Yoel Levi

Yoel Levi was born in 1950 in Satu Mare

Yoel Levi was born on 16 August 1950 in Satu Mare, Romania. He moved to Israel as a child and grew up there.

He studied violin at the Rubin Academy of Music in Tel Aviv and earned a Master of Arts with distinction. He studied conducting with Mendi Rodan in Jerusalem, with Franco Ferrara in Siena and Rome, and with Kirill Kondrashin in the Netherlands. He received a diploma from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London in 1978.

From 1975 to 1978 he played percussion in the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1978 he won first prize at the Besançon competition for young conductors and joined the Cleveland Orchestra, where he was resident conductor from 1980 to 1984. In 1988 he became music director of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, recording for Telarc and conducting at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics ceremonies.

In 2001 he became principal guest conductor of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the first Israeli with that title. He led the Brussels Philharmonic from 2001 to 2007, the Orchestre national d'Île-de-France from 2005 to 2012, and the KBS Symphony Orchestra in South Korea from 2014 to 2019. In 2021 he became music director of the Haifa Symphony Orchestra.

He is married to Jackie Perelman, and they have three sons.