Obituary: Jazz Musician Stu Hacohen, 77: Bulgarian-born pioneer of Isr

[Guy Berger]

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Maybe Barak, Bentsi or Alon can comment.

Stu Hacohen, one of Israel's first jazz musicians, died on Saturday. He was 77.

Hacohen was a gifted arranger, who adapted music with Yossi Banai, Arik Einstein and Shimon Yisraeli, among others; an extraordinary composer, who integrated jazz and Balkan music; and an influential teacher, who inspired students who became prominent musicians. With his wife, singer Rimona Francis, Hacohen recorded one of the first locally produced jazz albums.

Hacohen was born in Bulgaria in 1929 and immigrated to Israel in 1949. His first instrument was the accordion, but like many of his Eastern European musical colleagues, who settled in Tel Aviv and found work there in hotel jazz bands, Hacohen learned to play a variety of instruments, including the piano, saxophone and double bass. In the early 1950s, Hacohen was a member of Maurice (Pisi) Osherowitz's band, which played seven days a week at the Dan Hotel in Tel Aviv...

One of the musicians who expressed admiration of Hacohen and Francis' first albums was the great jazz trumpeter and bandleader Dizzy Gillespie, who invited the couple to appear in a few of his concerts. Later albums by Hacohen and Francis are best known for their integration of irregular Balkan rhythms and jazz...