UCLA Jazz Pianist Hosting Concerts on Zoom

Every Saturday evening at 6 p.m. Tarzana-based jazz pianist Tamir Hendelman gives a concert to an audience of 60-70 people. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, Hendelman has found a unique way of continuing his private concerts. Prior to the pandemic, he used to give small concerts in private homes. Now, he hosts them from the comfort of his living-room via Zoom and surprisingly enough, people are still attending.

“People enjoy watching and listening to a concert live” Hendelman told the Journal.  “Each performance is unique and different Before the coronavirus, I played a monthly home concert series in L.A. for the last couple of years. I love the intimacy of the setting.  Now, with weekly online concerts from home, each show is dedicated to a certain artist or composer, so I have a lot of music to revisit and discover.  If I play a well-known song, I’ll re-arrange it.  I will often discover a new piece by a favorite composer, or share an anecdote about how Gershwin came to write ‘Rhapsody in Blue.’  It’s fun to connect the dots and it’s good to leave some room to improvise in the moment.”

Hendelman knew that he wanted to be a pianist from a young age.  Born in Israel, Hendelman said, “It started when I was 6 and went to Dizengoff Street in Tel Aviv,” he said. “I saw a music store. Someone was playing a piece on the organ there. When I listened to it, it sounded like a whole orchestra to my young ears, because there were so many instruments involved —  drums, trumpets, etc. From that moment, I knew that’s what I wanted to do [with my] life.”

His parents first gave him keyboard lessons and only after they moved to the U.S. in 1984 he started taking piano lessons. “My first teacher lived 30 miles away and each week my parents would take me there for a two-hour class,” he recalled. The investment paid off and  at 14 Hendelman won Yamaha’s National Keyboard competition. Later, he started giving concerts in Japan and at the Kennedy Center.

After receiving a degree from the Rochester N.Y. Eastman School of Music in 1993, Hendelman became the youngest musical director at the Lovewell Institute for the Creative Arts in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. He then returned to Los Angeles and has been in steady demand as pianist and arranger, touring the US, Europe and Asia. He was a guest soloist with the Henry Mancini Institute Orchestra, accompanied Barbra Streisand at her return engagement to New York’s Village Vangaurd in 2010  and is featured on her 2009 album “Love is the Answer”. He is also featured on Natalie Cole’s 2008 “Still Unforgettable” album.

As a music professor at UCLA, Hendelman continued teaching online from his home after the university closed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. “When I teach online from home, my Yamaha piano connects to my computer, so students can both see and hear what notes I play,” he explained. “With our spring online classes at UCLA, we’ve developed creative ways for students to record with one another, make their own YouTube clips and interact in real time.  Instead of viewing the situation as an obstacle, we regard it as a challenge: how we can use the technology to learn and keep motivated.”

Hendelman believes that even once the coronavirus is a thing of the past and he’ll be able to resume his live concerts, there will still be a place for Zoom concerts. For one, he said, Zoom concerts allowed him to reach audiences in Europe and the U.S. at the same time. “Next week I’m giving a morning concert so audiences in London and Europe can also attend,” he said.

He addd, “This spring, many touring musicians have had months of concerts disappear overnight. Tours of Israel, Germany, France and New York have been postponed, with my own trio, the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, the Jeff Hamilton Trio and my new group, the Spirit of Israel Ensemble.  A concert of ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra was also canceled.  But I know it will all eventually happen, even if it takes a few months or a year.  With some patience, things will get back to a new normal for everyone.  Meantime, I am glad to have something new and musical to look forward to each week.”

To see Tamir Hendelman’s upcoming concerts, visit his website.