As the state of Israel marks its 60th anniversary in 2008, the University of Virginia Jewish Studies Program will host a conference exploring the music of Israel.

Along with scholarly discussion of Israeli music as a window into national identity, politics, religion and culture, the conference will also feature April 13 performances of Israeli popular, folk and religious music by Etti Ankri and Moussa Berlin, as well as cellist Uri Vardi and the Charlottesville and University Symphony Orchestra performing works by Osvaldo Golijov, Ernest Bloch and Hector Berlioz.

“This is the first conference ever held outside of Israel to look at Israeli identity through music,” said Joel Rubin, U.Va.’s director of music performance and a conference organizer. “We are bringing together scholars from around the world and two superstars of Israeli music.”

All events of the conference, titled “Hearing Israel: Music, Culture and History at 60,” are open to the public. Academic sessions, to be held April 13 and 14 at U.Va.’s Darden School of Business, are free. Concert tickets cost $15 to $28 for the symphony performance in Old Cabell Hall on April 13 at 3:30 p.m., and $10 for adults or $5 for students for the 8 p.m. concert at Darden’s Abbott Auditorium featuring the Etti Ankri Band and the Moussa Berlin Ensemble. To order, call the Cabell Hall Box Office at (434) 924-3984.

Ankri has been one of Israel’s most famous singer-songwriters and actresses since 1990, when her debut CD, “I Can See In Your Eyes,” went double platinum. She has performed around the world and has been called a “rock genius,” a “poet of Israeli spirituality” and “the contemporary voice of Israel.” Her songs, spanning eight albums, feature social commentary, feminist perspectives and religious and kabalistic imagery. Ankri has also acted in a number of Israeli and American movies, including “Deadline” (1987) with Christopher Walken.

At the age of 70, Berlin is one of the world’s leading klezmer musicians (along with U.Va.’s Joel Rubin, assistant professor and director of music performance).

The academic sessions will discuss many aspects of (and influences on) Israeli music, including the aggressive hip-hop of Palestinian identity, the influence of Arabic music, postmodernism, electric guitars, themes of diaspora and homeland, and “cochini” women’s songs in Israel and India.

A full conference schedule and details are available online at
www.virginia.edu/jewishstudies/music-conference.html

The Hearing Israel Conference is supported by the University of Virginia Jewish Studies Program, the Gunst Family Foundation, the Posen Foundation, the McIntire Department of Music, the Corcoran Department of History, the College of Arts & Sciences, the Department of Religious Studies, the Department of Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies, the Middle Eastern Studies program, the University of Virginia Hillel and the Cultural Affairs Department of the Embassy of Israel.