Yedidiah Admon

Yedidiah Admon was born in 1894 in Dnipro

Yedidiah Admon was born in 1894 in Yekaterinoslav, today Dnipro in Ukraine. He came to the Land of Israel in 1906. He studied at the teachers' seminary in Jerusalem and sang in the choir of Abraham Zvi Idelsohn.

During World War I he moved with his family to Egypt and joined the British Army. After the war he returned and worked as an accountant for the Mandate government. In 1923 he went to the United States and studied music in Baltimore.

Back in the Land of Israel, he wrote music for the play Queen Esther, which included the Purim song "Shoshanat Yaakov". He also wrote "Gamal Gemali" and many holiday songs. From 1930 to 1939 he studied in Paris with Nadia Boulanger.

He helped draft the first charter of ACUM, the Israeli society of authors and composers, and served as its chair. His larger works include the oratorio Song of Deborah and the opera Moses and Pharaoh's Daughter, staged in New York in 1963.

He received the Israel Prize in 1974. He died in 1982 and was buried in Tel Aviv. Streets in Be'er Sheva and Tel Aviv bear his name.