The idea for this collection of music written by prisoners at Theresienstadt, or Terezín, grew out of Anne Sofie von Otter's performance at the 2000 International Forum on the Holocaust. The music here represents only a small fraction of what was written and performed at the camp, much of which has been lost. Terezín served as the Nazi's model camp, in which artists were allowed to create new works put on display for the international public as a proof of the humane treatment of prisoners. The performances only masked the ...
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The idea for this collection of music written by prisoners at Theresienstadt, or Terezín, grew out of Anne Sofie von Otter's performance at the 2000 International Forum on the Holocaust. The music here represents only a small fraction of what was written and performed at the camp, much of which has been lost. Terezín served as the Nazi's model camp, in which artists were allowed to create new works put on display for the international public as a proof of the humane treatment of prisoners. The performances only masked the hard labor and malnutrition the prisoners suffered when they were not on public display, and most of them died there or went to their deaths in other camps. The awareness of the tragedy behind the music heightens its poignancy. Perhaps most moving are the songs that directly address the prisoners' suffering -- Ilse Weber's "I wandre durch Theresienstadt" and "Ade, Kamerad!, Karel Svenk's "Anything goes!," and the bitterly ironic "Terezín Song," set to a merry tune from the operetta...
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