Smoira-Cohn, Michal
SMOIRA-COHN, MICHAL
SMOIRA-COHN, MICHAL (1926– ), Israeli musical administrator, educator, musicologist. Born in Tel Aviv, daughter of Moshe *Smoira (Israel's first Supreme Court president). She studied piano with Joseph Tal, graduated from the Palestine Academy of Music in piano and music history (1947), and became a teacher at the Israel Conservatoire in Jerusalem (1952). She was appointed director of the Haifa Orchestra. In 1956, she went to Sweden. After graduating from Uppsala University in 1958, she returned to Tel Aviv, where she was editor of Bat Kol and lecturer at the Music Teachers' Training Seminary and the Thelma Yellin School of Arts (1959). She wrote musical criticism in Haaretz (1963–66) and was lecturer on music aesthetics at the musicology department of Tel Aviv University (1965–67), and on music history and literature at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem (1966–73). In 1968, she became director of the music department of the Israel Broadcasting Authority, Jerusalem, and directed the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem from 1979 to 1984. Active in Israel's cultural life and education, she chaired the Pedagogic Section of the education and culture department (1983), and served as chair and member of the jury of the "Arthur Rubinstein" and of the "Voice of Music Young Artists" competitions. Smoira-Cohn was a political and public activist for decades and one of the driving forces of the volunteer and non-profit sector in Israel and an advocate for women's causes. She was chair of Israel's Women's Organization; she became a member of the city council of Jerusalem and also created the Sovlanut (Tolerance) movement in 1982 (serving as the movement's chair for ten years). She received the Jerusalem Foundation Marthe Prize for Tolerance and Democratic Values in Jerusalem, for the year 2001. Among her Hebrew writings are Ha-Musikah, Mavo Histori (1966); Folk Song in Israel (1963); On Eastern and Western Foundations in the Music of Israel (1968); On Meanings in Music (1982); an autobiography, A Personal Repertoire (1997), and several articles. She also edited publications on the activity of the Jerusalem Rubin Academy of Music and Dance (in Hebrew, 1997/2003), and participated in the writing of the autobiography of her husband, Judge Haim *Cohn (1911–2002), published in 2005.
[Uri (Erich) Toeplitz and
Yohanan Boehm /
Naama Ramot (2nd ed.)]