Canaan JonathanBorn in Israel in 1977 and raised in Ramat Gan. Studied jazz at the Thelma Yellin High School of the Arts, where he began writing and composing songs and became interested in composing music for the theater. After his military service, he studied composition and conducting at the Buchman-Mehta High School of Music at Tel Aviv University, where he completed his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music. He also studied conducting at Indiana University in Bloomington and at the CCM School at the University of Cincinnati..
After graduating, he began his career as a rock music composer and singer. He performed with a band and released two solo albums, Yonatan Canaan – “7 Minutes” (2008) and “Santa Fe” (2012).
Singles from the albums were played on radio stations and the animated video for the song “7 Minutes” was broadcast on television. The video, directed by Dana Farber, now Jonathan’s wife, won the “Judges’ Choice” award at the Annecy Animation Festival. In 2010, Jonathan Canaan teamed up with director and actor Shimon Mimran and musician Adam Madar to create the musical show “Songs in Ashdod”, based on the poems of the poet Sami Shalom Sheetrit.
Jonathan composed the songs for the show, which described in a unique language the daily life and difficulties of adaptation of immigrants from Morocco to Ashdod in the 1960s. The show was invited to take part in many festivals and cultural events in Israel and abroad and was also known for its collaborations with many artists such as Ahuva Ozeri, Kobi Oz, Berry Sakharof, Dikla, Laura Rivlin, Zeev Revach, Ran Danker and other artists.
In 2014, Yonatan Canaan won a Mifal HaPais grant for the creation of the opera musical “Greta and the Space Race” based on a short story by Valeria Zbylotsky. The musical was about Greta, a young and ambitious girl living in the communist Soviet Union who falls desperately in love with cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. Her intense and impossible love led her, in desperation, to marry another man, whose name, coincidentally, was also Yuri Gagarin.
The musical “Greta and the Space Race” had its world premiere at the Original Musical Festival in Bat Yam under the artistic direction of Uri Pasteur, and won first prize in the festival’s competition. The musical was directed by Shirit Lee Weiss and the cast and singers included Daniela Lugsi, Guy Manheim, Yael Levita, Daniela Skorka, Anat Czerny, Sarit Vino Elad, Ohad Sragai and more.
Two years after “Greta and the Space Race” was performed at the Musical Festival, Uri Pasteur invited Jonathan Canaan to compose the musical “Messiah Now!” written by Ephraim Sidon, about the Jewish false prophet Shabtai Zvi. The work, also directed by Shirit Lee Weiss, focused on the inner and tormented world of Shabtai (Henry David), who managed to sweep the masses after him in messianic madness, but was also struck by feelings of helplessness and depression. Two important supporting characters were Sara, Shabtai Zvi’s wife (Etti Vaknin) and Natan Ha’azati – his close advisor (Koby Merimi), with both of whom he had difficult relationships, of love-hate and dependence. Sidon’s text was written entirely in a musical manner, in meter and rhyme, without separation between spoken dialogues and choruses, which led Jonathan Canaan to compose the musical as a rhythmic rock opera, in which the text is sung in its entirety, from beginning to end – which gave rise to a large-scale rock score, orchestrated by Eran Zahavi. A year later, in 2017,
Jonathan Canaan performed the first musical he composed in English at the New York Festival: Sacrifices, which tells the story of the destruction of Jerusalem from a contemporary and refreshing perspective. About a year later, the musical was performed in full reading before producers in New York, and several contemporary Broadway stars participated, such as Michael Maliakel, Julie Benko, Mary Testa, and more.
Jonathan Canaan has won the Prime Minister’s Award for Composers, the ACUM Award, and support from the Rabinowitz Foundation, the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, and a Mifal HaPais grant. He has composed, arranged, conducted, and musically produced many projects, such as musical direction of the performance “A Concert All Blue” at Yad Vashem:
Historical reconstruction of the secret Zionist concert that took place in the Kovno ghetto in 1942, music for the theater play “Atonement” at the Habima Theater, “Rainbow Girl” at the Kibbutz Theater, “The Decisive One” at the Nissan Nativ Acting Studio, music for a Strauss advertisement (Tahina Achla),
Music for the Xrhealth meditation app, musical arrangement and production of Ronit Shahar’s album, and more. Yonatan Canaan is the son of the late Prof. Nurit Canaan Kadar, who was a researcher in art history and dean of the Faculty of Arts at Tel Aviv University, and the late surgeon and heart surgeon Dr. Gabi Canaan.
He was the director of Rivka Ziv Hospital in Safed and the North Medical Center (Poriya). He is married to high-tech woman and entrepreneur Dana Farber, and they have two daughters: Thea and Aria. In addition to his work as a musician, Jonathan Canaan has also been active in the high-tech and technology world in recent years in the field of product and user experience design, with an emphasis on music and creative communities.
After graduating, he began his career as a rock music composer and singer. He performed with a band and released two solo albums, Yonatan Canaan – “7 Minutes” (2008) and “Santa Fe” (2012).
Singles from the albums were played on radio stations and the animated video for the song “7 Minutes” was broadcast on television. The video, directed by Dana Farber, now Jonathan’s wife, won the “Judges’ Choice” award at the Annecy Animation Festival. In 2010, Jonathan Canaan teamed up with director and actor Shimon Mimran and musician Adam Madar to create the musical show “Songs in Ashdod”, based on the poems of the poet Sami Shalom Sheetrit.
Jonathan composed the songs for the show, which described in a unique language the daily life and difficulties of adaptation of immigrants from Morocco to Ashdod in the 1960s. The show was invited to take part in many festivals and cultural events in Israel and abroad and was also known for its collaborations with many artists such as Ahuva Ozeri, Kobi Oz, Berry Sakharof, Dikla, Laura Rivlin, Zeev Revach, Ran Danker and other artists.
In 2014, Yonatan Canaan won a Mifal HaPais grant for the creation of the opera musical “Greta and the Space Race” based on a short story by Valeria Zbylotsky. The musical was about Greta, a young and ambitious girl living in the communist Soviet Union who falls desperately in love with cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. Her intense and impossible love led her, in desperation, to marry another man, whose name, coincidentally, was also Yuri Gagarin.
The musical “Greta and the Space Race” had its world premiere at the Original Musical Festival in Bat Yam under the artistic direction of Uri Pasteur, and won first prize in the festival’s competition. The musical was directed by Shirit Lee Weiss and the cast and singers included Daniela Lugsi, Guy Manheim, Yael Levita, Daniela Skorka, Anat Czerny, Sarit Vino Elad, Ohad Sragai and more.
Two years after “Greta and the Space Race” was performed at the Musical Festival, Uri Pasteur invited Jonathan Canaan to compose the musical “Messiah Now!” written by Ephraim Sidon, about the Jewish false prophet Shabtai Zvi. The work, also directed by Shirit Lee Weiss, focused on the inner and tormented world of Shabtai (Henry David), who managed to sweep the masses after him in messianic madness, but was also struck by feelings of helplessness and depression. Two important supporting characters were Sara, Shabtai Zvi’s wife (Etti Vaknin) and Natan Ha’azati – his close advisor (Koby Merimi), with both of whom he had difficult relationships, of love-hate and dependence. Sidon’s text was written entirely in a musical manner, in meter and rhyme, without separation between spoken dialogues and choruses, which led Jonathan Canaan to compose the musical as a rhythmic rock opera, in which the text is sung in its entirety, from beginning to end – which gave rise to a large-scale rock score, orchestrated by Eran Zahavi. A year later, in 2017,
Jonathan Canaan performed the first musical he composed in English at the New York Festival: Sacrifices, which tells the story of the destruction of Jerusalem from a contemporary and refreshing perspective. About a year later, the musical was performed in full reading before producers in New York, and several contemporary Broadway stars participated, such as Michael Maliakel, Julie Benko, Mary Testa, and more.
Jonathan Canaan has won the Prime Minister’s Award for Composers, the ACUM Award, and support from the Rabinowitz Foundation, the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, and a Mifal HaPais grant. He has composed, arranged, conducted, and musically produced many projects, such as musical direction of the performance “A Concert All Blue” at Yad Vashem:
Historical reconstruction of the secret Zionist concert that took place in the Kovno ghetto in 1942, music for the theater play “Atonement” at the Habima Theater, “Rainbow Girl” at the Kibbutz Theater, “The Decisive One” at the Nissan Nativ Acting Studio, music for a Strauss advertisement (Tahina Achla),
Music for the Xrhealth meditation app, musical arrangement and production of Ronit Shahar’s album, and more. Yonatan Canaan is the son of the late Prof. Nurit Canaan Kadar, who was a researcher in art history and dean of the Faculty of Arts at Tel Aviv University, and the late surgeon and heart surgeon Dr. Gabi Canaan.
He was the director of Rivka Ziv Hospital in Safed and the North Medical Center (Poriya). He is married to high-tech woman and entrepreneur Dana Farber, and they have two daughters: Thea and Aria. In addition to his work as a musician, Jonathan Canaan has also been active in the high-tech and technology world in recent years in the field of product and user experience design, with an emphasis on music and creative communities.
His works in the Israeli Opera:
Hanoch Levin – The Opera (2024)
Excuse me, are you the lady of this butt (from Jacobi and Leidenthal) |
If you are a pianist, then the piano (from Jacobi and Leidenthal) | Silence (from Murder)
Theodore (2023) December
Theodore (2023) May
