Since its opening in 1973, the Jerusalem Music Centre (JMC) has been providing the music and music education communities in Israel with a world-class national resource centre, dedicated to encouraging the country’s finest talents, bridging the distance between Israel and the rest of the music world, and initiating and implementing much needed programmes and projects that the education system and culture establishment cannot provide.
We believe that music is about inter-human communication and cooperation, social involvement and cultural relevance, at least as much as it is about an abstract sense of beauty or the expression of the self. In a competitive and ever-specialising world, where individual achievement is celebrated, we try to cultivate other important aspects of the young musician’s personality: broad horizons, sound knowledge, stylistic versatility, creativity, team work, sensitivity to the Other and commitment to the community. For us, all these are part and parcel of true musical excellence.
The JMC is an independent, dynamic and flexible organization, capable of developing projects and executing them in short periods of time, and of responding to changing needs and new challenges. It is not a school: it has neither a fixed curriculum, nor permanent faculty, nor enrolled students. Many of our programmes are, therefore, enrichment programmes, offered to talented young musicians (7-30 years old) from the entire country above and beyond their routine, formal music studies.
Our independence allows us to operate, to some extent, as a laboratory: free from the rule of rating and the burden of bureaucracy, we can afford to explore and experiment. At the same time, we cooperate regularly with practically all leading organisations of music and music education in Israel: the Buchman-Mehta School of Music, Tel Aviv University; the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance; the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra; the New Israeli Opera; the Ministry of Education; the Ministry of Science, Culture & Sports; pre-academic music schools all over the country; and so on.
The JMC is a not-for-profit organization, funded largely by philanthropic contributions. Its international advisory board is co-chaired by Lord Rothschild and Maxim Vengerov, and its members include: Ruth Cheshin, Asher Fisch, Jacob Fisch, Miriam Fried, Alexis Gregory, Lord Moser, Andrew Parrott, Natalie Portman, Prof. Curtis Price, Steve Reich, Lady Ritblat, the Hon. Nathaniel Rothschild, Joe Smouha, David Stern, Prof. Menahem Yaari, Lady Weidenfeld and Tabea Zimmermann. The Centre’s executive committee is chaired by Prof. Menahem Yaari, president of the Israel Academy for Sciences and Humanities and former president of the Open University in Israel. In addition, the JMC benefits from the experience of music advisors such as violinist Miriam Fried, violist Tabea Zimmermann, composer and pianist Menahem Wiesenberg and flutist Yossi Arnheim.
Our Missions are:
1. To nurture outstanding young musical talent through special intensive programmes, enhancing their skills of solo, ensemble and orchestral playing alike.
2. To provide opportunities for Israeli musicians and music students to meet, learn from, and be inspired by, internationally renowned musicians.
3. To create performing and recording opportunities for young musicians and ensembles, helping them launch professional careers.
4. To guide and support teachers of musical instruments, in order to improve teaching standards in all conservatories, especially in the periphery.
5. To develop and implement special, high standard programmes for teaching instruments in elementary schools, again favouring the periphery.
6. To pay special attention to areas of music that are neglected or marginalised by mainstream establishments: a-capella choirs, Arabic music, early music and so on.
7. To put Jerusalem on the map of the global music scene, while providing the city with a vibrant cultural centre offering top-quality chamber music concerts, workshops, conferences etc.
8. To promote informed public discourse on music and its socio-cultural contexts.