Music, food and a spectacular view constitute the fare of Revital Hachamoff’s new intimate concert series Piano in Nataf.
By MAXIM REIDERUpdated: SEPTEMBER 14, 2017 12:43Revital Hachamoff 521(photo credit: Courtesy)
‘It all happened almost by itself,” says one of the finest Israeli pianists Revital Hachamoff as she speaks about the concert series that begins on November 24 at her home in the village of Nataf in the Jerusalem Hills.“In our home there is a hall with an arched ceiling. The hall opens on to a patio with a breathtaking view of the Sharon Plain, and my husband, who is not a musician but a computer scientist, said one day that this was the perfect space for a chamber music series,” says Hachamoff.She admits that for her, as a pianist who performs regularly throughout the world in “real” concert halls, the idea of a ci concert series in her own home sounded strange, to say the least.“But then we bought the piano of my dreams, a Fazioli piano, with a sound so different from a Steinway and I started thinking that the acoustics in the hall are very good, the piano is excellent, I love playing music with my friends, and the place itself is so splendid, situated in the heart of the nature reserve – one of those places where it is simply impossible to play badly because its beauty inspires you – so I thought, why not?” Now the small hall, which seats about 130 listeners, is equipped with a stage, lighting and microphones, which also allows for the concerts to be recorded.“And besides, we enjoy hosting people who come to our village from the big cities,” continues Hachamoff, “and we have great neighbors – Maggi, who grows organic vegetables; the Himmelfarb family, which is famous for its cheese; just in front of us is the Rama gourmet restaurant; and the Seahorse winery is also in the region.So it was only natural to put music and culinary pleasures together,” she says.“And if that were not enough, it turns out that the chef of Rama is a double bass player who dreamed of coupling music with meals, so I just handed him the concert programs and gave him total freedom to follow his gastro-musical associations.”But above all, it is about the music. Piano in Nataf is an eight-concert series, most of which features Hachamoff performing with her musical friends. The series opens with a concert by the Israeli Piano Quartet (which includes Hachamoff, violinist Gilad Hildesheim, violist Shuli Waterman and cellist Ira Givol). The music program includes Beethoven’s Quartet in E flat major, Seven Waltzes, by Chopin and Beethoven’s Third (Heroica) Symphony in a rare piano arrangement by the composer’s student and friend Ferdinand Ries. The culinary program is based on numbers three and seven and will be offered at the Rama Restaurant at 6 p.m. Dessert will be served during the intermission.Other concerts in the series feature leading Israeli artists such as piano duo Sivan Silver and Gil Garburg (the culinary program is suited to the musical one and features meals for two); cellist Zvi Plesser and clarinetist Evgeny Yehudin playing Brahms and Mozart; soprano Claire Meghnaggi and counter tenor Yaniv Daor (with Food and Fire being the chef’s culinary response to their Baroque love arias and duet program), as well as the Jerusalem Trio, pianist Matan Porat, offering with Hachamoff an impressionistic program of pieces by Debussy, Ravel, Messiaen, Liszt and others. Among the concerts is also Hachamoff’s recital featuring pieces she never played before.The concerts take place on Thursdays (with the exception of one concert on Saturday night) and start at 8:30 p.m. For more details: www.pianonataf.org.il
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