Moshe Efrati

Moshe Efrati (Hebrew: משה אפרתי) is an Israeli choreographer, and founder and artistic director of the Kol Demama Dance Company, based in Tel Aviv. His works have been performed in prime venues around the world.^[1]

Efrati worked with the former president of Israel, Yitzhak Navon, setting his words to dance with music, for Israel’s 1982 celebration of the 25th anniversary of the retaking of Jerusalem. Kol Demema means sound silence in Hebrew. The company is notable as including hearing impaired dancers.

Awards

In 1996, Efrati was awarded the Israel Prize, for stage arts - dance.^[2]

Kol Demama

Efrati began working with deaf dancers in 1967, then formed Kol Demama, integrating ten dancers hearing impairment together with and ten dancers without. Efrati cues the hearing impaired dancers by pounding a board on the floor or a dancer stomping on the floor, creating a vibration that can be picked up by the dancers feet, similar to theories of an elephant hearing via vibrations perceived through its feet. Nijinsky is said to have used this method to cue his dancers for Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, as the rhythms were too complex for Nijinsky’s dancers to follow.^{[citation needed]} The dancers also get their cues from the vibration of bass notes in the music, eye contact, touch, movement of others, and lighting cues, all woven into the choreography. Kol Demama has a Tel Aviv school for dancers, teaching several hundred young dancers each year. Efrati intends Kol Demama to be judged on artistic grounds, "I am neither a social worker nor therapist, I am a dance creator." ^[1][3]

Style

Efrati was an original member of the Batsheva Dance company founded with Martha Graham’s assistance by the Baroness Bethsabee de Rothschild. Efrati blends strictly formal and classical ballet choreographic vocabulary with free-form contemporary dance. He draws inspiration from diverse influences ranging from Kafka’s Metamorphosis and Samuel Beckett’s surrealism to the Old Testament and Jewish poets of Muslim Spain His dance is set to music ranging from traditional early Spanish rhythms to contemporary electronic music..

Critical acclaim

"This is what true choreography is all about” – New York Times.^[1]

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Dance with a Difference, Simon Griver, Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1-1-1999
2. ^ "Israel Prize Official Site - Recipients in 1996 (in Hebrew)". http://cms.education.gov.il/EducationCMS/Units/PrasIsrael/TashnagTashsab/TASNAG_TASNAT_Rikuz.htm?DictionaryKey=Tashnav. 
3. ^ DANCE: FROM ISRAEL, THE KOL DEMAMA COMPANY , Anna Kisselgoff, New York Times, 11-21-84

See also

• List of Israel Prize recipients

Persondata
Name	Efrati, Moshe
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1934
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death