Music and the Holocaust
Reflecting the Music and the Holocaust website from World ORT. Posting music and history news, performances and remembrance events. Suggestions welcome.
- Renowned Austrian composer Karl Weigl was born #OTD in 1881. From 1933, Nazi rule imposed significant limitations of his musical creativity so in 1938, he emigrated to the US, with his second wife, musician and composer Vally Weigl, and their son. holocaustmusic.ort.o...
- German conductor, composer and music critic Gustav Brecher was born #OTD in 1879. Georges Sebastian wrote in 1934 that Brecher "had a fixed idea that the Nazis would reach him somewhere." de.wikipedia.org/wik...
- Oscar winner Bronislau Kaper (born #OTD in 1902 in Poland) was an American composer of film scores and hits. Kaper fled Berlin to France in 1933. Louis B Mayer (of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer) brought him to America in 1935. He has written over 150 compositions. de.wikipedia.org/wik...
- As a Jew, Gitta Alpár was persecuted after 1933 and she fled to Vienna via Budapest. Her second husband, the actor and director Gustav Fröhlich, left her but denied that the political situation was the reason for the separation. www.lexm.uni-hamburg...
- Polish composer and violinist Grażyna Bacewicz Biernacka (born #OTD in 1909) composed and gave secret underground concerts in Warsaw during the war, where she premiered her Suite for Two Violins. After the Warsaw uprising in 1944 she escaped the city. en.wikipedia.org/wik...
- Aldo Finzi's comedy "La serenata al Vento" won a Milan Scala award but his prize was denied him due to Italian racial laws. His works banned, he hid under a false name. Born #OTD in 1897, he died in 1945 persecuted and ostracised. http://www.aldo-finz...
- In 1943, Ludmilla Peskarova (born #OTD 1890) was transported to Ravensbrück where she was imprisoned until April 1945. She composed and arranged songs for her texts. Her songs have been recorded by Francesco Lottoro. holocaustmusic.ort.o...
- Concert master and theatre band master Hugo Bryk was born #OTD in 1874. In 1933 he fled to Paris then in 1941 to Nice. After the German occupation Hugo Bryk was arrested in 1944. He took his own life on 3 Mar 1944 in the German section of the Nice prison. www.lexm.uni-hamburg...
- Cantor, pedagogue and and music writer Samuel Lampel was born #OTD in 1884. On July 13 1942 he was deported to Auschwitz where he was killed. www.lexm.uni-hamburg...
- French organist and composer Jehan Alain (born #OTD in 1911) was shot fighting on 20 June 1940. The only known recording of his playing was made in 1938 in the Rue Notre-Dame-de-Nazareth synagogue. en.wikipedia.org/wik...
