Yuval Ron: Music’s Cross-Cultural Catalyst
by Chris Anderson
(Note: to see the entire article, including a sample of his music, see OM-Times May 2010 Edition)
Israeli born Yuval Ron is the musical director and oud player for The Yuval Ron Ensemble, which includes Arabic, Jewish and Christian artists who unite the sacred music traditions of Judaism, Sufism and the Armenian Church into an unusual mystical, spiritual and inspiring musical celebration. Rabbi David Zaslow says, “Yuval Ron’s music arises from deep within the soul of the Middle East: the Arab soul, the Jewish soul, the soul of Druze, Sufi, and Christian alike. In his compositions all differences disappear, even for just a moment, to let the real soul of peace, shalom, saalam enter the heart.”
During his broad and varied career, Yuval Ron has worked with countless producers, directors, actors, composers, arrangers, vocalists, and musicians. Having a special affinity for music in particular and for the performing arts in general, he’s recorded and mixed the music for innumerable commercials and recorded and mixed film scores and dozens of album projects.
Since moving to California in 1997, after thirty years in the NYC music industry, Yuval has continued to work with advertising clients on the one side of his musical identity while also developing themes around musical interfaith celebrations that include Andalusian, Gypsy, Sephardic Jewish songs, Sufi chants from Turkey, Jewish songs from Morocco and Israel and Armenian Church chants… imparting the ancient and deep intercultural connection between these three Abrahamic traditions and the musical influences they share.
Among his many honors, Yuval was invited to perform for the Dalai Lama, for Pir Zia Iniyat Khan (Head of the Sufi International Order), and has produced albums of Turkish master-musician Omar Faruk Tekbilek. In 2006, Yuval won an Oscar for the musical film West Bank Story, and in 2004 he received the Los Angeles Treasures Award. Yuval has lectured throughout the world in universities such as University of California Los Angeles, John Hopkins University, Middlebury College, Brandeis University, MIT, Berklee College of Music, Pittsburgh University, Texas University in Austin, University of California San Diego, and the Jerusalem Film School in Israel.
He’s done field recordings in the Sinai desert with the Bedouins and produced the record One Truth with Turkish master musician Omar Faruk Tekbilek on World Class Records. His One, on Magda Records, features Omar Faruk Tekbilek, Yair Dalal, Azam Ali, Pejman Hadadi, Nahil Azzam and Haim Louk. A recipient of multiple grants from National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, the American Composers Forum and the California Council for the Humanities, Yuval also has worked with the Moscow Symphony, the LAJS Symphony, and the New Hampshire Philharmonic.
