Avi Belleli
Avi Belleli is a creative musician who works in collaboration with various branches of the arts. Soloist and bassist of the rock group Tractor’s Revenge, he has performed together with dance troupes, playing music that he composed especially for the production. He has been involved in musical installations and presentations and played in collaboration with creators in the plastic arts. He has won several awards for composition of soundtracks for theatrical performances films.
Belleli’s entry into the world of music started at the age of 11, when he persuaded his parents to buy him a guitar and taught himself to play. As a teenager he founded a band called Hurricane, together with friends from the neighborhood, and at age 15 he switched to playing bass. Despite their fondness for progressive rock, this young group soon joined the reggae vocalist Tony Ray and played at his gigs. These were Belleli’s first experiences of performing on stage.
At the early age of 17 he accompanied some of Israel’s leading singer/songwriters, such as Zvika Pik and Ariel Zilber, while simultaneously participating in startup bands like the prog. rock group Atmosphere
Parallel with his military service, Belleli established the groups Modus Vivendi and Collage, which appeared in the legendary Israelis dark clubs of the period: Liquid, Penguin and Dan Cinema.
In 1986 Belleli returned from a long stay in London and Berlin and established a duo together with a friend from his youth, the artist and musician Uri Dushi. They called the duo Hakaan (The Here), and under that name they recorded an album which was enthusiastically received by the critics and is considered to this day as a milestone in the Israeli Indie music.
In 1988 Belleli put together an ensemble with friends from various bands, including Green, the keyboardist from Hurricane, Ophir Leibovitch, the guitarist from Modus Vivendi, and the drummer Danny Makov. Their first album was recorded and thus began the long history of Tractor’s Revenge (in Hebrew Nikmat Hatractor)
Hitherto Tractor’s Revenge has released eight albums (see discographia). The latest was released in September 2011 under the title Nishaar Rak Larutz (Nothing left to do but run).
In 1990 Tractor’s Revenge performed jointly with the Bat Sheva dance troupe directed by choreographer Ohad Naharin, accompanying the dance “Kyr”. This groundbreaking collaboration between a dance troupe and a rock group generated one of the most successful performances in the world of modern dance in Israel and abroad.
The range of Avi Belleli’s musical creation covers a broad range extending over diverse branches of the arts: from composition of the music for the popular TV series “In Treatment”, which was sold to many countries, to collaboration in experimental shows in the world of dance, such as “Strawberry Cream and Gunpowder” by Yasmin Goder; from composing music for Israeli repertory theater (e.g. Othello at Haifa Theater, Birthmark, and Parcels from America at Habima Theater) to long-term collaboration with the unique theatrical creator Rina Yerushalmi (Myth, Three Sisters, the Herzl Project)
Currently Belleli is recording with Tractor’s Revenge an album of music set to the poetry of Moshe Iben Ezra, a Jewish poet from Medieval Spain.
Both with the band and individually, Belleli works in collaboration with creators in various branches of the arts: dance, cinema, the plastic arts and theater.
Dance
Kyr (with T.R.), Anaphase, Einoela, The Power of Balance, Strawberry Cream and Gunpowder ,Clouds and Soup
Theater
Hammerhead Shark (Karish Patish) Paradise South , Parcels from America, Nothing, Of Mice and Men, Orphans, Paradise South, Cooper, The Father, Myth, Othello, Three Sisters, Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Herzl Project
Cinema
What a Wonderful Place, Broken Wings, Coordinating Plans, Joy, Guide to the Revolution, Good Morning Mr. Fidelman, My Beautiful Sister.
Documentary and television
Cinderellas, Children of the Sun, Angry People, In Treatment, Taking the Dog Out, I Didn’t Promise You, The Cinema Course, Garbage State, The Knesset: day job Beside Me, Lady Kul El Arab, 77 Steps., Timrot Ashan, Bare feet. To Catch The Shadow,
Presentations
There’s Someone on the Stairs (with N. T.) Urban Exotica, Crumbs. In addition, Belleli has released six albums containing soundtracks and musical experiments in various branches of the arts: Orphans and dead-end kids , broken wings, power of balance, myth, strawberry cream and gunpowder , Belleli, Ravitz Ravikovitch.
Awards
- Academy of Cinema and Television, 2005 award for the score of Joy.
- Documentary Cinema, 2008 award for the score of Children of the Sun.
- Academy of Cinema and Television, 2010 award for the score of The Guide to Revolution.
- Jerusalem Film Festival, 2011 award for composer of the year for the score of the film Restoractor.
- Academy of Cinema and Television, 2011 award for the score of the film Good Restoractor.