About Us ▾
The Israel Composers' League
The Israel Composers' League (ICL) was founded in 1953. Its aim is to promote all kinds of contemporary concert music written in Israel, to improve the general welfare of composers living in the country and to bring the knowledge and awareness of music written by Israeli composers to the general public. It functions as the local section of the ISCM (International Society for Contemporary Music) and the ACL (Asian Composers' League).
The League directs its main activities to organizing concerts, competitions for composers (young composers in particular), encouragement of young performers playing Israeli music, educational lectures at conservatories and academies of music and cultural exchanges of concerts and lectures with similar organizations in foreign countries. The Israel Composers' League has established its own publishing house ( IMC - Israeli Music Center), which publishes and distributes our members' works. The ICL is also active in producing CDs of Israeli music culminating with the 2003 release of "Psanterin" - an anthology of Israeli piano music of the 20th century.
The Israel Composers' League is a nonprofit organization, supported by the Ministry of Culture and Education, membership fees and contributions.
Members of the Board of Directors are: Dr. Shai Cohen - Chairman, Dr. John Bostock - Treasurer, Dr. Eyal Adler – Secretary
The Israel Music Center
The Israel Music Center (IMC, or as is generally known in Hebrew - "Mali") is the Israel Composers' League members' publishing house. The ICL was initiated in 1994, by Ari Ben Shabetai – then the chairman of the Israel Composers' League, with the support of the League's management and council. Each council member submitted a composition of his to the new organisation, and ever since then the collection grew to the current number of 4010 registered compositions , composed by 136 Israeli composers. The IMC is unique among publishers of its kind, since it is run directly by the composers themselves, taking care of all compositions created in the country with no need of lectors committees whatsoever, and without even a slight preference of one work or one creator over another.
The IMC was formed as a result of an essential need of Israeli composers who felt that the already existing Israel Music Institute (IMC) did not support their professional needs in a satisfactory manner. The ICL publishes the works, promoting and striving to bring them to performance as much as possible. The IMC also takes care of securing the composers' right to get their share in rental fees of orchestral parts. Since the initiation of the IMC, every Israeli composition has a location – either with the IMC itself or at any other music publisher subject to the composer's preference.
During its first 12 years of operation the IMC was directed by the musicologist Dushan Michalek. Currently it is directed by the ICL chairman, with the help of its employees Efrat Carmush and Ronald Boersen.
Composers Write For The young ▾
Composers write for young players
It is the ICL's major objective to bring young players and their teachers into the world of contemporary music.
- We cooperated with inner-city conservatoires and developed a program in which few original pieces for solo, duos, trios and even small chamber ensembles were written especially for children.
- The idea is to write original artistic pieces, not didactic, but, adapted to children’s abilities.
- The composers worked together with the teachers and the young players.
- For the Paul Ben Haim Competition, the Composer's League requested from a number of composers to write new works suitable for young performers, with the purpose of broadening the catalogue especially for those instruments that have few works written for them.
Psanterin - An Anthology of Israeli Music for Piano ▾
9 CDs of Israeli Music from the 1920's through the end of the 20th century.
A publication (2003) of the Israel Composers' League
and the Israeli Music Center (IMC)PSANTERIN is the first Israeli music anthology published on CDs (2003). The Anthology includes 72 works for piano composed between 1923 and the end of the previous century. The collection opens with works of first generation of composers in Israel: Joel Engel, Paul Ben-Haim, Menachem Avidom, Yehoyachin Stutchewsky and others. It continues with first generation composers of statehood (Mordechai Seter, Oeden Partos and others) going as far as the younger generation of today's composers (Yoram Meyuchas, Gil Shohat and others).
All works included (except one) have been studio-recorded. Each CD features one of the following pianists: Liora Ziv-Li, Allan Sternfield, Ora Rotem-Nelken, Herut Israeli, Tomer Lev, Michal Tal, Natasha Tadson, Yuval Admoni and Astrith Baltsan. (The last CD includes pianists Allon Goldstein and Allan Sternfield.)
The Anthology is above all an outstanding window on the vast compositional activity and stylistic diversity in Israel. It manifests great musicological and cultural values in addition to its intrinsic pure musical values. It is thus intended for the use of musical libraries, academies and conservatoires, classical music radio stations and music information centers throughout the world.
Contact Us
MLI & Composers Union Address:
36 Tsahal St., Tel Aviv, 6935158 (Basement floor ) [PO Box 10039]
Union Reception hours:
Sunday-Wednesday 8:00 - 13:00
IMC Reception hours:
Monday and Thursday 13:00 to 19:00
Union & MLI TelFax:
+972-(0)3-562 1282
Union Mail: israelcomposers@gmail.com
MLI Mail: music.imc@gmail.com