
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, August 7, 1995                   TAG: 9508070086
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: JERUSALEM                                 LENGTH: Short

ISRAELI MUSIC PIONEER DEAD AT 87

Composer Menachem Avidom, a pioneer of the Mediterranean style that was popular in Israel for three decades, died Saturday at 87. Family members did not give a cause of death.

A cousin of Austrian composer Gustav Mahler, Avidom wrote nine symphonies and three operas, as well as concertos and string and brass quartets.

He pioneered a musical style interweaving Mediterranean rhythms, melodies and instruments with traditional Western technique. The style caught on in the 1930s and dominated Israeli composing for three decades.

He won the 1961 Israel Prize and other awards.

Avidom was general secretary of the Israel Philharmonic from 1945 to 1952 and director of Israel's national society for the performing arts from 1955 to 1980.

He was born in 1908 in Stanislav, Poland, and emigrated to Palestine in 1925.

by CNB