Speaker: Murry Sidlin

It seems impossible to imagine that in the Nazi concentration camp of Theresienstadt, there were 20 or more talented composers who found ways to write and perform while imprisoned. They called themselves the New Music Studio and their music was saved under floorboards or passed along from prisoner to prisoner.

This new music reflected life in the camp, sustained hope, provided spiritual and cultural resistance for both the prisoner composers and audience, and promised a future. Some of the music contained hidden messages, or served as eye (or ear) witness to the horrors of the camp, or of the broken heart.

Murry Sidlin will honor the work of these composers by sharing with us some recordings from Hours of Freedom: The Story of the Terezin Composer. He will also speak of what music means in the most desperate of times.