Roni Ben-Hur is a Tunisia

Tunisia

Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...

n-Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

i bebop

Bebop

Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...

 jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 guitarist who emigrated to the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 in 1985. His third CD, Anna's Dance, was rated by The Village Voice

The Village Voice

The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...

as one of the best jazz CDs of 2001. All About Jazz

All About Jazz

All About Jazz is a leading jazz music website for enthusiasts and industry professionals based in Philadelphia in the United States.Founded by Michael Ricci in 1995, the Web-Site is maintained by a volunteer staff of writers, editors, and musicians, and provides coverage of all genres of jazz from...

called him "a virtuoso guitarist with impeccable swing." In 2000, he won the Jazziz reader poll for "Best New Talent."

Ben-Hur has performed with Barry Harris

Barry Harris

Barry Doyle Harris is an American bebop jazz pianist and educator.-Biography:Harris left Detroit for New York City in 1960...

, Ronnie Mathews

Ronnie Mathews

Ronnie Mathews was a jazz pianist primarily known for his work with other musicians, including Max Roach from 1963 to 1968 and Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. He acted as lead in recording from 1963 and 1978 - 1979...

, Rufus Reid

Rufus Reid

Rufus Reid is an American jazz bassist, educator, and composer. He lives in Teaneck, New Jersey.-Personal history:...

, Chris Anderson

Chris Anderson

Chris Anderson may refer to:* Chris Anderson , founder of Future Publishing and curator of the TED Conference* Chris Anderson , author, journalist, editor-in-chief of Wired Magazine, popularized "The Long Tail"* Chris Anderson , football player, educator, former Vice-Chairman of Aberdeen F.C.*...

, Cecil Payne

Cecil Payne

Cecil Payne was a jazz baritone saxophonist born in Brooklyn, NY. Payne also played the alto saxophone and flute...

, Walter Booker

Walter Booker

Walter Booker was an American jazz musician. A native of Prairie View, Texas, Booker was a reliable bass player and an underrated stylist. His playing was marked by voice-like inflections, glissandos and tremolo techniques.-Biography:Booker moved with his family to Washington, D.C. in the mid 1940s...

, Etta Jones

Etta Jones

Etta Jones was an American jazz singer. She is not to be confused with the more popular singer Etta James nor her namesake, a member of the Dandridge Sisters, who recorded with Jimmy Lunceford and was Gerald Wilson's first wife. Her best known recordings were "Don't Go To Strangers" and "Save...

, Marcus Belgrave

Marcus Belgrave

Marcus Belgrave is a jazz trumpet player from Detroit, born in Chester, Pennsylvania. He has recorded with a variety of famous musicians, bandleaders, and record labels since the 1950s. Notable among them are: Ray Charles, Charles Mingus, Gunther Schuller, Motown Records, Tribe Records, Blue Note...

, Charles McPherson, Leroy Williams

Leroy Williams

Leroy Williams is an American jazz drummer.Williams first began playing drums as a teenager in the 1950s. From 1959 to the middle of the 1960s he played with Judy Roberts, and following this he moved to New York City and played with Booker Ervin in 1967...

, Charles Davis

Charles Davis

Charles Davis or Charlie Davis may refer to:Athletes* Charlie Davis , West Indian cricketer* Charlie Davis , American basketball player* Charlie Davis...

, John Hicks

John Hicks

Sir John Richard Hicks was a British economist and one of the most important and influential economists of the twentieth century. The most familiar of his many contributions in the field of economics were his statement of consumer demand theory in microeconomics, and the IS/LM model , which...

, Jimmy Heath

Jimmy Heath

James Edward Heath , nicknamed Little Bird, is an American jazz saxophonist, composer and arranger. He is the brother of bassist Percy Heath and drummer Albert Heath.-Biography:...

, Clark Terry

Clark Terry

Clark Terry is an American swing and bop trumpeter, a pioneer of the fluegelhorn in jazz, educator, NEA Jazz Masters inductee, and recipient of the 2010 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award...

, Amy London

Amy London

Amy London is a jazz singer from Teaneck, New Jersey, United States.London grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. She moved to Manhattan in 1980, and moved to Teaneck with her husband, guitarist Roni Ben-Hur, and daughters, Sofia and Anna, in 1998....

, Slide Hampton

Slide Hampton

Locksley Wellington "Slide" Hampton is an American jazz trombonist, composer and arranger.He was a 1998 Grammy Award winner for "Best Jazz Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist", as arranger for "Cotton Tail" performed by Dee Dee Bridgewater...

, Earl May, Teri Thornton

Teri Thornton

Teri Thornton, born Shirley Enid Avery was an American jazz singer....

, Lewis Nash

Lewis Nash

Lewis Nash is an American jazz drummer. According to Modern Drummer magazine, Nash has one of the longest discographies in jazz. and has played on over 400 records by musicians, earning him the honor of being named Jazz's Most Valuable Player by the magazine in it's May, 2009 issue...

, Steve Kroon, and Bill Doggett

Bill Doggett

Bill Doggett was an American jazz and rhythm and blues pianist and organist. He is best known for his tracks, "Honky Tonk" and "Hippy Dippy", and variously working with The Ink Spots, Johnny Otis, Wynonie Harris, Ella Fitzgerald, and Louis Jordan.-Biography:William Ballard Doggett was born in...

.

Ben-Hur is also the founding director of the jazz program at the Lucy Moses School

Lucy Moses School

Kaufman Center's Lucy Moses School is a community arts school located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. Founded in 1952 as The Hebrew Arts School for Music and Dance, it is now part of Kaufman Center, a performing arts complex that houses the Special Music School and Merkin...

 at Kaufman Center

Kaufman Center

Kaufman Center is a notable performing arts complex in New York City that houses Lucy Moses School, the Special Music School, and Merkin Concert Hall. Originally known as the Hebrew Arts School, it was founded in 1952 and is currently located on West 67th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam...

 in Manhattan, where he educates others about the genre.

He runs numerous jazz camps throughout the world.

His 2004 book, Talk Jazz: Guitar from the Mel Bay Talk Jazz series is now out of print and much sought after by jazz guitarists. The book includes a CD with a removable guitar track of Ben-Hur performing the exercises in the book with Tardo Hammer on piano, Earl May on bass, and Leroy Williams

Leroy Williams

Leroy Williams is an American jazz drummer.Williams first began playing drums as a teenager in the 1950s. From 1959 to the middle of the 1960s he played with Judy Roberts, and following this he moved to New York City and played with Booker Ervin in 1967...

 on drums.

Biography

Roni Bohobza grew up in Dimona

Dimona

Dimona is an Israeli city in the Negev desert, to the south of Beersheba and west of the Dead Sea above the Arava valley in the Southern District of Israel. Its population at the end of 2007 was 33,600.-History:...

, the youngest of seven children, one of two born after the family emigrated from Tunisia in 1955. His surname was legally changed to Ben-Hur via ritual at age 10. He performed in clubs and wedding bands in Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...

 from the age of 19. He arrived in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 in 1985 and began playing jazz clubs there. He spent a lot of time at Barry Harris

Barry Harris

Barry Doyle Harris is an American bebop jazz pianist and educator.-Biography:Harris left Detroit for New York City in 1960...

's Jazz Cultural Theater and met many of the great living jazz artists there.

Ben-Hur's experience as an educator goes back to 1981, when, while still in Israel. Since coming to the United States he has set up jazz music programs at Professional Performing Arts School

Professional Performing Arts School

The Professional Performing Arts School or PPAS is a New York City public school.-History:The Professional Performing Arts School was created in 1990 to meet the needs of two groups of students: those who wanted to pursue professional work in the arts as they earned a junior/senior high school...

, The Coalition School for Social Change, and other New York area high schools. He created a model jazz program for use in New York City high schools at the request of Bette Midler

Bette Midler

Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...

. He began the jazz program at Lucy Moses School in 1992, and remains there.

Ben-Hur first began a jazz camp in Saint Cezaire, Côte d'Azure, France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 with Santi Debriano

Santi Debriano

Santi Wilson Debriano is a jazz bassist.Debriano was raised in Brooklyn, having moved there with his family at age four. He studied composition at Union College in New York, then attended the New England Conservatory of Music and Wesleyan University...

. With Nilson Matta

Nilson Matta

Nilson Matta is a premier Brazilian bassist and composer. He has been based in New York City since 1985. He is also known for his work with Trio Da Paz, Don Pullen African Brazilian Connection, Joe Henderson, Yo Yo Ma and Nilson Matta's Brazilian Voyage....

, he began a jazz and Brazilian music camp in Bar Harbor, Maine

Bar Harbor, Maine

Bar Harbor is a town on Mount Desert Island in Hancock County, Maine, United States. As of the 2010 census, its population is 5,235. Bar Harbor is a famous summer colony in the Down East region of Maine. It is home to the College of the Atlantic, Jackson Laboratory and Mount Desert Island...

, both intended for adult jazz amateurs.

Personal life

Ben-Hur lives in Teaneck, New Jersey

Teaneck, New Jersey

Teaneck is a township in Bergen County, New Jersey, and a suburb in the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2010 United States Census, the township population was 39,776, making it the second-most populous among the 70 municipalities in Bergen County....

, with his wife, singer Amy London

Amy London

Amy London is a jazz singer from Teaneck, New Jersey, United States.London grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. She moved to Manhattan in 1980, and moved to Teaneck with her husband, guitarist Roni Ben-Hur, and daughters, Sofia and Anna, in 1998....

, and their two daughters, Sofia and Anna.

Discography

• Backyard (TCB-1996)
• Sofia's Butterfly (TCB-1998)
• Anna's Dance (Reservoir Music- 2001)
• Signature (Reservoir-2005)
• Keepin’ It Open (Motéma Music
  Motéma Music
  Motéma Music is an American record label focused on jazz and world music, as well as other creative projects by virtuosic musicians who also compose. It was founded by Jana Herzen in 2003, and is now based in Harlem, New York City...
  
  -2007)
• Smile (with Gene Bertoncini
  Gene Bertoncini
  -Biography:Bertoncini was born in New York City, where he was raised in a musical family. His father played guitar and harmonica. Bertoncini began playing guitar at age seven and by age sixteen was appearing on television. He graduated from high school and attended the University of Notre Dame,...
  
  , Motéma-2008)
• Fortuna (Motéma-2009)
• Mojave (with Nilson Matta
  Nilson Matta
  Nilson Matta is a premier Brazilian bassist and composer. He has been based in New York City since 1985. He is also known for his work with Trio Da Paz, Don Pullen African Brazilian Connection, Joe Henderson, Yo Yo Ma and Nilson Matta's Brazilian Voyage....
  
  , Motéma, 2011)

External links

• Official Site
• Roni Ben-Hur at Motéma Music
  Motéma Music
  Motéma Music is an American record label focused on jazz and world music, as well as other creative projects by virtuosic musicians who also compose. It was founded by Jana Herzen in 2003, and is now based in Harlem, New York City...