Josef Bardanashvili: Ofra Yitzhaki plays Bardanashvili Ofra Yitzhaki

• Josef Bardanashvili (b. 1948): Fantasia (2004):
• 1 Bardanashvili: Fantasia (2004) 08:12
• Piano Sonata No. 1 (1974):
• 2 Bardanashvili: Piano Sonata No. 1 (1974): I. Allegretto 05:31
• 3 Bardanashvili: Piano Sonata No. 1 (1974): II. Lento (sostenuto) 07:20
• 4 Bardanashvili: Piano Sonata No. 1 (1974): III. a piacere 04:24
• Four Short Pieces on Jewish Folksongs (1975):
• 5 Bardanashvili: Four Short Pieces on Jewish Folksongs (1975): I. Ashrei ha’Am (‘Blessed is the People’) 01:22
• 6 Bardanashvili: Four Short Pieces on Jewish Folksongs (1975): II. Ashira (‘I Shall Sing’) 00:54
• 7 Bardanashvili: Four Short Pieces on Jewish Folksongs (1975): III. Haftara (‘Parting’) 02:03
• 8 Bardanashvili: Four Short Pieces on Jewish Folksongs (1975): IV. Shir (‘Song’) 02:17
• Piano Sonata No. 2 (1984):
• 9 Bardanashvili: Piano Sonata No. 2 (1984): I. Vivo 12:42
• 10 Bardanashvili: Piano Sonata No. 2 (1984): II. Post Scriptum 03:54
• Five Theater and Film Sketches (2020):
• 11 Bardanashvili: Five Theater and Film Sketches (2020): I. ‘Agape' - a play by Hanoch Levin 04:19
• 12 Bardanashvili: Five Theater and Film Sketches (2020): II. ‘It All Begins at Sea' - a film by Eitan Green 02:40
• 13 Bardanashvili: Five Theater and Film Sketches (2020): III. ‘Snow in May' - a film by Zurab Inaishvili 01:38
• 14 Bardanashvili: Five Theater and Film Sketches (2020): IV. ‘Ghetto' - a play by Joshua Sobol 01:41
• 15 Bardanashvili: Five Theater and Film Sketches (2020): V. ‘The Dragon' - a play by Evgeny Schwartz 02:33
• Postlude (1993):
• 16 Bardanashvili: Postlude (1993) 10:27
• Canticum Graduum (‘Song of Ascent’, 2022):
• 17 Bardanashvili: Canticum Graduum (‘Song of Ascent’, 2022) 10:35
• Total Runtime 01:22:32

Info for Josef Bardanashvili: Ofra Yitzhaki plays Bardanashvili

A premiere recording of the complete piano music of Georgian-Israeli composer Josef Bardanashvili.

"I was born in Batumi, a Georgian port town on the coast of the black sea. I now live in Bat-Yam, an Israeli coastal city on the Mediterranean. The topography of these cities shows itself in my works as a long, imaginary horizontal shoreline, with layers of musical events above and below it."

This shoreline that Bardanashvili describes – be it in Batumi or Bat-Yam – is always there for the listener to follow in his music, be it a highly ornamented melodic line or a film-like dramatic narrative (drawing upon his decades of work in film and theater).

Georgia has been, for many centuries, a place where different ethnicities have resided side by side: Armenians, Azerbaijanis, Jews, Kurds, Persians, Christians, Muslims, and others. According to Bardanashvili, living in a Jewish family in such a culturally affected his style in leaning towards pluralism, eclecticism, and tolerance of all musical cultures. This love of diverse musical styles is evident in each of the works in this collection.

The music of Josef Bardanashvili has been performed by the Israel Philharmonic, Berlin Symphony, and Mariinsky Theater Orchestras, conducted by Zubin Mehta and Valery Gergiev. Bardanashvili’s solo works have been heard in performances by Giora Feidman, Tabea Zimmermann, Natalia Gutman, Alexander Korsantia, and Shlomo Mintz.

Known for her emotive power, clarity of interpretations, and captivating programming, pianist Ofra Yitzhaki has performed for audiences at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, the Taiwan National Concert Hall, Berlin’s Museum of Musical Instruments, and at the Vilnius Palace of Arts. With this new album, she presents the complete piano works of the contemporary composer Josef Bardanashvili as premiere recording.

A spectacular journey between music theater and Jewish prayer, Sephardic tunes and jazz, Puccini and Alban Berg, baroque, romanticism and film music.

Ofra Yitzhaki, piano

Ofra Yitzhaki
was described by the New York Magazine as “downright sensational” and by the Israeli Ha'aretz as “a profound, virtuoso artist”. She is a winner of the Carnegie Hall Millennium Piano Book Competition and the Van Cliburn Institute Concerto Competition and was awarded a Doctorate of Musical Arts Degree from the Juilliard School. Recent highlights of her activity include performing Beethoven's 'Emperor' Concerto with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra and Ligeti's Piano Concerto with the Israel Contemporary Players.

With repertoire ranging from Bach and his contemporaries to the composers of her own generation, her recital engagements have taken her to New York's Lincoln Center, the Chicago Cultural Center, Germany's Klavierfestival Ruhr, Berlin Philharmonie's Instrument-Museum, the Tel Aviv Museum, the Jerusalem Theater, Taiwan's National Concert Hall and Korea's National Arts-Center, among others.

Ofra Yitzhaki started her piano lessons in Tel-Aviv at the age of five with Dr. Noa Blass, and played her debut at the Tel-Aviv Museum at age eight. She continued her studies with Dr. Zecharia Plavin. Subsequent to the completion of her education at the Jerusalem Academy of Music, she became the recipient of the Vladimir Horowitz Scholarship at the Juilliard School, where she studied with Prof. Jerome Lowenthal and Prof. Jacob Lateiner. For her pianistic and scholastic achievements, she was awarded a Doctorate of Musical Art Degree in Piano Performance from the Juilliard School. Following her participation in the Weimar Master classes in Germany, she was invited by the legendary Austrian pianist Paul Badura-Skoda for a private study, focusing on music by Bach and First Viennese School.

Yitzhaki gave her American debut after winning the Van Cliburn Institute Concerto Competition, as a soloist with the Fort Worth Chamber Orchestra in Texas. Her New York concerto debut followed a few years later, as a soloist with the American Symphony Orchestra in Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center.

As a recitalist, her recognition rose greatly when being invited to perform at Carnegie Hall world premieres of piano music by Milton Babbitt and Ellen Taaffe Zwilich. A subsequent invitation by Carnegie Hall’s director at the time, Franz Xaver Ohnesorg, to perform at Germany’s Klavierfestival Ruhr, resulted in her European debut, described by the German press as "An Evening with Soul, Poetry and Glorious Sounds". A few years later she was invited by the prestigious German SchierseFoundation to give her Berlin Debut Recital at the chamber music hall of the Berlin Philharmonie.

In addition, she is an avid performer of modern and contemporary music. Highlights of her work in this field include a solo open-air recital of twentieth century music at New York’s Bryant park under the auspices of MoMA (Museum of ModernArt), a chamber music concert with members of the Parisian Ensemble Intercontemporain, and performances in New York‘s new music festivals such as 'Cutting Edge'and 'Focus!'. Her concert-lectures about Israeli piano music, based on her Doctorate dissertation and on collaborations with Israeli composers, have taken her to Cultural and Academic centers across Germany and the U.S.

Booklet for Josef Bardanashvili: Ofra Yitzhaki plays Bardanashvili