Albert Behar - Composer

Albert Behar is an award-winning New York classical composer of orchestral, chamber, vocal & electronic music. Described as “charming” by the New York Times, “inventive” by the Los Angeles Times, and “truly remarkable” by I CARE IF YOU LISTEN, Behar has collaborated with Kronos Quartet, Contemporaneous, Europa Ritrovata and other international ensembles. He draws upon American minimalism, French chanson, and baroque music, but moves in a more propulsive rhythmic direction. Behar has received grants from the NY State Council for the Arts, ASCAP Foundation, Austrian Cultural Forum, and Brooklyn Arts Council. He hails from Ojai, California, a town famous for its avocados, tangerines, and avant-garde music festival. Julia Wolfe and Morton Subotnick were Albert’s composition teachers at New York University, where he graduated summa cum laude in Music Composition and French. He is currently based in Brooklyn, NY.

As a film composer, Albert created original music for PBS, Showtime, ESPN, and MSNBC. His soundtracks have been featured at international film festivals in Tribeca, Los Angeles, Abu Dhabi, Calgary, Bristol, Sydney, among others. Commercial clients include Google, Lincoln Motors, eHarmony, and Patagonia. Behar also loves to design new musical interfaces such as megaphone helmets, tactile sound orbs, and heart-rate tempo controllers. Albert’s apprenticeship with MacArthur ‘Genius’ sound sculptor Trimpin led to several new compositions for kinetic musical installations. Upcoming projects include ‘LOST WAX,’ a multimedia work for Kronos Quartet and phonograph celebrating the wax cylinder field recordings of Béla Bartók. Behar is also collaborating with soprano Ariadne Greif on ‘CALLIGRAMMES,’ a song cycle celebrating the visual poetry of Guillaume Apollinaire. Albert performs regularly as an accordionist in Albert et son Orchestre, The Bailsmen, and the Avalon Jazz Band.