Ofra Yitzhaki
Pianist​

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Known for her emotive power, clarity of interpretations, and captivating programming, pianist Ofra Yitzhaki has performed in recitals at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, the Taiwan National Concert Hall, Berlin’s Konzerthaus, and at the Vilnius Palace of Arts. Her recital at the Klavierfestival Ruhr — playing Bach alongside European premieres of Israeli
and American music — was described by the Westfaelische Rundschau as “an evening with soul, poetry, and glorious sounds.”
Yitzhaki’s latest album, released on NEOS and co-produced by Hessischer Rundfunk and Deutschlandfunk Kultur, features the premiere recording of piano music by the German- Jewish modernist composer Josef Tal. Other recent releases include the complete piano
works of Georgian-Israeli composer Josef Bardanashvili (TYXArt, 2024) and the late works of Mordecai Seter (IMI, 2025).
Yitzhaki has performed over thirty concerti—from Bartok and Haydn, to Ligeti and Schoenberg—with the Berlin Symphony, the Romanian Radio Orchestra, as well as both the American and Jerusalem Symphony Orchestras. Committed to new music, she has premiered
more than 60 works for solo and chamber ensembles. Her close collaboration with composer
Milton Babbitt led to a successful premier of his music at Carnegie Hall, and her work with the Parisian Ensemble Intercontemporain was described by the Israeli Ha’aretz as reaching “a
new, superb level for the performance of modern music.”
Yitzhaki’s dynamic programming often pairs old and new works to reveal how each can
illuminate the other. She’s programmed C.P.E. Bach’s fantasies alongside Georg Friedrich
Haas’s music for piano and electronics, Scarlatti’s miniature sonatas with Ives’ enormous
Sonata No.1, and French Impressionist composers opposite new music of her native Israel.
Recognizing her commitment to engaging audiences, the Hessentag Festival in Germany
commissioned her to write and perform recital programs with actors narrating letters between
Mozart and his father and between Brahms and the Schumanns.
One of the last pupils of Paul Badura-Skoda, Yitzhaki has recently focused on solo recitals of
Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier. On faculty at Tel Aviv University’s Buchmann-Mehta
School of Music, she is also the artistic director of the “Voice of Music in the Upper Galilee,”
Israel’s oldest and largest chamber music festival. She holds a Doctorate in Piano
Performance from the Juilliard School.