Ami Maayani

Ami Maayani was born in 1936 in Ramat Gan

Ami Maayani was born in Ramat Gan in 1936. Around 1938 his family moved to a workers' housing estate in north Tel Aviv that his father Yehuda, an engineer, helped build. As a child he studied violin, viola and trumpet, and later piano and organ.

He finished high school at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem at 17 and studied with Paul Ben-Haim and conductor Eitan Lustig. He earned a bachelor's degree in architecture at the Technion and a master's in urban planning at Columbia University, where he also studied electronic music. He later earned a master's in philosophy at Tel Aviv University.

He co-founded and conducted the Gadna orchestra and in 1956 founded the Tel Aviv municipal youth orchestra. He also conducted orchestras in Haifa and at the Technion. His Harp Concerto won the Engel Prize for 1963.

As an architect he worked with Yitzhak Perlstein and Arieh Sharon and designed the Jerusalem music academy building at Givat Ram. In 1971 he left architecture for music. From 1980 he was a professor at the music academies of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and twice directed the Tel Aviv academy.

He chaired the Israel Composers' League and wrote books on music philosophy and on Richard Wagner. He died on February 17, 2019, and was buried in Rishon LeZion.