Composer, Percussion master and oudist Yinon Muallem was born in Israel in 1968 to parents of Iraqi origin. After earning his bachelor’s degree from the University of Tel Aviv, he found himself drawn to the world of music. Starting with Middle Eastern percussion, he then began learning the oud and composing his own music. His exposure to the beauty of Ottoman Turkish music moved him to study the Turkish oud with master Yurdal Tokcan, and in 2002 he moved to Istanbul and joined the Istanbul Sazendeleri (Istanbul Instrumentalists) ensemble. Muallem played with Istanbul Sazendeleri throughout Turkey and the world. During his eighteen years in Istanbul, he conducted a host of inter cultural music projects, taking part in concerts with his group in Israel and arranging joint concerts by Israeli and Turkish musicians in Istanbul. His versatility and curiosity have brought him into collaboration with a variety of musicians including Ross Daly (Greece); Omer Faruk Tekbilek (Turkey-United States); the Tekfen Philarmonic Orchestra, Kudsi Erguner, İstanbul Sazendeleri, Akin Eldes, Anjelika Akbar, Erkan Oğur, Derya Turkan, Sirin Pancaroglu (Turkey): Alim Gasimov (Azerbaijan); Ganesh Kumar, Subash Chandran (India) and many more. He wrote scores for documantry and feature films that were released in Turkey, Israel, Germany and Italy and the u.s. Yinon released 10 albums of his compositions