Program

Tel-Hai Master Classes 2025

The daily schedule during the program:

Individual lessons, workshops and practicing--daily from 9.00 a.m. to 1.00 p.m.(Lessons and workshops open for all to observe).

Public Master Classes are every day from 4.00 p.m. to 6.30 p.m.

Evenings (from 8 p.m.)--students concerts and occasional special events.

Concerts

Considering the importance of performing in public, a number of public concerts will take place during the course. Be ready to perform from the first day! Please include in the application form the pieces you are ready to play in public. The concert programs will be devised in consultation with the faculty. If you intend to perform a concerto, be sure to have a two-piano score.

Chamber Music Workshop (Professor Vera Vaidman, violin & viola)

Mindful of the significance of chamber music in a pianist’s professional life, a Chamber Music Workshop will be taking place during the Master Classes session. This year, the focus is on sonatas for violin and piano and viola and piano. The faculty's professor, in the true spirit of collaborative music-making, will take an active part in building performances, sharing her experience, knowledge and insight in the process. Successful projects may be presented in Master Classes public concerts. As the number of places in this Workshop is limited, only those genuinely interested in the subject and with previous experience in studying and performing chamber music should apply.

If you intend to join the Chamber Music Workshop, please indicate so in the application, specifying one complete composition you wish to work on. The piano part should be ready for rehearsal from day one of the course.

Any sonata for violin and piano or viola and piano

Art-Song Workshop in memoriam of Prof. Jonathan Zak (Professor Ido Ariel)

The memory of Jonathan Zak, who established the Art Song Workshop, is cherished by the Master Class and the workshop is named after him.
With enthusiasm, profound knowledge, and great skill he conducted the Art-Song workshop year in and year out, implanting in young pianists the understanding and appreciation of the unique connection between the poetic content, human voice, and the piano in this fascinating repertoire

Whether on the concert stage or in parlor music-making, the voice and the piano are arguably the closest allies and collaborators. Think of the glorious songs by Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Wolf, Faure, Tchaikovsky, Ravel, Mahler, Strauss, Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich and more…

Art-song builds upon an intimate inter-relationship between the music and the words. Both performers – the singer and the pianist – communicate meanings and feelings expressed within this relationship. Both need to understand the music and the text. Thus, while preparing a song, the pianist should study not only the instrumental part but also the singer's part and the poem. Students participating in the art-song workshop are expected to be well-heeded in these different aspects of the song: poems translated and understood, piano parts mastered and vocal material learned. Such preparation will enable a fascinating and enjoyable work, with resident singers, on a collaborative interpretation of a great repertoire.

Master-classes students interested in taking part in the Workshop are requested to indicate so in the Application Form. They will be contacted by the office about the repertoire.

Improvisation Workshop

During his workshops, Guy Mintus sets out to connect the participants deeper with the core of their own musical expression by using an approach that is both technical and holistic.
In this intensive session participants will take part in musical games, experiments, exercises which will reveal the improviser and the inner voice in each participant.
The workshop will include taking pieces from the participants’ repertoire and using them as springboards for improvisations, re-imaginations and musical explorations.
Guy had taught globally at institutions such as UCLA; Royal Conservatory Madrid; University of Cincinnati; University of Toledo; KM School of Music & Technology, Chennai; Tel Aviv-Vienna Vocal Connection; Thelma Yellin High School of Arts, and more.

Concerto Audition

In the framework of the 2025 Tel-Hai International Piano Master Classes, a Concerto Audition will be held with the aim of choosing outstanding course participants for performance as soloists with orchestra in Israel.

In addition, the Audition winners will be offered the following monetary prizes:

● First Prize: 1500 ILS
● Second Prize: 1000 ILS
● Third Prize: 500 ILS

The Master Classes students wishing to take part in the Audition should indicate so in their application form.
Applicants who have performed with orchestra as a result of winning a similar Tel-Hai Audition in the past, are not eligible.

for more information about thew concerto audition click here>>

Each participant is assigned to the class of a faculty member of his/her choice as indicated in the application form, for regular work during the course. In addition, some students are chosen to perform in public master classes. Students are encouraged to apply and perform in concerts.

As in the past, scheduling permitting, participants may ask for additional individual lessons from faculty members other than their assigned teacher. The teachers will make every effort to accommodate such requests.

Students may apply to Chamber Music, Art Song, and Improvisation workshops, indicating so in the application form.

On the last day, an annual Gala Concert will take place at the Lin & Ted Arison Israel Conservatory of Music Concert Auditorium, in which outstanding participants of the course perform.