Yardena Alotin

Yardena Alotin was born in 1930 in Tel Aviv

Yardena Alotin was born in Tel Aviv. She was the only child of Dr. Arie and Dr. Hana Alotin, and her father was among the founders of Magen David Adom. At age 5 she began piano lessons with Rivka Sharett-Hoz, sister of Moshe Sharett.

She studied at the Music Teachers' College in Tel Aviv from 1948 to 1950 and at the Israel Music Academy from 1950 to 1952. Her teachers included Mordecai Seter, Paul Ben-Haim, Alexander Uriah Boskovich and Ödön Pártos. Her studies were interrupted by service in the IDF.

Her first work, Yefei Nof for mixed choir, was written in 1952 and won the Nissimov Prize. She wrote chamber, vocal, piano and orchestral music, often drawing on Baroque and Classical forms and on Eastern, Western and Jewish traditions. In 1978 she arranged Yefei Nof for solo flute for James Galway.

She was composer-in-residence at Bar-Ilan University and taught piano at the Israel Conservatory of Music in Tel Aviv. In 1984 she wrote Shir Chag for the 75th anniversary of Tel Aviv.

Alotin died in New York in 1994 and is buried at Yarkon Cemetery. Her husband was the physicist Yohanan Riverant. Bar-Ilan University holds a yearly composition competition in her name.