Echoes of Croatian Music Culture in Israel

Croatian emigrants took with them elements of Croatian music to many countries of
the world, so it happened that their music put down new roots on other territories.
Israel is a very specific country in this respect. There are echoes of Croatian music
culture here, but they did not come by way of Croatian emigrants; instead 'repatriate'
Jews who used to live on the territory of today’s Republic of Croatia moved to their
.new state, founded exactly fifty years ago, and brought their music with them

Even before the state of Israel was established, Jews from the territory of Croatia kept
a vigilant eye on events in the Jewish part of Palestine, while individuals, inspired by
Zionist ideas or those taking shelter in face of the spread of fascism in Europe, settled
in the Holy Land. After the great pogroms carried out by Arabs against the Jews of
Palestine in 1936, the violinist from Osijek, Abraham (Adolf) Kupferberg (1872-
1939), felt inspired to compose an ode to the defenders of Jewish settlements, Am
Jordan haltet Wache. The text (in German) and melody of this composition have been
preserved in the private archive of a family living now in Israel and have been made
public for the first time for the purpose of this study. The composition was first heard
for the first time at a concert given by Raheli Galay - cello and Daniel Galay - piano,
.in Makarska on August 16th, 1998

In the period before the state of Israel was founded, the composers Paul Rafael Šterk
(he left Zagreb and emigrated to Palestine in 1932), Uri Givon (emigrated in 1939)
and the conductor Lay Mirski (here from 1944 to 1947, when he went back to Osijek)
.were active here in Israel

Most of the Jews from Croatia came to Israel with other Jews from what was then
Yugoslavia in the period between 1948 and 1952. There is no breakdown by republic
of the some ten thousand Yugoslav Jews who migrated to Israel, but it may be
assumed that between one fourth and one third of the entire number came from
Croatia. They were mainly Ashkenazim, from urban comfortably off families, in
which music was considered one of the components of a good education. Some of
them had a substantial knowledge of music and had received their training not only in
Croatia, but also in the neighboring great musical centers (Vienna, Budapest, and
.(elsewhere

This was also the case with the ‘pioneer’ Croatian musician in the Holy Land, Paul
Rafael Šterk. He was born in Zagreb in 1904 where he started to learn piano with
Professor Ernest Krauth. His older brother became a member of the Vienna
Symphony Orchestra in 1912. He received a wound to his left hand during World War
I and was forced to discontinue his musical career, and his parents took away the
young Paul's piano and sold it. He used to practice music in secret, at a friend's home
until, in 1920, his uncle bought him a new piano. He then commenced his systematic
education in music at the Zagreb Music Academy (with lessons in composition,
harmony, counterpoint, orchestration, and conducting). He studied composition and
conducting with Robert Heger in Vienna, from 1929 until 1931, and then came back
to Zagreb and became the Opera chorus assistant conductor at the Croatian National
Theatre. In the following year, 1932, he came to Eretz Israel. Those were the years of
the so-called ‘second wave of immigrants to Israel’, the years in which many young

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European Jewish intellectuals came to Palestine and built Jewish settlements with
their bare hands under harsh circumstances in the parched country. Paul Rafael Šterk
was among the pioneers of Shar ha-Golan, the first Jewish settlement on the Golan
Heights. When the Palestinian Radio and its orchestra were established in Jerusalem
in 1936, two of Šterk’s suites for strings and some of his songs were performed. In the
same year when the Arab pogroms against the Jewish population were taking place,
he joined the Palestinian police force. He was a British Army cipher clerk in Egypt
.during World War II. The Palestinian Radio performed his Ballad for Strings in 1942

Shar ha-Golan was razed to the ground by Arabs during the Independence War in
1948 and seven Šterk’s symphony manuscripts were destroyed there. He continued his
service in the Israeli Army during operations in the Negev Desert and moved to
Jerusalem in 1951, where he worked as a Jewish Agency official until he retired in
1964. The Voice of Israel radio station orchestra in Jerusalem performed his
symphonic poem Jerusalem in 1951. After the performance, Sergej Kussewitzky, who
was present at the concert, commissioned Šterk to compose a major symphony on
Jerusalem. Kussewitzky died four months later, while the symphony dedicated to
Jerusalem, named City of David, was played by the same orchestra in 1956. As far as
we are informed, the last performance of an orchestral composition by Sterk, the
symphonic poem The Death of Saul (Mount Gilboa) was given a year later. Around
the same time, two of his songs for choir and orchestra were also recorded for a radio
.program - Pesah Song and Song of the Negev

Paul Rafael Šterk had to sell the piano because of the grave illness of his wife. He
lived a rather solitary life, away from the mainstream of the Israeli academic music
life. He worked as a Jewish Agency clerk and composed in his spare time, but there
was less and less response from prospective performers. Israeli music life was
.developing without him, new generations of composers were maturing

He finished his Jewish Violin Symphony for violin and symphonic orchestra in 1958.
He made various efforts to get it performed. Yehudi Menuhin and Isaac Stern praised
the symphony, but they apologized that they were too busy. Zino Francescatti was
highly interested in the composition, but, nevertheless, this did not result in its
performance; nor was the City of David symphony conducted and performed by the
conductor Sergiu Comission and the Haifa Symphonic orchestra. Efforts to get some
.of the compositions performed by the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra also failed

Paul Rafael Šterk died in 1979, almost completely forgotten in Israeli music circles.
Two decades later it was almost impossible to get any information on this composer.
The only guideline was an eight-line entry in the Who’s Who published by ACUM
(Israeli Authors, Composers, and Music Publishers Copyright Protection Agency).
However, ACUM could not give us any information on the destiny of Šterk’s music.
No archive, no academy of music, not even the Association of Composers had any
data on him. Even the oldest Israeli musicians have forgotten him, along with the
.composers and musicologists

We were lucky to find Šterk’s son, Moshe Stark, who takes care of his father’s entire
sheet music heritage. In also contains many variations of Šterk’s orchestral pieces, and
completely unknown works: Beehive Yard Ballad for string orchestra, the Hertzel
Mountain (Har Hertzel) symphonic poem, Die Geigensinfonie (dated 1944), The

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Issaiah Symphony op. 39 1964-76, The Elegic Symphonic Poem, The Tragic
Symphony, Prelude for Violin and Piano, and a solo song Poem to Ruth. It still
remains for the large and important creative opus of this self-effacing composer to be
.submitted to thorough musicological analysis

Uri Givon (Željko Veljković) was born in Zagreb towards the end of 1912. He studied
piano as a little boy, and then continued to study clarinet and saxophone at Music
Institute in Zagreb. As his father died when he was still very young, he was forced to
make his own living while still a sixteen-year old boy, playing in various ensembles,
and also on board a ship. He joined the Zionist youth movement Hashomer hacair in
1938 and came to Palestine the following year as one of the Shadir Kibbutz pioneers.
In 1940, he transferred to Shar Haamakim, a kibbutz being set up by immigrants from
Yugoslavia. As was the practice among kibbutzim, he performed all possible duties.
He tended to the horses, and was a baker, but found the time to keep up his music,
showing his considerable talent. He proved to be an extremely adept and likeable
teacher and animator, so as early as late 1940s he taught music at the Inter Kibbutz
Institute. During those years, his reputation as an outstanding accordion-player spread
throughout Israel. He presented this instrument in its full dignity showing that it was
more than merely an instrument to accompany folk songs, but also an instrument
capable for all the forms of classic music-making. When a culture center was
established within the Shar Haamakim Kibbutz, he was appointed its manager and
initiated many activities – choir, orchestra, various courses… Meanwhile he was also
working on his own advanced training, taking lessons from the most prominent
musicians of that time: he studied composition with Mordechai Seter and Paul Ben-
Haim, piano with Ilona Vince-Kraus, and conducting with Michael Taube. He spent
1959 in London perfecting his conducting skills. Prepared in this way, he became very
involved in the in activities of the Kibbutz Association Choir for which he made
numerous arrangements for Jewish and Israeli songs. He also composed many
compositions for this and other professional choirs, amateur choirs, and for moments
of leisure and festive occasions, which are still popular today in Israel. Although he
composed his songs for the requirements of the moment and never considered himself
a professional composer, they show the best characteristics of his talent and
composing skill. Without great pretensions, these songs captivate us with their sweet-
sounding melodies, harmoniousness with the Hebrew text (in which they virtually led
the way), animated rhythms, undemanding quality, and simplicity. As was the case
with many Israeli songs of the period, they tried to ‘reconcile’ the diversities and
contrarieties of Jewish folklore and to build something which could be called “the
Israeli folk music”. Elements of showbiz are also present, while a more serious
.analysis would also show influences of his native land

When the composer died in 1974, a voluminous anthology of his songs for voice and
instrument, children’s choirs, and a series of the most popular arrangements were
published. Many of these songs are still performed by amateur ensembles and are
.heard on the air at many festive occasions, for holidays and anniversaries

It is interesting that the doyen and one of the most prominent Israeli composers, Abel
.Ehrlich, is also the leading representative of the Zagreb music school in Israel today

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Ehrlich was born in Cranz, in Eastern Prussia (today’s Russia) in 1915. He received
his initial music education in the nearby Köenigberg. When his parents felt the
inherent danger of penetrating Fascism, they transferred him to Vienna to study, and
when anti-Semitism started to grow there, he came to stay with his uncle in Zagreb, in
1934. What can you study in a country whose language you do not know? Music, of
course. Since he already had elementary knowledge of violin playing, his uncle
enrolled him at the Polyhymnia Music School, where he was lucky enough to have
Vaclav Huml as his teacher. Even today, Abel Ehrlich has very vivid recollection of
.his days in Zagreb

Unlike Professor Wieck, from whom he took violin lessons in Königsberg, and who
had not put the emphasis on the technique of her pupil, Huml worked almost
exclusively on developing left-hand and riht-hand technique. Adhering to Ševčik’s
method, he taught students to use their left-hand fingers as if they were mechanical
hammers. While Prof. Wieck insisted on delicate and emotional playing, Huml was
.““breaking the wall with his head

As early as at the first lesson he would explain to students that they had to cut their
nails so that calluses formed on the ends of their fingers. He was merciless in his
demands, but students respected and practiced for hours so as never to turn up
.unprepared for their lessons. Nevertheless, Huml was seldom satisfied

Huml particularly insisted on developing the musical ear of his students, so that the
students themselves could determine the exact tone by ear. Although he complied
rather mechanically, Ehrlich was later grateful for this training when he himself
discovered that musical ear is perhaps the most important component of music –
whether it be an ear for harmony, counterpoint, or orchestration: “The most important
“!thing is to HEAR the music

Huml instilled patience in his students. He was not a pleasant teacher. He was strict,
rigorous, very critical, but an excellent teacher. According to Ehrlich, he was the best
possible “preparatory teacher” for establishing the technical foundation upon which
the artistic personality would later be built. However, at the moment that Erlich’s
playing technique reached the level of excellency which satisfied Huml, Ehrlich
realized that he did not want to be a violinist, and started down the path of a future
composer. He continued to take private lessons with Huml. During the summer, he
even traveled to Zagreb from his uncle’s holiday home near Laško to Zagreb to have
lessons with Huml, but his thoughts were already oriented in another direction. Some
of Ehrlich’s compositions were written as early as at the age of ten. In the first months
after his arrival in Zagreb, his relatives used to take him into fancy resorts, to the
Sljeme mountain range and to their house of Laško. There he composed four short
operas – if the small scenes/sketches - in which young Ehrlich accompanied himself
on the piano and sang all the roles - could be called operas. Later on, in 1936, when
he started to attend lessons at the Zagreb Academy of Music and came into contact
with real music, he almost stopped composing, accumulating knowledge which would
.later lead to a creative boom

Abel Ehrlich has interesting memories of the professors who taught him at the
Academy of Music in Zagreb. Not many people of his generation are still alive, while
he has maintained a certain distance, probably because, as a foreigner, with only a few

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years direct contact with Croatian music culture could perhaps be more objective.
Ehrlich emphasised the methodical way in which Franjo Lučić worked on developing
the musical ear of students and regards him as the best teacher he ever encountered.
He found Lhotka’s original but complicated approach to harmony to be quite
unapplicable in his later work. Franjo Dugan delighted students with his art of
improvisation on the organ, and with his profound knowledge of counterpoint.

He had the finest memories associated with the personality of Jakov Gotovac. As the
youngest professor, he was also the closest in age to his students. His students were
very enthusiastic about his analytical approach and his relation with music. Gotovac
lectured on musical forms, but his lessons usually transformed into extraordinary
fundamental, interesting and attractive analyses of compositions, even when the
simple sonatinas by Mozart and Haydn were the topic. Gotovac simply “opened his
students’ eyes” and, although young, he lead them with extraordinary maturity into
.the essence of understanding music

Ehrlich was to carry away with him moving impressions from the music life of
Zagreb. He played in the Academy Orchestra for three years, and among other, took
part, in performing Händel’s Messiah. He was delighted with the excellent opera
orchestra of the Croatian National Theatre, as well as with the good voices and
interesting direction of stagings (Rossini’s Barber of Seville, and Shostakovich’s Lady
Macbeth of Msensky County, particularly). Of his colleagues at the Academy he
remembers only Milko Kelemen, whom he met afterwards in Darmstadt, and with
.whom he used to play during Fran Lhotka’s boring lessons

The Kingdom of Yugoslavia enacted a law in 1938, requiring all Jews who held
German passports to leave the country within a month. Ehrlich was forced to abandon
his studies at the Zagreb Academy of Music. Albania was the only country in Europe,
which was still acceptinig Jews with German passports. Thus Ehrlich came to
Palestine, via Albania, before the beginning of the World War II. He was fortunate in
being able to continue his studies with the exceptional Professor Salomon Rosovski
(Rimski-Korsakov’s student) at the Jerusalem Academy of Music. Afterwards he did
advanced training in Darmstadt, with Henry Pousseur, Kalrheinz Stockhausen, and
Luigi Nono. Ehrlich was a beloved teacher to many generations of Israeli musicians,
and he attained the reputation of a leading composer in world terms. He was given his
country’s highest recognition, the Israel Award. It is a curiosity of sorts to find his
name in the Guiness’ Book of Records as the composer with the greatest number of
opuses to his name. To date, he has written more than 2700 compositions of the most
diverse genres so far, and even today with his extraordinary creative energy surprises
everyone. Although in very advanced years, he continues composing some hundred
!works a year –all at a high artistic level

In addition to this “Huml School” representative, an important former student from

.the Zagreb “Stančić School” of piano lives in Israel, too

Ilika (Ilana, Ilona, Jelena) Ofner was born in Kisač near Novi Sad, in 1915. After
starting her piano studies with Leontina Rosenzweig in Novi Sad, she left for Vienna
in 1933, where, upon being recommended by professor Eugen Zador, she joined
Hedwig von Andrassfy’s class at the Academy of Music. Professor Andrassfy was a

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proponent of the Breithaupt “Natuerliches Klavierspiel Methode” of piano playing,
which was a new method at that time. The purpose of this method was to reduce the
strain on the “high fingers” and to make the whole body free by means of free
.movement of the entire hand

However, as Fascism in Vienna was takin complete rein and the life of Jews
wasunbearable, Ilika was forced to leave Vienna and go back to Novi Sad in 1936.
The piano-player Milica Moč advised her then to continue her studies with Svetislav
Stančić in Zagreb. Her memories of her lessons with this prominent representative of
the Zagreb piano school, a disciple of his teacher, Professor Ferucci Busoni, are all
.very interesting

At first, Stančić was astonished that Ilika Ofner was able to play with such small
hands, but when he saw the mobility of those hands and the results of Breithaupt
method, he withdrew everything he had said earlier. He was very appreciative of her
gift for music, but advised her to forget the playing technique altogether. Instead of
theextensive repertoire, which Ilika Ofner had learnt in Vienna, Stančić gave her
Czerny’s etude opus 740- and for 5 or 6 months made her play only these etudes for 8
hours a day and to give her fingers practice. After several months of hard work and
effort to adopt Stančić’s technique of playing, Ilika Ofner started to master extensive
piano literature (both volumes of Bach’s Das Wohltemperierte Klavier, Beethoven’s
sonatas – including the Waldstein Sonata; Mozart’s Fantasia - in spite of its octaves;
Chopin’s preludes, etudes, and polonaises). Ilika Ofner acquired strength, steadiness
and mobility in her fingers in the 1936 to 1938 period, so she linked these
achievements of the Stančić school with her former experience as a pianist. Even
.Stančić himself acknowledged that this was a good combination

During the World War II, Ilika Ofner went to Istanbul with her husband Dr Francisco
Ofner, a long-term correspondent from the Middle East for the Christian Science
Monitor and the Observer. There she was engaged in helping Jewish prisoners from
German camps and refugees from Europe. After the war the couple settled in Israel,
where she became a highly esteemed teacher of the piano. Because of the nature of
her husband’s work, she was never engaged formally by any music institution, but she
gave lessons to a series of piano students, and was particularly respected as a
consultant to the most prominent Israeli piano teachers (Ilona Vince, Edit Kraus,
Miriam Boskovich). One of her most successful students was Dragan Šobajić, the son
.of Yugoslav ambassador in Israel at that time

The Osijek piano-player Ladislav (Uri) Sternberg (1916 – 1984) also had an
.outstanding carrier as a piano teacher in Israel

Sternberg received his piano training in Osijek, at private lessons with Russian
teachers, and went on to improve it as a refugee in Italy during World War II. Thanks
to the American/Israeli scholarship awarded to him as a nature student he studied for
and earned his doctorate in the USA. His activity in the Negba Kibbutz was
particularly important. There he taught a host of delighted students, including the
prominent composer, Meir Mindel. He recorded programs for Israeli Radio, and was
also a leading teacher of the accordion. He finished his career at the Beer-Sheva

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Conservatorium where his collection of sheet music, including pieces brought from
.Osijek are still kept today

The piano player Elisheva Eshet (Elizabeta Kupferberg, married name Čepečka, 1903
– 1992), who was the above mentioned Abraham Kupferberg’s daughter, also came to
Israel from Osijek. She studied in Budapest with Professor Arpad Karpathy and spent
most of her career in Dubrovnik, until she left for Israel in 1951. Soon after her arrival
in Israel she started teaching at the Rubin Academy Conservatorium, where she
trained a large number of students (including Mirjam Hed-Holander i Hana Gafni).
She particularly insisted on the master of repertoire that was new at that time (Bartok,
Shostakovich, Prokofieff, Hachaturian). She was a well-known solo-singer
accompanist, and also performed as a member of Jerusalem Piano Trio in the 1950s
with which she recorded programs for Israeli Radio. The Zagreb violin-player, Antal
.Sever, was also a trio member

Lav Mirski’s sister, Dita Kovač (née Fritz, 1891-1976), a longtime opera soloist in
Trieste, Zagreb, and Osijek, came to Israel in 1950, where she taught singing at Gat
Kibbutz. Her son Yitzak (Ivica) Kovač, having finished the Osijek School of Music,
.too, was one of the most successful music teachers at Kiryat Gat

In addition to these intangible traces of Croatian music culture in Israel composing,

performing, and teaching activities- and Ilika Ofner’s and Uri Sternberg’s note
collections, it should be mentioned that the Hebrew University Library in Jerusalem is
an important collecting point for data on the Music culture of Jews who came to Israel
from Croatia. As far back as the 1920s, a gratifying custom existed among Jewish
communities from the Diaspora. They used to send results of their activities, including
.sheet music

As a result, many issues of the Zagreb Omanut have been kept intact in the Eventov
Archive at Hebrew University. Manuscripts of Rikard Schwartz’s compositions, which
.were considered lost for a long time, were preserved in the Archive by mere chance

We will end this text with the composer Reuven Yaron’s tragic life story. This is the
story equally important for both Croatia, and Israel, in which we will find some
.characters, which have been already dealt with here

When the pianist Ilona-Ilika Ofner came to Istanbul during the War, she met the
energetic Mrs. Marija Bauer. Mrs. Bauer and her husband, Jews born in Vinkovci,
came to Istanbul before the War and went into the timber business. When refugees
started coming from Europe and told of the atrocities taking place, Mrs. Bauer set up
a Red Cross-type organization with Ilika Ofner, managing somehow to establish lines
of contact and send relief parcels to Jewish officers from the Yugoslav Army, who
were prisoners in German military camps. They went to the large Istanbul market
every day to find cartons, and to buy food and tobacco to send them to Germany (they
were allowed to send 100 parcels a month). Mrs. Bauer was an enthusiastic collector
and vendor of items from Antiquity, furniture and paintings, and she also dealt in
stamps. The Papal Nuncio Msgr. Angello Roncali (who was to become Pope John
XXIII after the War) was one of her clients and one could even say, numbered among
her friends. A secret delegation, lead by Moshe Sharet (who was to be second to Ben-

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Gurion in the future Israel) came to Istanbul at the end of 1941 or the beginning of
1942. Their task was to organize the transport of Jewish children to Israel from
Slovakia and Hungary, via Istanbul, and a contact with Cardinal Roncali was needed
to make this happen. Mrs. Bauer organized the meeting, and as a mediator between
them, came upon the idea of saving children from Zagreb, since her grandson Fedor-
Feđa Frank had been there, too. Everything was conducted through Jewish
underground and semi-official organizations in Hungary and Slovakia. A rich Jew,
Mikloss Krauss, led the action in Hungary through the PALAMT organization. He
opposed the plan to include Zagreb children in the transport, but Mrs. Bauer
succeeded in the end. She sent a secret letter to her relatives in Vinkovci, and they
informed the Zagreb Jewish Community. Most of the Zagreb Jews had already been
killed, but the Jewish Community still formally existed in a private apartment. Even
Cardinal Stepinac saved 56 Jews from the retirement home. Emil (Amiel) Schwartz-
Shomroni acted as contact-person between Stepinac and the Zagreb Rabbi, Dr.
Miroslav Shalom Freiberger (the Jewish Cultural Society in Zagreb is named after
him). He also acted as a mediator in the transfer of the Jewish rabbinical library to the
.Church Chapter

An intermezzo on Schwartz-Shomroni now follows. His young wife gave birth at that
time. All of a sudden, as a gift from heaven, he received notice from Budapest that
had been granted a ‘license’, that is, a permit to leave for Palestine. He than traveled
to Budapest together with his wife and a newborn baby and visited Mikloss Kraus’
office. However, Miklos Kraus said he knew nothing of any ‘license’. Schwartz-
Shomroni’s wife went into hysterics, but Mikloss Kraus shrugged his shoulders and
left. However, his secretary informed Schwartz-Shomroni that Mikloss Kraus had
SOLD the license to another Jew. Schwartz-Shomroni went with his wife and baby to
see the Jew in question to ask for his license, but the Jew said he had paid honestly for
.the license, which saved his son’s life. His son had already left for Palestine

The ship the son was traveling on was torpedoed and he lost his life. Schwartz-
Shomroni finally reached Israel, where he still lives and lends his support to the idea
.that Cardinal Stepinac be awarded the Charter of the Righteous

In April 1942, the Zagreb Jewish Religious Community asked the Interior Ministry of
the Independent State of Croatia (the NDH) for approval for emigration of 50
children. The Interior Ministry demanded a list of the children’s addresses. The
Jewish Community did not provide the children’s addresses, since Jews from similar
lists were often killed, giving only the Community’s address. In the interim, many of
these children were killed or escaped and sought refuge with the Partisans. However,
the quota of children to be sent remained unchanged. The Ustashi authorities and the
Budapest organizers made it a condition that only children whose names were on the
list could leave the country. The Jewish Community tried to substitute other children
under the names of the children who had been liquidated and taught them to respond
to their names. However, Mikloss Kraus from Budapest, would not permit such
substitution and finally, only eleven children left Zagreb. Ruben Mihael, Rabbi
Freiberger’s ten-year old son was among the children in the group. In Budapest, all
the fifty Zagreb children responded when the names on the list were called. Kraus had
!substituted children from Slovakia, Poland and Hungary under their names

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The children from Zagreb finally arrived in Istanbul. Mrs. Bauer could not find her
grandson Feđa Frank among them. However, one of the boys insisted that he was
Feđa Frank. Mrs. Bauer was shouting this was not Feđa, but the boy trembled and
…kept repeating the name: Feđa Frank

Ruben Mihael Freiberger, the Rabbi’s son came to Israel in 1943 and was accepted
into the Shar Haamakim Kibbutz. Meanwhile, his parents had been taken away on
May 3,1943 never to be seen again... He took the Hebrew name Reuven Yaron. His
great music talent soon became evident. It was perhaps inherited from his mother,
who played piano, or from his uncle, who was a singer at the Zagreb Opera. Uri
Givon, who was his first teacher, simply inoculated him with music. Reuven took
lessons at the Tel-Aviv Conservatorium. He studied there under the mentorship of one
of the most prominent Israeli composers, Mordechai Seter, and started composing
himself. As early as at the age of 15 he conducted a choir, and when Gari Bertini
.established the best Israeli choir Renat he joined it

In March 1956, the Renat choir, conducted by Gari Bartini, won first prize at an
international festival in Paris, in competition with 16 countries. The choir sang
Reuven Yaron’s song. This was one of the first great successes of the young state of
.Israeli

Reuven Yaron got married that very spring. Lina i Avraam Avni, who hadadopted him,
prepared a humble celebration on the lawn in front of their small house in the Shar
.Haamakim Kibbutz
The war in the Sinai broke out in the autumn of that year. One day, having returned
from working in the fields, Reuven’s young wife found the following note in
Reuven’s handwriting: “I have been called up, see you!” He was mobilized, sent to
.Sinai and was killed there at the age of 23

.And forgotten

Working on this article, we found a very interesting recording in the Israel Radio
Archive. In Reuven Yaron’s composition for mezzo-soprano, violin, viola, cello and
piano, his teacher, Professor Mordechai Seter himself played the piano passages. We
also found a booklet of Reuven’s sheet music, published after his death by the Shar
Haamakim Kibbutz members, helped by Uri Givon, Mordechai Seter and Gari
.Bertini

This review of Jewish musicians who came to Israel from Croatia is the first dealing
.with the topic. Our hope is that it will stimulate further research

Jews left many traces in Croatian music culture, taking part actively in building it up
over several centuries. As has been shown in this short review, Croatian music culture,
too, had a positive impact on the Jewish population, so that it also indirectly
.influenced the development of music culture in the new Jewish state of Israel

SUMMARY

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Contributions for material on Jewish musicians who were born and educated on the
territory of today’s Croatia and then continued their activities on the territory of
Palestine or, after 1948, in the newly established state of Israel. Jews from Croatia,
mainly from well to do Ashkenazi families, acquired a solid music education in
Croatia and the music centers of neighboring countries. This experience enabled them
to fit into the music life of Israel. Almost unknown and forgotten data is presented on
the activities of the most prominent Israeli musicians, brought up on the territory of
Croatia, such as: Paul Rafael Šterk, Uri Givon, Abel Ehrlich, Reuven Yaron, Ilika
Ofner, Uri Sternberg, and others. Their memories of their early training in Zagreb
were presented, and the further development of their music career in Israel is
.followed

DUŠAN MIHALEK

Dušan Mihalek was born in Novi Sad,Voivodina in 1949. He graduated and took his
masters degree (Magistar) in musicology in Belgrade. He was the Radio Novi Sad
Music Program Editor-in-Chief, and the secretary of the Stage Art and Music
Department of the Matica Srpska. Since 1991, he has been living in Israel, where he
.was the director of the Israeli Music Center

by Dushan Mihalek 2009 ©

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