Concert-lecture program:

Gideon Klein (1919-1945)

2nd movement from his sonata from solo piano

“adagio” (1943)

The piano sonata by Klein was one of his latest and most profound works, which he composed in Ghetto Theresienstadt. It is extremely dissonant, uncommonly dense, and truly captures in sound the history of its time. Like in his string trio, which he composed shortly after the piano sonata, the slow middle movement is the most heart-wrenching intense movement of the piece, of Elegiac nature. The movement has a very clear structural arc and a climax, but with the musical language being so dissonant throughout, from the very opening of the movement, Klein concludes by the loss of strength, providing a sense of resignation rather than a resolution, at least not a satisfying harmonious resolution.

Mario Melli (1924-1944)

Preludio (1943)

Melli was a young Jewish Italian from Florence, a  Zionist activist, who was taken to Auschwitz. One of his friends kept the hand writing of this only surviving composition, immigrated to Israel and gave it to the Israeli Holocaust Museum.

Female artists:

Josima Feldschuh (1929-1943)

Mazurka no.6 in E minor 1

Nocturne in G minor

Sabbathiada no.2 in C minor

(1940, Warsaw Ghetto)

Josima was a Polish pianist, truly a child prodigy who performed as a soloist even during the war- Mozart concerto with the Warsaw Ghetto Orchestra. She composed a volume of piano solo pieces when she was about 11 years old. Her father, who survived her, kept her notebook of compositions, and eventually gave it to the Israeli Holocaust Museum. Since members of Josima’s family survived, I had been in touch with a family member in Israel, and learnt many more interesting facts about Josima and her family, about their story during the war. Some of the memoirs are from her father’s diary, which was released in Israel recently. I look forward to sharing more in the spoken part of my presentation.

Ilse Weber (1903-1944) was a Czech poet and a fiction author, she wrote stories for children. She played the guitar and wrote songs as well. Her lullaby, “ Wiegala”, had been performed and recorded by renown singers. She was a central figure in the Ghetto, and worked in the children’s infirmary. When it was time for those children to be deported to their final destination- the gas chambers, Ilse Weber stuck by them and voluntarily joined the transport to Auschwitz, where she found her death, together with her younger son, Tommy. Her husband, Willi survived Theresienstadt and reunited with their older son who remained in Sweden during the war. While in Ghetto Theresienstadt, Ilse wrote many poems surrounding the war, and letters to her close friend Lilian, who took care of Ilse’s older son, Hanuš. Thankfully, many of her writings survived, including testimonies from her last moments. Some of her poems were translated to English, and I will be reading from her poetry. This would also be a Hommage to Josima Feldschuh, who was so young when she died, depriving her and us of her potential enormous career and life in music.

Erwin Schulhoff (1894-1942)

From “Suite dansante en Jazz” (1931)

-Stomp

-Waltz

-Tango

 From the group of the composers here that died in Europe in WW2, Schulhoff was the most established as a pianist and composer at the time of his death. A lot of his music has been published, he composed music literature for various instruments, genres, and styles. He was influenced by Schönberg, by his colleague Alban Berg, and also by Claude Debussy and by American Jazz. These influences are prevalent in his music. Like Paul Ben-Haim, he integrated elements and ideas from these different worlds while creating his own compositional DNA. Still, among his piano literature, chamber music, orchestral music, and more, there was tremendous range and evolution.

Paul Ben-Haim (1897-1984)

From “five pieces for piano” op.34

-Pastorale

-Canzonetta

-Toccata  

When I think of Ben-Haim’s life and compositional style, two words come to mind: transformation and  fusion. I find the change of his original name from the German name Frankenburger to Ben-Haim (son of life) to be quite symbolic. Ben-Haim lived such a long prolific life, and that change was prominent not only in his national or ethnic identity but above all in his music. He acquired formidable education and skills from European traditions. After immigrating from Germany to Palestine, his exposure to indigenous music and instruments formed an original compositional language, a fusion, a meeting of West and East, with the best of both worlds. In these three pieces specifically, I hear the emulating of middle-eastern flute, of oud, of qanun, and harmonies of 2nds, 4ths and fifths, melismatic melodies, and a sense of texture and improvisation which represent this new style. To me there is also a significant journey from the first to the last piece. The ambiguous harmony in the Pastorale is somewhat meditative, but also searching, exploring in a new land, possibly a dry dessert? ‘The land of Palestine’, and ‘what happens next’. In the canzonetta, there are traces of the French composer Ravel in the harmony, the layered texture, the tender sound and rhythm, which Ben-Haim incorporated with middle-eastern elements from the middle of the piece onwards. The two worlds integrate seamlessly. The brilliant Toccata has a visceral middle-eastern spirit. The energetic rhythm keeps the momentum exciting, and the repeated notes on the piano imitate the sound of string plucking. The virtuosic piece develops very gradually, introducing many new elements, and ends in a triumphant way!

-Renana Gutman