The geography of music is definitely changing.

Case in point: jazz clarinetist and saxophonist Anat Cohen. Born in Israel, she fell in love with Dixieland music in junior high school, thanks to an instructor/conductor who favored traditional jazz. She’s also been influenced by great modern saxophone players like Dexter Gordon and John Coltrane. She sometimes plays traditional Israeli songs. She tosses in the Portuguese-influenced melodies and African beat of Brazilian choro. There’s a bit of Argentina's tango, too. And she’s a fan of “the sound and power” of a big band.

But she’s not a style hopper: “My goal is to find one way of combining everything,” says Cohen, who’s lived in New York since 1996 and slyly gives her age as “30-plus.”

“Music is a real melting pot,” she adds. “This is the soup mix I have in me. I’m going to mix this soup, and maybe tomorrow have a different mix. Maybe it needs more salt, more African, a little bit more Brazilian.”

Critics are happy with her cooking. Billboard calls her a “reed virtuoso.” The Washington Post raves over her “remarkable lyricism.” She can swing, too. “The secret is to really get inside the rhythm and feel it with your body, your complete self,” she says. “You’re going to start bouncing up and down. That is swinging!”

Cohen is emblematic of a new and eclectic Israeli music scene. “I think people in general are surprised at the amount of musicians from such a small country,” she says. “It’s actually nice. I’m very proud.”

This groundswell of new music from Israel is a sign of the shrinking world. “As a kid growing up, the U.S. was so far, the only way you could be there was to fly there. There was no Internet, and rarely would [foreign] musicians come by.”

Music is also a way to bridge the divide between Israelis and Palestinians. “There are quite a bit of exchanges,” says Cohen. “The goal is to combine the musicians. Sometimes they have to meet in other places than Israel, but there are many more exchanges than there used to be. As a kid, I sometimes would hear Arabic music, and people would say, ‘Oh, turn that off.’ It’s nice that young Israeli musicians are not afraid to use the sound.”

Anat Cohen will be playing at New York's venerable Village Vanguard from October 21 to 26. Her latest CD is Notes from the Village, featuring original compositions as well as standards like Fats Waller's "Jitterbug Waltz."

-Marc Silver

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