With, at the time of writing, another lockdown in the offing but as yet to be confirmed, it looks like we’ll be back to online means of keeping ourselves entertained and culturally enriched.
With that in mind, and if you didn’t manage to get yourself over to the Jerusalem Theater or Israel Museum last week for the Israel Festival or Jerusalem Jazz Festival, respectively, you will have another opportunity to grab some of the onstage action with a bunch of Internet-facilitated reruns this Tuesday-Thursday. All the shows in both festivals were shown via Zoom, live, in addition to their performance before restricted audiences at the actual events.
Thus, over the coming few days, we can all sit back, relax with our popcorn, slurp of wine, or whatever takes our gastronomic fancy, and settle into some cutting-edge creative endeavor across various styles and genres of dance, music and performance art, at our own convenience.
One of the most intriguing slots in the Israel Festival was the Blue Zone dance production created by veteran choreographer Galit Liss. For some time now Liss has focused on what she terms the “physiological aesthetics” of the mature body in the contemporary dance scene. Blue Zone features 14 women aged 65-80 who, together, explore their feelings and physical maneuvering domain, also dipping into various topics such as the Zionist ethos and individual sexuality.
One of the most eagerly anticipated items in the Israel Festival agenda was the rendition of The Eichmann Project – Terminal 1 by the Pathos Mathos theatrical performance company under the guidance of company founder and artistic director Lilach Dekel-Avneri. The show investigates one of the landmark events in the history of the state, which changed the national approach to the Holocaust.
On the classical musical side, we will be able to catch the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra performing compositions by three 20th-century Jewish composers – Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Igor Stravinsky and Kurt Weill – whose works were banned by the Nazis. There is also another chance to hear what the LAB Orchestra and Castle in Time Orchestra combined combo – under respective composer-conductors Stephen Horenstein and Matan Daskal – made of the groundbreaking efforts of electronic music pioneer Eric Siday’s output.
And, if you missed the Jerusalem Jazz Festival, you might want to hook up for any of the three highly varied online berths, featuring gigs by the likes of Iraqi music-influenced rocker Dudu Tassa, and singer-songwriters Rona Kenan and Evyatar Banai, as well as some actual jazz performances by pianist Eden Ladin and his quartet, avant-garde-leaning duo multi-instrumentalist Gershon Waiserfirer and drummer Haggai Fershtman, the LBT trio, and voice artist Victoria Hannah alongside singular pianist Omri Mor.
For tickets and more information: www.israel-festival.org and www/jerusalemjazzfestival.org.il