oriental"), is an oriental style of music, mainly popular within the oriental Jews who immigrated and fled to Israel from Arab lands (Mizrahim). This style features a modernized adaptation of Arab music and San Remo, enriching the traditional instruments (such as the oud) with violins and electronic musics. This music is mainly known for its singing style, known as Silsulim.

Main artists:

Until the 1980s, this music was an underground music and not accepted as legitimate culture by the dominant European-oriented cultural elite. The great breakthrough was made by Zohar Argov who made this music popular with the general public and on commercial TV and radio.

See separate entry for Mizrahi music

Hip hop and rap

The successful hip hop culture and rap music was imported to Israel. They remain popular, although shunned in many circles. Other performers include the Israeli Arab Tafer Nafar and leftist Israeli Jews Hadag Nahash and Muki/Mook E..

Rappers:

Trance

Israel is also one of the leading creators of Goa trance and psychedelic trance.

Main artists:

References

  • Lenz, Dubi. "A Narrow Bridge". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 1: Africa, Europe and the Middle East, pp 363-369. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0
  • Cohen, Judith. "Ladino Romance". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 1: Africa, Europe and the Middle East, pp 370-379. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0
  • Regev, Motti & Edwin Seroussi. Popular Music & National Culture in Israel. 2004. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-23654-8
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