

In 1996 I met Michael Delman, the conductor of the Wind Orchestra of the Petah-Tikva Conservatoire (Israel).
Before meeting him for the first time, I had never written anything for wind orchestra, and I have viewed wind orchestration as limited to bands performing marches or any entertainment music, like songs, waltzes, polka, fantasy, and potpourri.
Mr. Delman opened a new world to me: the wind orchestra, with abilities and repertoire similar to the symphony orchestra. This type of orchestra is called a symphonic wind band or a wind symphony orchestra.
For more than 20 years, Michael Delman and I have collaborated. He and his orchestra premiered most of my compositions written for symphonic wind band. Mr. Delman himself conceived the theme of some of my wind band compositions, including Massada, Wind Of Yemen, Exile, and The Heroic Song.
Massada was the first piece that I composed for symphonic wind band. It was composed, and also performed for the first time, in 1997.
Massada (or Masada) is a fortress near the Dead Sea, whose defenders resisted the Romans for seven years and then committed suicide rather than being captured and enslaved by the Romans.
In 1999, Michael Delman and the Petah-Tikva Conservatoire Wind Orchestra performed the European premiere of Massada in the wind-orchestra competition in Zurich, Switzerland, where they won first prize in their category.
They also performed Massada in Festival Mid-Europe ’99 in Schladming, Austria.
Since then, Massada has been performed by various orchestras in Europe, the United States, and in South America, and several orchestras have recorded it.
The most important performances took place at:
Below are some recordings.
For several days I was a guest at the 20th International Harp Contest in Israel.
It took place in the historic Knight’s Halls in the Old City of Akko, chosen by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.
My piece The Wandering Stars for Harp Solo was in the program of the first stage of the competition, together with works of Haydn, Smetana, Salzedo, and Permont.
29 musicians from several countries, including Finland, Italy, Russia, the United States, France, South Africa, China, Serbia, Switzerland, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Germany, and Israel, participated in the contest, 21 of them choose to perform The Wandering Stars at the first stage.
It was an incredible and wonderful experience – to listen to a lot of very different interpretations of this piece performed by such a talented musicians!
The inspiration behind this work is a city at the centre of three religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam, City whose name means “peace”, and whose fate is war, City which has known pain and joy, destruction and renewal, sadness and hope, City whose past is submerged in blood. As for its future… Would anybody dare to say that he knows it?
The poem Jerusalem exists in three versions: for solo piano, for symphonic wind band, and for symphony orchestra.
I wrote the piano version in 1991, and revised it in 2002 and in 2009.
Below is a recording of the 2002 version, performed by Michael Zelevinsky in Jerusalem.
The final piano version premiered in 2014 in Paris, at the first COMPETITION-FESTIVAL – modern piano repertoire, performed by Olivier Seuzaret.
Jerusalem for Piano was published in 2015 by Le CHANT du MONDE, Editions Musicales (in France).
In 2017, this work was performed several times by Albanian pianist Almira Emiri. Below is a recording from YouTube.
In 2012, I wrote the symphonic wind band version.
It was premiered in 2013 by the Petach-Tikva Conservatoire Wind Orchestra, conducted by Michael Delman.
Below is an audio recording of that performance. Although both the orchestra and the recording are not professional, the performance was very enthusiastic and presents a favorable rendition the work.
I wrote the initial version for symphony orchestra in 1993, shortly after I wrote the piano version. However, I was not satisfied with the result; I’ve added a lot of additional content to orchestral version, and the combination resulted in a musical structure that lacked cohesion.
After I wrote Holocaust Requiem in 1994-1995, my attitude towards orchestration changed. As result,I put aside Jerusalem until autumn 2017, when I prepared a new version.
Below are recordings of the piano solo version and of the symphonic wind band version.