Hennech Kon

Der Komponist Henech Kon (1890-1970) zog vor dem Zweiten Weltkrieg nach New York, wo er zu den eingewanderten Schriftstellern und Künstlern gehörte, die vor den Nazis geflohen waren. Er komponierte weiterhin Stücke zum Gedenken an die Vernichtung des polnischen Judentums.

Yonas Turkov

Jonas Turkow (1898-1987) was an actor, stage manager, director and writer. He received the Itzik Manger Prize for his contributions to Yiddish letters.

Diana Blumenfeld

Diana Blumenfeld (1903–1961) was a folksinger, pianist, and actress. Caught in the ghetto along with her husband, family and friends, she continued to sing, performing in cafes and in the ghetto theatre.

Yankl Krimski

Yankl Krimski was a theatre artist and musician in the Vilna ghetto. One of his most popular songs was 'Dos Elnte Kind' (The Lonely Child). Krimski’s fate is uncertain, but he is believed to have perished in an Estonian labour camp in 1943.

Mordechai Gebirtig

Poet, actor and songwriter Mordechai Gebirtig (1877-1942) was politically active and called 'the perfect Jewish folk poet'. His songs provide a window into daily Jewish life in inter-war Poland.

Isa Vermehren

Isa Vermehren (1918-2009) volunteered to support the German troops as an entertainer between 1940 and 1943. Due to her brother's defection she was taken to Ravensbrück, where she was locked in an isolation cell.

Paul Morgan

Actor Paul Morgan (1886-1938) studied theatre and writing, and began performing in small theatres and cabarets before World War I. He died in Buchenwald concentration camp.

Hermann Leopoldi

One of the few surviving Jewish members of the cabaret scene of 1920s Vienna, Herman Leopoldi (1888-1959) was interned in two of Nazi Germany’s most notorious camps but obtained a last-minute release.

Benzion Moskovits

In 1942 Cantor Benzion Moskovitsh (1907-1968) was deported to Westerbork and in 1944 to Buchenwald. There he sang for fellow prisoners and took notes of melodies he heard on a smuggled block-note.

Yehoshua Wieder

Cantor Yehoshua Wieder and his family were deported to Auschwitz, where his wife Chana and three youngest children were killed. Wieder and his three other children survived.

Charles Lowy

Cantor Charles Lowy (1911-1998) escaped Munich after Kristallnacht to Hungary and became chief cantor in Szolnok. From 1942 he was subjected to forced labour and liberated by the Red Army in 1945. His wife and son were killed in Auschwitz.

Gershon Sirota

Gershon Sirota (1874-1943) was one of the leading cantors of Europe during the "Golden Age of Hazzanut", sometimes referred to as the "Jewish Caruso". He and his family died together in the Warsaw uprising in 1943.

Joseph Schmidt

When the war broke out Joseph Schmidt (1904-1942) fled to France then retreated to Switzerland. Although in possession of an American visa and well known, he was interned and, owing to a lack of medical attention, he died on 16 November 1942.

Viktor Ullmann

Composer Viktor Ullmann (1898-1944) grew up and was educated in Vienna. He was trapped in Prague on the German invasion in March 1939 after trying unsuccessfully to find work in London or South Africa. In 1942 he was deported to Terezin.

Carlo Taube

In December 1941, pianist, composer and conductor Carlo Sigmund Taube (1897-1944) was deported to Theresienstadt with his wife and child.

James Simon

In spring 1944, composer, pianist and musicologist James Simon (1880-1944) was sent to Westerbork. On April 4 he was deported with 1000 other inmates to Terezín. On 12 October 1944 he boarded the transport to Auschwitz.

Zikmund Schul

The composer and violinist Zikmund Schul (1916-1944) and his father left Germany in October 1933, taking residence in Prague. He was transported to Terezín on 11 November 1941 where he continued to compose pieces, few of which survive.

Rafael Schächter

Rafael Schächter (1905-1944) made his name as an accompanist and vocal coach, working in opera and theatre before deportation to Terezin in Nov 1941. A pioneer of cultural life in the ghetto, he was deported to Auschwitz on 16 Oct 1944.

Egon Ledeč

Egon Ledeč (1889-1944) was a Czech violinist and composer sent to Theresienstadt. He appears as the concertmaster in Karel Ančerl’s orchestra in the Nazi propaganda film of the camp.

Hans Krása

After spending several years in Terezin being active in its musical life, Hans Krasa (1899-1944) left for Auschwitz on 16 October 1944 with his fellow composers Viktor Ullmann, Pavel Haas and Gideon Klein.

Gideon Klein

At age 6, Gideon Klein's (1919-1945) precocious musicality was evident and he began to study piano with the head of the Přerov conservatory. He was an organiser of cultural life at Theresienstadt.

Dovid Ayznshtat

Dovid Ayznshtat (1890–1942) continued to compose, conduct, perform, and train aspiring musicians, in the Warsaw Ghetto, despite the limitations and dangers of ghetto life.

Misha Veksler

The conductor and composer Misha Veksler (1907-1943) became an important figure in the musical world of the Vilna ghetto, serving as the conductor of the theatre orchestra and composing music for many of the revues that were performed there.

Wolf Durmaschkin

Wolf Durmashkin (1914-1944) war ein jüdischer Komponist, Dirigent und Pianist in Vilnius. Er wurde während der Liquidierung des Wilnaer Ghettos nach Klooga deportiert und kam einen Tag vor der Befreiung ums Leben.

Teodor Ryder

Conductor and pianist Teodor Ryder (1881-1944) was deportated to the Łódź ghetto in 1940. He continued to perform and organise even after the death of his wife and gave his final concert in the summer of 1943.

Alma Rosé

The violinist Alma Rosé (1906-1944) luck came to an end when she was arrested in France and sent to Drancy for several months. In July 1943, she was transported to Auschwitz.

Zofia Czajkowska

The Polish music teacher Zofia Czajkowska arrived in Auschwitz on 27 April 1942 on a transport from her home town of Tarnow. She was to become the original organiser and first conductor of the Birkenau women’s orchestra.

Adam Kopyciński

Polish musician Adam Kopyciński (1907-1982) was conductor of the men's orchestra in Auschwitz. He struggled with the morality of a death camp orchestra knowing that rejecting a musician could well mean his death.

Otto Klemperer

Otto Klemperer (1885-1973) war ein jüdischer, deutschstämmiger Dirigent und Komponist, der als "der letzte der wenigen wirklich großen Dirigenten seiner Generation" bezeichnet wurde. Im April 1933 floh er nach Österreich und ließ Frau und Kinder zurück, um ihnen zu folgen, sobald er einen festen Wohnsitz gefunden hatte.

Martin Rosenberg

In 1933, Rosebury D’Arguto’s activities with his Gesangsgemeinschaft was banned. On a return trip to Germany to settle some personal matters in September 1939, he was arrested by the Gestapo, and taken to Sachsenhausen where he organized a Jewish choir.

Kurt Gerron

A cabaret artist, theatre and film actor and director of theatre and early sound movies, Kurt Gerron (1897-1944) was a successful entertainer of the 1920s and early 1930s. He directed the Terezin propaganda film and was killed soon after.

Wolfgang Langhoff

Actor, director and leftist activist Wolfgang Langhoff (1901-1966) engaged in cultural activities in Börgemoor, organising the ‘Zirkus Konzentrazani’, as well as co-creating the song ‘Moorsoldatenlied’.

Walter Starkie und das Britische Institut in Madrid

Der Musiker Walter Starkie, der "El British" gründete und sich mit General Franco traf, um den kulturellen Austausch zwischen Großbritannien und Spanien zu formalisieren. Starkies Bemühungen trugen dazu bei, dass Spanien während des Zweiten Weltkriegs neutral blieb.

Myra Hess

Dame Julia Myra Hess, DBE (1890-1965) war eine englische Pianistin, die vor allem für ihre Interpretationen der Werke von Bach, Mozart, Beethoven und Schumann bekannt war. Während des Zweiten Weltkriegs veranstaltete sie Konzerte in der National Gallery, um die Stimmung zu heben.

Bruno Walter

Bruno Walter Schlesinger (1879-1962) war ab 1898 Musiktheaterdirektor und einige Jahre später Direktor der Bayerischen Staatsoper. Von den Nazis auf die schwarze Liste gesetzt, ging er 1938 in die USA, wo er die New Yorker Philharmoniker dirigierte.

Kurt Weill

Kurt Weill (1900-1950) und Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956) stehen wie wenige andere für die kulturelle Innovation der Weimarer Republik. Vor allem mit ihrer Dreigroschenoper verkörperte das Duo alles, was die Nationalsozialisten zu ihrem Feind erklärten.

Arnold Schönberg

Der Komponist Arnold Schönberg (1874-1951) gilt zusammen mit Berg und Webern als die Zweite Wiener Schule. Seine revolutionäre musikalische Technik der Dodekaphonie (Zwölftonmusik) war sein Markenzeichen.

Ernst Krenek

Der österreichische Komponist der berühmten Jazz-Oper Jonny spielt auf, Enrst Krenek (1900-1991), emigrierte 1938 in die USA, nachdem seine Musik von den Nazis verboten worden war. Er unterrichtete an mehreren Universitäten und komponierte bis zu seinem Tod 1991 weiter.

Berthold Goldschmidt

Der Emigrantenkomponist Berthold Goldschmidt (1903-1996) ist im Alter von 93 Jahren in London gestorben. Er lebte in derselben Erdgeschosswohnung, seit er Deutschland im Oktober 1935 auf der Flucht vor den Nazis verlassen hatte.

Hanns Eisler

Der marxistische Komponist Hanns Eisler (1898-1962) war im Januar 1933 in Wien, als Hitler deutscher Bundeskanzler wurde. Eisler blieb seinen kommunistischen Idealen treu und floh in den 1930er Jahren aus Nazi-Deutschland und in den 1940er Jahren aus Amerika.

British Internment and Music

Hans Gál (1890-1987) enjoyed professional success prior to 1933. When the Nazis came to power, he served as director of the Mainz Conservatory but was dismissed and his work was banned from both performance and publication.

Paul Arma

Paul Arma (1905-1987) ist eine zentrale Figur in der Geschichte der französischen Résistance-Musik, sowohl wegen der von ihm komponierten Lieder als auch wegen seiner Bemühungen um die Bewahrung des enormen Bestandes an Musik, der während des Krieges entstand. Arma sah in den Liedern der Résistance nicht nur Quellen der Hoffnung und Akte des Kriegsmuts, sondern auch wichtige Artefakte, die es zu retten galt.

Alfred Rosenberg

Alfred Rosenberg (1893-1946) schrieb Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts" (1934), in dem er für die Vorherrschaft der "arischen" Rasse und die Bedrohung durch die Juden plädierte. Er wurde wegen Verbrechen gegen die Menschlichkeit für schuldig befunden und hingerichtet.

Hans Pfitzner

Der Komponist Hans Pfitzner (1869-1949) sah sich als Verteidiger der deutschen Nation, ihrer Werte und ihrer Kultur gegen ein "entartetes" und "verdorbenes" Frankreich. In seinem Entnazifizierungsprozess wurde er, ebenso wie Furtwängler, Egk und Strauss, für nicht schuldig befunden.

Hans Joachim Moser

Hans Joachim Moser (1889-1967) gab Amerika und den Juden die Schuld an der Kommerzialisierung der Musik. Sein Engagement für die Feierlichkeiten in Deutschland brachte ihm die Anerkennung der Nazis ein und er wurde zum Generalsekretär des Propagandaministeriums befördert.

Gustav Havemann

Der Geiger und Dirigent Gustav Havemann (1882-1960) entwickelte sich von einem modernistischen Musiker und Freund radikaler jüdischer Komponisten zu einem engagierten NS-Musikideologen und schließlich nach dem Krieg zu einem glühenden Antifaschisten.

Herbert Gerigk

Herbert Gerigks (1905-1996) Lexikon der Juden in der Musik war so populär, dass bis 1943 Tausende von Exemplaren im gesamten Deutschen Reich kursierten. Selbst im Rahmen der NS-Ideologie war Gerigk als besonders konservativ und kritisch bekannt.

Karl Blessinger

Der Autor des 1939 erschienenen Buches Mendelssohn, Meyerbeer, Mahler: Drei Kapitel des Judentums in der Musik als Schlüssel zur Musikgeschichte des 19. Jahrhunderts begründete Karl Blessingers (1888-1962) Ruf als einer der prominentesten antisemitischen Musikwissenschaftler des Dritten Reiches.

Joseph Goebbels

Joseph Goebbels wollte alle Werke fördern, die von der deutschen Hegemonie in der Musik zeugten. Aus diesem Grund schützte er paradoxerweise zunächst Komponisten oder Dirigenten, die sich gegen die Anwendung der antisemitischen Gesetze wehrten, und verschleierte sogar die jüdische Herkunft einiger talentierter Komponisten oder schützte deren Ehefrauen.

Wladyslaw Szlengel

Władysław Szlengel (1912-1943) was a Jewish-Polish poet, lyricist, journalist, and stage actor. He was shot along with his wife at the age of 28.

Avraham Sutzkever

Avraham Sutzkever (1913-2010) is one of the most important contemporary Yiddish poets. During the war, Sutzkever was involved in many acts of resistance and helped save many important texts. He escaped to Moscow with his wife.

Leah Rudnitski

Leah Rudnitski (1916-1943) wrote one of the most beautiful lullabies to have survived the Vilna ghetto, entitled ‘Dremlen feygl oyf di tsvaygn’ (Birds doze on the boughs). She was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to Treblinka, where she was murdered.

Shmerke Kaczerginski

Poet and partisan fighter Shmerke Kaczerginski (1908-1954) was a collector of Yiddish Shoah song. He was sent to the Vilna ghetto in early 1942 where he crafted songs to console prisoners and encourage resistance.

Hirsh Glick

Hirsch Glick (1922-1944) was a Jewish poet and partisan. He began to write Yiddish poetry in his teens and became co-founder of Yungvald, a group of young Jewish poets.

Isaiah Shpigl

Writer, poet and teacher of Yiddish literature, Isaiah Spiegel (1906-1990), was an inmate of the Lodz Ghetto from its inception in 1940 until its liquidation in 1945. In August 1944, Shpigl hid some of his writings in a cellar and took the rest with him to Auschwitz.

Moshe Diskant

An important poet and song writer in the Kovno ghetto, Moshe Diskant was critical of the divisions between wealthy and poor in the ghetto.

Avrom Akselrod

Avrom Akselrod was a well-known poet and songwriter in the Kovno ghetto, known for his cynical, humorous and realistic depictions of the misery and occasional joys of ghetto life.

Karel Berman

Bass singer Karel Berman (1919-1995) was deported to Terezin on 6 Mar 1943. He sang in operas and recitals and was cast as 'Death' in Ullmann’s Der Kaiser von Atlantis. Transported to Auschwitz on 28 Sep 1944 and liberated from the Allach camp.

Marysia Ayznshtat

Marysia Ayznshtat (1921-1942) war eine der bekanntesten Musikerinnen des Warschauer Ghettos. Sie wurde im Alter von einundzwanzig Jahren von einem SS-Offizier erschossen.

Khayele Rozental

Khayele Rozental (1924-1979) was one of the most popular singers in the Vilna ghetto. She established her talents in drama and singing aged 16, when she was chosen to represent Vilna at the Festival of Songs in Moscow.

Lyube Levitski

Soprano Lyube Levitski's beautiful voice made her a star at the age of 21. In the Vilna ghetto she was lashed, kept in solitary confinement for a month, and eventually killed at Ponar.

Kasriel Broydo

Kasriel Broydo (1907-1945) was a songwriter, singer and coupletist. He was born in Vilnius and played in various troupes and marionette-theaters.

Yankele Hershkovitsh

In 1940, Yankele Hershkovitsh (1910-1972) was deported to the Łódź ghetto. He became the much-loved voice of the ghetto, singing in the courtyards and streets, and documenting and commenting on events.

Fania Fénelon

Fania Fénelon (1922-1983) was a French pianist, composer and cabaret singer whose contested 1976 memoir, Sursis pour l'orchestre, about survival in the Women's Orchestra of Auschwitz during the Holocaust was adapted as the 1980 television film, Playing for Time.

Aleksander Kulisiewicz

Alexander Kulisiewicz (1918-1982) was a poet, player, and songwriter of ballads in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp that often evoked his native Poland with nostalgia and patriotic zeal.

Partisanen

Während des Zweiten Weltkriegs widersetzten sich viele europäische Juden ihren nationalsozialistischen Unterdrückern, indem sie aktiv Widerstand leisteten. Dieser Partisanenkrieg, der von geheimen, irregulären Kräften im feindlichen Gebiet geführt wurde, war besonders in den dichten Wäldern und Sümpfen Osteuropas weit verbreitet.

Jozef Kropinski

The Polish musician Jozef Kropinski was born on 28 December 1913 in Berlin. On 7 May 1940, Kropinski was arrested by the Gestapo for publishing an underground newspaper, and sent to Auschwitz.

Jan Vala

Jan Vala was a self-taught guitarist, singer and composer. He had been the owner of a popular bar in Ostravia, where he had entertained his patrons with comedy sketches and musical performances. He spent 2,060 days in German prisons and camps.

The Troubadours of the French Resistance

Songs of the French resistance were collected by Paul Arma with his wife Edmée to rescue from obscurity the numerous songs that were written as acts of resistance during World War II, and to recognise the efforts made and dangers faced by their creators.

Jehovah's Witnesses

Erich Hugo Frost

Composer and musician Erich Hugo Frost (1900-1987) was imprisoned several times in prisons and concentration camps between 1934 and 1945. He composed ‘Fest steht in großer, schwerer Zeit (Stand Fast in Great and Hard Times) in the spring of 1941.

Leo Strauss

Leo Straus (1897-1944) was arrested along with his wife Myra and sent to Theresienstadt where he was involved in cabaret productions, both as a librettist and performer. In October 1944, they were deported to Auschwitz and killed.

Roma and Sinti

Artur Gold

Artur Gold (1897-1943) war ein polnischer Violinist und Komponist. Er arbeitete mit seinem Bruder Henryk Gold und mit Jerzy Petersburski zusammen, mit dem er Musik arrangierte. Er und seine Musikerkollegen wurden in den letzten Wochen von Treblinka ermordet.

Wladyslaw Szpilman

The musical career of Wladyslaw Szpilman (1911-2000) was interrupted by the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939. Szpilman and his family were driven, along with hundreds of thousands of other Jews, into the Warsaw ghetto.

Avrom Brudno

Avrom Brudno was a musician and composer in the Vilna ghetto. He created many of the ghetto’s most successful songs including the melody for ‘Friling’. He died in Klooga.

Dovid Beyglman

David Beigelman (1887–1945) was a Polish violinist, orchestra leader, and composer of Yiddish songs. In the Łódź ghetto established a small theatre where he composed prolifically and wrote his own lyrics.

Michael Hofmekler

One of the remarkable reunions to take place in the immediate aftermath of the war was that of the Jewish brothers Michael (1898-1994) and Robert Hofmekler (1905-1994), in June 1945, at the Saint Ottilien Displaced Persons’ camp.

Henry Meyer

A doctor put Henry Meyer’s ID on a corpse and hid the violinist. Meyer (1923-2006) was transferred to Birkenau, where he played in the orchestra. After brief time in other camps and surviving a death march, he survived and emigrated to the US.

Arno Nadel

Jewish musicologist, composer, playwright, poet, and painter Arno Nadel (1878-1943) had an exit visa to England but he was too weak to make the journey. On 12th March 1943 he was deported to Auschwitz where he was murdered the same year.

Hans Keller

Der in Österreich geborene britische Musikwissenschaftler und Musikkritiker Hans Keller (1919-1985), der bedeutende Beiträge zur Musikwissenschaft und Musikkritik leistete, wurde von den Nazis verhaftet und musste Österreich nach dem "Anschluss" 1938 verlassen.

Komitee Vardapet

Der Komponist und Musikethnologe Komitas Vardapet (1869-1935) wurde durch sein hohes kulturelles Ansehen nicht geschützt und wurde zusammen mit 800 Intellektuellen von den Jungtürken ins Exil geschickt. Er war einer der wenigen, die den Völkermord an den Armeniern überlebten.

Henryk Apte

Henryk Apte was a prominent figure in the cultural and musical life of the Jewish community in Krakow during the early 20th century.

Paulina Braun

Paulina Braun (1915-1943) was a songwriter and composer in the Warsaw ghetto. Before being forced into ghetto’s cramped quarters, she had established a name for herself as a composer in the Polish theatre world of Warsaw.

Alek Volkoviski

Pianist and song writer Alek Volkoviski (1931-2019) won a competition in 1943 at age eleven in the Vilna ghetto for his lullaby ‘Shtiler, shtiler’.

Yankl Trupyanski

Yankl Trupyanski was (1909-1944) a music teacher and composer of children's songs in Warsaw and Vilna. He composed many of the songs sung by children in the Yiddish schools of the inter-war years.

Leyb Rozental

Leyb Rozental (1916-1945) was a poet, publishing his first poetry book at the age of 14. In the Vilna ghetto he became one of the most successful writers of musicals and theatre revues.

Rikle Glezer

Rikle Glezer (1924-) was only 16 when the Nazis invaded her home city of Vilna. She wrote several songs during her years of imprisonment in the Vilna ghetto. She escaped during deportation and joined the partisans in the forests around Vilna.

Khane Khaytin

Khane Khaytin (1925-2004) was a Lithuanian-Jewish songwriter who wrote many popular songs in the Shavli ghetto.

Salomon Kannewasser

Salomon Meijer Kannewasser (1916-1945) was the lead singer in a popular young musical duo from Amsterdam known as Johnny & Jones. Their popularity began in 1938 and they went on to record six albums under the Panachord music label.

Arnold Simeon van Wesel

Arnold Simeon van Wesel (1918-1945) played guitar in a popular young musical duo from Amsterdam known as Johnny & Jones. Their popularity began in 1938 and they went on to record six albums under the Panachord music label.

Hans Neumeyer

From the age of fourteen, Hans Neumeyer (1887-1944), a composer and teacher of musical composition, was completely blind. He died whilst interned in Theresienstadt on 19 May 1944.

Peter Gellhorn

Der deutsche Dirigent, Komponist und Pianist Peter Gellhorn (1912-2004) floh in den 1930er Jahren aus Deutschland und ließ sich in London nieder. Er dirigierte am Royal Opera House, Sadler's Wells und Glyndebourne.

Walter Bricht

Walter Bricht (1904-1970) war ein österreichischer Komponist, dessen Jahre als professioneller Komponist mit dem Aufstieg Hitlers und dem Beginn des Austrofaschismus 1933 zusammenfielen.