Praised by the 2010 Israeli Prime Minister Committee for creating music that is “fascinating, vibrant, and drawing the ear as well as the heart,” Israeli composer Gilad Cohen (b. 1980) is an active composer, conductor, and performer of concert music, music for the stage, and rock.
A graduate of the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance and the Mannes College of Music, Cohen is currently a Whiting Fellow and Ph. D. candidate at Princeton University. Cohen was the winner of the 2010 Israeli Prime Minister Award for Composers. His works have been performed by the Nash Ensemble of London, the Israeli Chamber Project, the Maitar Ensemble, leading Israeli choirs (including Ankor, Moran, Ha-Efroni, and Adi), and Braca Baruh of Belgrade.
A current student at the Tony-honored BMI Musical Theater Workshop in New York, he was commissioned by the Program in Theater at Princeton University to write original songs and incidental music for their 2010 fall production of Bertolt Brecht’s play The Good Person of Setzuan. The show was performed at the McCarter Theater Center with a singing cast of fifteen and a four-part band. Cohen has written music for several plays in Israel, including a complete musical theater score for Napoleon - Dead or Alive!, a play by Nissim Aloni and productions of the International Puppet Theater Festival in Jerusalem.
In 2003, Cohen co-founded Double Space, an original-music band that combines influences from jazz, progressive rock and world music. Following the release of their debut album Windings in 2006, reviewer Adam Baruch wrote: “Excellent debut album…probably the most significant piece of music recorded in this country in the last decade.” Soon after the inclusion of Windings in Radio 106FM’s “Best Albums of the Decade” list, Double Space’s composition After the Tsimess won the Outstanding Achievement in Songwriting Award in the 11th Annual Great American Song Contest. Cohen is also a member of Klezshop, a New-York based original modern-kleizmer trio, with clarinetist Gilad Harel and violinist Jonathan Keren. His composition for Klezshop, “Danse Amaleque,” was a finalist in the prestigious John Lennon Songwriting Contest.
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