In recognition of the musical path he has blazed and along which he has inspired so many others, creating a unique style that mixes East and West with instrumental improvisation, melody, and driving rhythm; of his continuing creative experimentation with harmony, sound, and structure; and his immeasurably rich contribution to the cultural life of Israel.
Composer, vocalist, drummer and social activist, Shlomo Bar is a pioneer of ethnic music in Israel. He has created a musical continuity between past and present, in his words, "a link in the chain that connects my parents to my children."
Born in Rabat, Morocco, in 1943, he was brought to the year-old State of Israel at age six. His family settled in Be’er Yaacov, then a village of immigrants from many countries, where the young Shlomo was enveloped in their varied musical traditions. He learned to play ethnic percussion instruments, singing and drumming his way through high school and afterwards. His breakthrough came in 1976, when he performed songs to music he had composed for Israeli playwright Joshua Sobol’s groundbreaking Kriza (Outrage), an on-stage exposé of discrimination against Oriental (Mizrahi) Jews in Israel.
A year later, Bar founded one of Israel’s most innovative musical bands, HaBrera HaTiveet (The Natural Choice). A fertile encounter of mostly immigrant musicians of diverse ethnicities, its original members were Indian violin and sitar virtuoso Samson Kehimkar, Israeli bassist and producer Yisrael Borochov, American guitarist and banjo-player Miguel Herstein, and Bar, who composed most of the music, performed the vocals, and played bongo and conga. In the almost four decades since and throughout the changes in the group’s lineup, Bar remains its leader and moving spirit. Over the years, the group has represented Israel in music festivals around the world.
Long before the concept of ‘world music,’ the group fused Eastern and Western musical elements from varied ethnic origins, its complex opuses drawing inspiration from Biblical and modern Israeli themes. Bar’s musical influences, he says, range from Bob Dylan and Miles Davis through Shlomo Carlebach, to Jewish liturgy and classical Indian music. While no specific niche awaited HaBrera HaTiveet, its music was instantly popular and has remained so.
In his early career, Bar made his mark with songs that expressed ethnic pride and celebrated Jewish life in Morocco, themes then conspicuously absent from Israeli public culture. This was the theme of HaBrera HaTiveet’s first album, released in 1979. It combined traditional Moroccan and Yiddish music with Indian motifs, and new renditions of songs by Israeli poets, some of its tracks running up to eight minutes. He later moved on to create a musical culture that connects all Israelis with their heritage and articulates their reality as a renewed nation.
Alongside his musical activities, Bar is also involved in diverse social activities, among them, working with youth in different frameworks, including teenagers and students.