The Sand and the Sea: Navigating the Repertoire of Israeli Jazz Musicians

An impressive number of Israeli jazz musicians have successfully established themselves internationally over the past two decades, creating music that melds together various aspects of “American” jazz and an array of Israeli and Jewish influences. While each musician has developed his or her own approach to this process of musical fusion, collectively one can hear common threads interwoven and connecting them all. In the constant search for new source material, Israeli artists go to familiar and familial repertoires as a natural starting place. This talk focuses on the ways in which these leading artists engage with and reimagine this broad and diverse repertoire. Study of these arrangements provides a direct route to exploring the ways in which Israeli jazz artists seek to blend Israeli and Jewish musical sources and influences with their jazz practice.