First Israel Philharmonic Tour Of US In Three Years Arrives At The Soraya This Weekend & Carnegie Hall Nov. 14

This weekend, November 4-5, 2022, The Israel Philharmonic (IPO) will be performing at The Soraya, The Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for the Performing Arts in Northridge (about an hour from LA) as part of the IPO’s first United States tour in three years (tickets available here). The IPO will be in nine cities around California and across the States including a gala in New York and a performance on November 14 at Carnegie Hall (tickets available here).

It is hard to think of the Israel Philharmonic without flashing to its history as the “orchestra of exiles” gathered by virtuoso violinist Bronislaw Huberman to save Jewish musician’s lives during the Holocaust, to its first concert conducted by Leopold Stokowski, to Leonard Bernstein’s devotion to the IPO performing with the orchestra for Israeli troops, and to Zubin Mehta’s long history with the orchestra having been in Israel during the Six Day War in 1967 and having organized a special concert then.

When the IPO was last in LA, Zubin Mehta was still leading the orchestra. This tour will introduce American audiences to the IPO’s new maestro, Lahav Shani.

Shani, who is in his early 30s, has been a familiar performer with the orchestra for more than a decade, having guest performed as a pianist in 2007 and been chosen to be an assistant conductor by Zubin Mehta in 2010. I believe Shani is the first Israeli-born music director of the IPO, in of itself a landmark event.

At the Soraya, the program will consist of Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 – the first time Mahler has been played at The Soraya, and a Symphony from Paul Ben-Haim, the Munich-born Israeli composer who emigrated to British mandate Palestine in 1933 and whose works championed a new Jewish national music for the young country.

The American Friends of the IPO, a not-for-profit created in the 1980s to support the Orchestra beyond its limited subsidies has organized several special events surrounding the concerts, see their website for more info.

I am not a regular attendee of classical music concerts. Yet there is an emotional quality that the IPO delivers, perhaps due to its history and certainly due to its continued excellence that makes their concerts a moving experience. I have seen the IPO at Walt Disney Hall in LA and I have seen the IPO at Tsinandali in the Republic of Georgia, and the orchestra is never less than thrilling.

See them on this tour if you can. You will be supporting a world class Israeli institution with a great history of rescuing refugees from the Holocaust as well as its track record of nurturing home-grown talent such as its new maestro, Lahav Shani.

For more information on the IPO and its tour, go to