[PW] holocaust orchestra clarification

[S M Colowick]

I've only seen mention of single-sex orchestras, but a mixed choir is
mentioned in the article "Orpheus in hell: music and therapy in the
Holocaust" by Joseph Moreno (The Arts in Psychotherapy
Volume 26, Issue 1, 1999, Pages 3-14).

Also from that article: "The most well-known book description about
the experience of the prison orchestras is Fania Fenelon's "Playing
For Time" (Fenelon & Routier, 1977) about her experiences in
performing in the women's prisoner orchestra in the Birkenau
extermination camp."

I looked for "women" in the book Music of Another World by Szymon Laks
(at Google Books) and found nothing about women performers.

Other than the "secret orchestra" formed by Herbert Zipper (subject of
the documentary Never Give Up -- I haven't seen it, so can't say for
sure that the orchestra was all men), the orchestras were work
details, and I'm pretty sure these were always segregated by sex.

smc

On Tue, Apr 8, 2008 at 8:55 AM, Campbell, Barbara A
<barbara-campbell at uiowa.edu> wrote:
> We just acquired a new Children's/YA book by Michael Morpurgo (Ill.
> Michael Foreman) entitled "The Mozart Question." In general it is
> getting rave reviews but Publishers Weekly calls into question a flaw.
> The story is about the orchestras made up of Concentration Camp victims
> who were forced to play Mozart's music while others were being led to
> the gas chambers. The story tells that the boy's parents met while
> playing in such an orchestra in a concentration camp. According to the
> review in Feb, 2008 Publisher's Weekly, "The story's foundation,
> unfortunately, is flawed: men and women prisoners did not mix in
> concentration camps, and orchestras were not exceptions. Why ask readers
> to honor history (much less a history that undergoes very public
> challenges) if the author reinvents the record?
>
>
>
> Can anyone either verify or negate this claim that concentration camp
> orchestra's were never coed, and that this could or couldn't have
> happened?
>
>
>
> Thanks much, Barb
>
> barbara-campbell at uiowa.edu
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Project Wombat
> list at project-wombat.org
> http://www.project-wombat.org/
>