Includes unlimited streaming of Composing Israel: The First Three Generations
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Streaming + Download
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
Capriccio was composed in 1955 and revised in 1975; this is the first commercially released live recording. Tzvi Avni wrote: “The piece belongs to my ‘Mediterranean’ period, when I was under the influence of my teachers Paul Ben-Haim (to whom this work is dedicated) and Mordecai Seter. Retrospectively, one might find in it other influences like, for example, that of Bartók. The structure of the piece is based on two central themes which are worked out rather freely, although in the wider sense an A-B-A form might be discerned, with a coda at the end.” Avni wasn’t able to attend the 1987 NIU concert, but his guest lecture during a 1994 visit included a repeat performance by William Koehler of Capriccio and a performance of Avni’s Elegy for solo cello by then graduate student (now physician) Karen Cardon. The ICL/IMC Psanterin anthology includes a more recent recording of Capriccio by Allan Sternfield.
Tzvi Avni (orig. Hermann Jakob Steinke, b. 1927) left Germany in 1935 for Haifa. He studied with Abel Ehrlich, Paul Ben-Haim, and Mordecai Seter at the Israel Music Academy in Tel Aviv, with Vladimir Ussachevsky at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center, and with Aaron Copland and Lukas Foss at Tanglewood. Avni has composed symphonic, chamber, vocal, and choral music, as well as electronic works and music for film, radio-plays, and ballets. His music (published by IMI) is often performed internationally and has been released on recordings in Israel, Europe, and the U.S. Avni’s numerous awards include the Israel Prize, Emet Prize, ACUM Prize for lifetime achievement, the Saarland Kunstpreis, and the Germany-Israel Friendship Association’s Kustermeier Prize. A Jerusalem Rubin Academy of Music faculty member from 1971-2015, he served as Head of the Theory and Composition Department and Director of the Electronic Music Studio.
