Ari Rabenu (1990*) A composer, researcher and notation editor. He finished his Master’s degree in Composition (Summa cum Laude) and a diploma in music education at Tel-Aviv University. In addition, Rabenu completed his postgraduate studies in composition at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna in the class of Prof. Detlev Mühler Siemens. His works were performed in Vienna, Berlin, and Budapest and Tel Aviv. In every aspect of his musical activity, Rabenu seeks to underline the significant role of timbre and sound richness in the artistic expression of music. Therefore, his musicological research attempts to integrate the reference to these notions into music analysis and semiology.

The Timbral Features of Alkan’s Esquisses
Charles Valentin Alkan (1813-1888) was a renowned pianist and composer in nineteenth century Paris. Nevertheless, his oeuvre never became an essential part of musical canon and his unique compositional style remains widely unfamiliar. As a result, some moments in Alkan’s music, containing rather exceptional features, sound inscrutable to contemporary listeners.

Numerous performers and musicologists who have shown an increasing interest in Alkan’s music over the last five decades believe him worthy of renewed attention. Their overt agenda has been granting him his ´rightful´ position in music history. The strategy taken by most researchers is to emphasize points of resemblance between Alkan’s compositions and those of his better-known contemporaries. This strategy is based on a covert premise, according to which canonic composers embody an absolute standard of musical value. This standard was used by Alkan’s researchers to confirm the quality of his music.

Challenging the premise mentioned above, this research will focus on Alkan’s musical characteristics that differ from those of 19th century canon, using the 49 short piano pieces of his Esquisses (Op. 63) as case studies. Overviewing these pieces, it seems that Alkan’s peculiar style utilizes the sonorous richness of the piano as a central element of his compositional technique. It is achieved by incorporating timbral features - stylistic features which enhance the timbral properties of the musical material. After detecting and investigating the timbral features of Esquisses, its 49 pieces will be analyzed, showing how these features operate in each piece in particular. This analysis will examine the role of the timbral features in forming musical motifs, as well as their significance in ‘depicting’ the extra-musical character of the pieces, as implied by their programmatic titles.