Zecharia Plavin

Zecharia Plavin was born in Vilnius (Vilna) in 1956. He studied at the renowned Churlionis School, then at the Academic Conservatory in Lithuania and after immigrating to Israel in 1977 at Tel Aviv University. Guided in piano studies by Deborah Yellin, Prof. Mariam Azizbekova, Prof. Viktor Derevianko. In 1984 studied with Louis Kentner in London. He received a doctorate for research on the works of Ernest Bloch at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem under the supervision of Prof. Jehoash Hirschberg. In 1980 he won the François Shapira Prize and has since performed with most Israeli orchestras including the Philharmonic, and since 1987 began performing in Western Europe and the United States and then in Eastern and Northern Europe. He performed and recorded numerous compositions by Franz Liszt, Ernest Bloch, Robert Schumann and Cesar Frank for Western European recording labels. Plavin also performed and recorded several works by Yardena Alotin, Ben-Zion Orgad, Andre Hajdu, Eitan Avitsur, Tzvi Avni and Ron Weidberg. Since 1989 he has been teaching piano and piano literature at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. Since 2000, his activities have expanded into the fields of cultural and social research, writing books and plays, and composing. In the composition over the years he consulted with Prof. Ron Weidberg. Plavin’s works to date have been performed in Israel, the United States, Hong Kong, Germany and Lithuania.