Issued by: Beth Stafford 414-229-4800 bstaff@uwm.edu Date: Sept. 12, 2001

Concert at Allis Art Museum Oct. 3
Focuses on Israeli Piano Music

MILWAUKEE -Music From Almost Yesterday, directed by University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Professor Yehuda Yannay, presents "A Kaleidoscope of Israeli Piano Music for Four Hands" on Wednesday, Oct. 3 at 7:30 p.m. at the Charles Allis Art Museum, 1801 N. Prospect Ave.

The concert will be presented in the museum's Margaret Rahill Great Hall. Israeli pianists Miriam Boskovich and Hemda Raz will perform Israeli classical music by A. U. Boskovich, Andre Hajdu, Tsipi Fleisher, Ron Weidberg and Ben Tsion Orgad.

The pianists have just completed a European tour, and the Music From Almost Yesterday concert is part of their U.S. tour.

Admission is $8/general public and $6/FOCAL (Friends of Charles Allis Art Museum) members, students and seniors. Checks for concert tickets should be made payable and mailed to Charles Allis Art Museum, 1801 N. Prospect Ave., Milwaukee 53202. Contact

(414) 278-8295 with any questions about reservations.

The concert's sponsors include FOCAL, Music From Almost Yesterday, UWM's Peck School of the Arts music department, and Alliance Francaise de Milwaukee.

Yannay describes the evolution of Israeli classical music. "Israel has been a cultural melting pot, with nearly four generations of composers. The years surrounding 1948 witnessed a historical renaissance in Israel's socioeconomic, cultural and artistic development, with the revival of Hebrew as a modern language and the creation of a new society, culture and art. A very special group of composers began to formulate music based on a fusion of Oriental musical elements with compositional European techniques, which developed into the landmark Eastern Mediterranean style."

Yannay continues, "The common denominator that underlies many of these 1940-`50s works are the living sonorities and rhythm of oriental dialects of the Hebrew language; texts and cantillations of the Old Testament; and the songs, dances and rich folklore of the Oriental Jewish communities as well as the colorful sonorities of Arab music and its instruments. The generation of composers and musicians following World War II were strongly exposed to Western influences, while Ethiopian and former Soviet Union immigration enriched the tonescape of Israeli music, and individualism flourished."

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