Music

Classical music in Israel has been vibrant since the 1930s when hundreds of music teachers and students, composers, instrumentalists and singers, as well as thousands of music lovers, streamed into the country, driven by the threat of Nazism in Europe. The founding of The Palestine Philharmonic Orchestra (today the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra) 1936, marked the beginning of Israel's classical music scene. In the early 1980s, the New Israeli Opera began staging productions, reviving public enthusiasm for operatic works. The Russian immigration in the 1990s boosted the classical music arena both with new talents and music lovers. The contemporary music scene in Israel is hugely varied, dynamic and eclectic. It spans across all spectrums of musical genres and often fuses many musicals influences ranging from Ethiopian, Middle-Eastern soul, rock, jazz, hip-hop, electronic, Arabic, pop and mainstream.