Ahead of the “Sounds of Childhood” festival: a guest column by Maya Belzitzman, artistic director of the festival

by time news

Just before it starts again, Maya Blazitzman, the artistic director of the “Sounds of Childhood” festival returns to her childhood and tells “Hashakma Holon” about her artistic choices for being on stage this year

Published on: 3.10.22 17:48

For the upcoming Sukkot holiday, I would like to invite you to the Holon Theater for the Children’s Sounds Festival for a special and one-time experience for children and the whole family, a multi-sensory experience that combines music, dance, theater, circus, comics and much more.



One of the first childhood experiences I remember came from the concert hall. I vaguely remember how as a child I was sitting in a large hall, where all the chairs were green, with an impressive wooden stage, filled to capacity with lots and lots of chairs. The hall itself is full of people sitting and waiting, the lights are on and blinding and then, in one moment there is silence. One by one about 80 musicians come up to the stage and sit down in their chairs. After them a man in a long black suit comes up, clicks together with one of the musicians, raises his stick and immediately the orchestra plays their impressive and powerful opening chord.

I, a little girl, about 3 years old, immediately straightens up in my chair, my feet are on the floor, my ears are directed forward to the stage – I am mesmerized. From the great sound, from the initial experience, from the size and power that I see before my eyes. In my life I have never seen or heard such a large orchestra playing in front of me.

This experience left a huge mark on me. The great sound that an orchestra can produce together, at once, which until a second ago was silent, moved me especially.

Later, I think this experience led me to want to play the cello. I don’t know why I chose cello. The reason, at the age of 6, was that when playing the cello you can sit down, which is what I wanted at that age.

But how did I know that the cello was sitting and the violin was standing? Apparently something from the orchestra entered my system strongly. But what is all this story for? To tell you that this year at the Children’s Sounds Festival the mighty Camerata Orchestra will also play!

The orchestra will play beautiful works by Tchaikovsky, Handel, Stravinsky, Sasha Argov and even David Bowie and with them on stage will be a team of three great actors – Merav Feldman, Dodo Erez and Yuval Segal. The actors, combined with the orchestra, brilliantly written by the young and talented director and writer – Yonatan Blumenfeld, will show you – the audience – how music affects our brains. How do these great sounds that the orchestra produces affect our emotions. How these sounds affect our memory and our feelings. How sounds affect our senses. And actually that’s the whole point – how big is the role of art and culture in our lives. We are not aware of it but we are greatly influenced by everything we hear or see and anything like that can leave a big mark on us for long distances as well as a small mark at the very moment that can change our life course at once.

And this is what I tried to create this year at the Children’s Sounds festival in Holon. An unforgettable experience for children and their families.

Multi-sensory experiences in which the little and big children will come to a big and beautiful theater, on the way they will meet a wonderful circus called Clown X that will make them feel joy and laughter. On the way to the halls, the children will be able to participate in the comic workshops of Atfoni together with Uri Fink and many others. Then, when they enter the halls, they will be able to choose between the big orchestra performance, and a performance with a big band that plays and sings the beautiful children’s songs from the children’s festivals of the past. They will be able to see a theater and dance adaptation of Beauty and the Beast, or take an active part in singing in public with Einat Shrouf! They will be able to enter the house of a drum and see and hear all types of percussion instruments with Noya Shaline, or see a musical theatrical performance by the Scapino band. It will also be possible to watch a tribute show to Ularchik with his participation! Or see Tomesh in an original show about the plots of Patel and Ishon Halach, or listen to a musical story time with Daniel Salomon and Dana Adini.

And if we go back to my first childhood experience, I and the whole wonderful team of the Holon Theater, tried to create a strong experience for the children, one that they would not forget. One that they will want to return to, and perhaps in the future also participate in it on stage as musicians, actors, dancers, painters and what not.

You are warmly invited to come. Maya

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