Israel Yinon died last night whilst conducting a performance of Strauss's Alpine Symphony in Lucerne. He collapsed suddenly during the performance and could not be resuscitated. 

Yinon was born on January 11, 1956, in Israel and studied with Noam Sheriff and Mendi Rodan. As a conductor he was devoted to exploring little-performed repertoire.

Among his most significant recordings are Pavel Haas's opera The Charlatan with Prague State Opera (on Decca Entartete Musik), which Gramophone's John Steane described as 'perhaps the most purely delightful of the inspired Entartete Musik series.' Yinon also recorded Rathaus's First Symphony and Der letzte Pierrot with the Deutsches Symphony Orchestra, Berlin (also on Decca Entartete Musik), of which Gramophone's reviewer Michael Oliver wrote, 'The Symphony is a tough piece to bring off - it had to wait five years for its premiere, because conductors were scared of it – but Israel Yinon has its full measure, I look forward to future recordings by him as eagerly as I do to more music by Karol Rathaus.'

Yinon also made several recommendable recordings for CPO of works by Paul Ben-Haim, Joseph Tal (review of Symphonies Nos 1-3), Tilo Medek, Rudolph Simonsen, Eduard Erdmann and Franco Alfano.