Sadai, Yiẓḥak
SADAI, YIẒḤAK
SADAI, YIẒḤAK (1935– ), Israeli composer and music theorist. Born in Sofia, Bulgaria, Sadai came to Israel at the age of 14 (in 1949). In 1956 he graduated from the Tel Aviv Academy of Music under A.A. *Boskovich and also studied composition with Joseph *Tal (1954) and *Haubenstock-Ramati (1959). His works consist of orchestral and chamber music as well as electronic music, and they have been performed at four international festivals of contemporary music. Sadai founded the electronic music studio at Tel Aviv Univeristy (1974), and from 1960 he was a lecturer at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem and at the Rubin Academy of Music at Tel Aviv University (since 1966), where in 1980 he was appointed professor. His special interest lies in interdisciplinary research. His early works as a composer show an integration of maqāmāt with Bergian expressionism (in the chamber cantata Ecclesiastes and in the Ricercare symphonique). From 1965 Sadai embarked on a post-Webern Impressionist style (Interpopulation for strings and harpsichord; Nuances for orchestra; and Prelude à Jerusalem for choir, orchestra, and electronic tape). Among his other compositions are three canatatas – Kohelet, Ha-Ẓevi Yisrael, and Psikoanalisah; Serenade for woodwinds; and Anamorphoses (1981–82) for orchestra and electronic tape.
He published a book on methodology of musical theory (1960) as well as Harmony in Its Systemic and Its Phenomenological Aspects (1980).
bibliography:
Grove Music Online; A.L. Ringer, "Musical Composition in Modern Israel," in: Music Quarterly (1965), 282–87.
[Yohanan Boehm and
Uri (Erich) Toeplitz /
Israela Stein (2nd ed.)]