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May 9, 2008
Musical ambassadors
Children's concert is part of Israel rebranding effort.
DAVE GORDON
In an effort to showcase Israeli talent and to bring people's association with Israel towards a more positive light, a group of young musicians gave a set of performances in Toronto recently.
All of the children, aged 11-15, are from the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance and they are accomplished in their instruments: saxophone, piano, violin and cello. They were accompanied by the director of the conservatory at the academy, conductor Rashi Levaot, who handpicked the students.
Their first performance in Canada was at Stephen Lewis Secondary School, north of Toronto, before a crowd of 200 public school children. The musicians performed classical pieces Paganini's Variations on the Carnival in Venice for alto saxaphone and piano and Capriccio 24.
The next evening, they performed before about 200 adults at the Unicorn Dream Dinner, a fundraising gala for terminally ill children, associated with Mount Sinai Hospital. The nondenominational dinner's focus, said its organizers, was to highlight the achievements of Israeli arts and culture.
There, the musicians played Prokofiev's Overture on Jewish Themes, Liszt's Transcendental Etude No. 8 – also known as the "Wild Hunt" – and the first movement of Schubert's Trio, Op. 99. Opening for the group were six cello students from Toronto's Koffler Centre for the Arts, comprised of both Jewish and non-Jewish instrumentalists.
Later in the week, the Israelis played live on Toronto's Classical 96.3 radio. As well, the dean of the Glenn Gould Professional School in Toronto, pianist James Anagnoson, invited the students to tour the soon-to-be completed TELUS Centre for Music Education and Performance.
Adrienne Cohen, the chair of the Jerusalem Academy student tour of Toronto, said that the mandate for the visit was a part of the Israel Branding project, to which she is also a committee member. That initiative was set forth by the government of Israel to shift the focus away from the conflict in the region, explained Cohen.
Violinist Daniel Askarov, 15, has been studying violin from the age of six. He has won the Sharett Competition for solo performance four times in the last seven years, and has performed in concerts in New York (2006) and Capetown (2007), with the Johannesburg Philharmonic Orchestra. He plays compositions by Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Tchaikovsky and others.
Ron Agron, 16, who plays the saxophone, was born in Jerusalem. He started his music studies at the age of 12 and, in his short career, he has already won acclaim in Israel. In 2007, he won the Outstanding Musician Award from the America-Israel Cultural Foundation. He has also played as a soloist with the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra.
Fourteen-year-old pianist Itay Meyer was also born in Jerusalem and he has been studying at the Jerusalem Conservatory of Music and Dance since the age of nine. He expressed modesty about his musical talents: "There's no difference between people," he said. "Everyone can be successful at things if they try."
Siblings Michael Cohen-Weissert, 15, on the piano, and Elia Cohen-Weissert, age 14, playing cello, were born in Jerusalem but grew up on the Greek island of Sifnos, where they began their musical studies. Michael has been a regular recipient of the America-Israel Cultural Foundation Piano and Chamber Music Scholarship, and is the youngest composer ever to receive this honor. Elia is also a regular recipient of the scholarship. At the age of 12, Michael won first prize in the National Broadcasting Authority Competition for young artists, performing with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra. At age 12, Elia also performed with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra.
Elia admitted her initial anxiety about her première North American performance for peers. "It was scary to perform," she said. Music, however, runs in the family. Her mother, from Germany, is a pianist, and her father, originally from Romania, is a professional guitarist. "From a very early age, I wanted to play cello. I chose this, and I want to be a soloist," Elia said.
The visit to Canada, and the chance to perform before a variety of audiences, has been a meaningful experience for her. "It's beautiful that we came and I hope that they [the audience] find the music beautiful. I hope they will enjoy listening to classical music."
The students' visit was a project launched in conjunction with the consulates of Israel in Toronto and Miami to celebrate Israel's 60th. The idea for the students' visit originated from a meeting Cohen had with the Miami consul general for Israel, Ofer Bavli, who had already been planning for the troupe to give a Yom Ha'atzmaut concert there. Cohen and the Israeli consul general of Toronto, Amir Gissin, offered to bring the performers to North America earlier, to give Torontonians a chance to hear them play.
Canadian Friends of Hebrew University financially supported the students' trip to Canada. Other sponsors were the Canadian Israel Cultural Foundation, United Jewish Appeal-Federation, and a donated piano from Yamaha.
Dave Gordon is a freelance writer based in Toronto. His website is DaveGordonWrites.com.
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