Avner Finberg

Avner Finberg is an Israeli American composer and violinist. His music reimagines traditional musical forms and ideas using fragments and stylistic references to wide-ranging sources, while also drawing upon cutting-edge contemporary music techniques. 

Finberg’s debut album, THE FOUR SEASONS OF ISOLATION, was hailed as “intriguing, entertaining and thought-provoking” by Gramophone Magazine. His music was described by the late composer Steven Stucky as “refined, mature work of impeccable technique, original voice, and considerable ambition.” Finberg’s compositions have been performed by Meitar Ensemble, ensemble mise-en, The Boston New Music Initiative, Ensemble Platypus Wien, and The Fort Worth Opera, among others. His awards and accolades include the 2017 Kirkoskammer Chamber Music Competition, Chamber Music Rochester Award, the Bard Prize, and the 2014 Kol Emet Young Composers competition. Finberg was a composition fellow at American Opera Project’s Composers and the Voice workshop in 2013-2014. He collaborated with librettist Edward Einhorn on two operas; their first opera, A Taste of Damnation (based on a short story by Etgar Keret), and their second opera, The Exagoge, slated for performance at La Mama Experimental Theatre Club in New York City. 

Finberg began composing and performing his original music for violin and electronics at performances of The Ithaca New Music Collective. His ongoing interest in combining live electronics with solo violin resulted with his first original solo album, THE FOUR SEASONS OF ISOLATION (2022), released with Ravello Records. He specializes in performing new music and has premiered new chamber music works at ORF Radio Tirol in Austria, Cornell University, Spectrum NYC, and Manhattan School of Music. In addition, he performed as an orchestral violinist with The Israel Philharmonic, The Tel-Aviv Soloists Ensemble, and The Schleswig Holstein Music Festival Orchestra. 

As a child, Finberg studied violin with Robert Canetti in Haifa and received masterclasses with Ivri Gitlis and Miriam Fried. His first lessons in harmony and composition took place at the Wizo High-School for the arts in Haifa. Finberg later studied composition and violin at the Jerusalem Academy for Music and Dance, taking composition lessons with Menahem Zur and Ari Ben Shabtai and violin lessons with Hagai Shaham and Roi Shiloach. He studied composition with Robert Cuckson at The Mannes College, and with Susan Botti at Manhattan School of Music where he earned his Doctor of Music degree in composition in 2015. Other teachers and mentors include Samuel Adler, Steven Stucky, and Martin Bresnik. Finberg lives in Washington DC, where he teaches violin and composition at The Levine School of Music.