Joseph Dorfman

Joseph Dorfman Composer Joseph Dorfman was born in 1940 in Odessa, Ukraine († 2006) . He studied at the P. Stolyarsky School of Music, at the Odessa Conservatory and the Gnessin Institute of Musical Education in Moscow, where he received his Ph.D. in 1971. Already as a student he engaged in a wide range of musical activities, such as composer, pianist, lecturer, theoretician, coach and conductor. During the 1960s, Dorfman was among the first musicians in the Soviet Union to perform and lecture on Western contemporary music. As a composer, he has explored many directions including recorded and live electro-acoustic improvisation, graphic composition and combinations of graphic and traditional notational forms. Together with his involvement in contemporary music, having served as Chairman of the "Young Composerױs Section of the Odessa Composers League", he became increasingly interested in Jewish Art Music, cantillation and folk music. This bore fruit in later years when he served as Artistic Director of International Festivals of Jewish Art Music. Dorfman is a prolific musician, performing as solo pianist, member of various chamber groups and conductor of concerts in several European festivals and radio programmes. Since 1973 he has been living in Israel. He is currently a Professor of Composition and Theory at the Israel Rubin Academy of Music, Tel Aviv University. He served as Head of the Composition and Theory Department (1981-85) and as Head the Academy of Music. He was also visiting professor at Columbia University, at the Hochschule fŸr Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Frankfurt am Main, at Bar Ilan University and at Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz. He was a sought after lecturer on 20th century music, and his master classes on the composition and performance of modern music are highly esteemed. Dorfman has been the Music Director of the concert series "20th Century Music", secretary of the Israeli Composersױ League and initiator of an independent composersױ group called "Acoustic 7-11", which pioneered the music of foreign avant-garde in Israel. His works include music for solo instruments, chamber ensemble, symphony orchestra, ballet and theatre, opera and oratorios. He wrote also multi-media staging and educational works.
Dorfman died in June, 2006.