Lexikon der Juden in der Musik (fwd)

[Ryna Kedar - Mekatleget for music lib. <ryna_k...>]

I thought this would be of interest to our list.

Ryna Kedar
Head, Acquisitions & Cataloging division
The Felicja Blumental Music Center & Library
Tel-Aviv, Israel


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2000 12:34:14 -0500
From: Darwin Scott <dscott (at) BRANDEIS(dot)EDU>
To: MLA-L (at) LISTSERV(dot)INDIANA(dot)EDU
Subject: Lexikon der Juden in der Musik

I thought I would bring to your attention an important reprint that is
buried within a larger publication, and thus may pass you by as you work
your way through selection slips.

No doubt many of you know of the two editions of this topically dreadful
but biographically essential lexicon:

Lexikon der Juden in der Musik: mit einem Titelverzeichnis juedischer Werke
/ zusammengestallt im Auftrag der Reichsleitung der NSDAP auf Grund
behoerdlicher, parteiamtlich gepruefter Unterlagen; bearb. von Theo Stengel
in Verbindung mit Herbert Gerigk. (Berlin : B. Hahnefeld, 1940).
Veroeffentlichungen des Institus der NSDAP zur Erforschung der Judenfrage
Frankfurt A. M., Bd. 2). 2d ed. 1943.

You may also remember that these were published on horribly acidic paper,
which developed into extremely browned and brittle volumes. Many libraries
have reformatted these volumes to preserve this invaluable list of every
Jewish musician known to the compilers. It is particularly essential for
the biographical data on the lesser-known personages, particularly those in
Germany and Austria, which are covered exhaustively.

The 1940 edition has been reprinted as part of the following, recently
published monograph:

Eva Weissweiler. Ausgemerzt! : das Lexikon der Juden in der Musik und seine
m=F6rderischen Folgen / Eva Weissweiler ; unter Mitarbeit von Lilli
Weissweiler. K=F6ln : Dittrich-Verlag, 1999.  444 p.=20
Includes a facsimile of: Lexikon der Juden in der Musik / Theo Stengel.
Berlin : B. Hahnefeld, c1940. Includes bibliographical references (p.
431-435) and index. ISBN: 3920862252=20

Title translates: Weeded Out! The Lexicon of Jews in Music and Its
Murderous Results.

The book discusses the compilers, the creation of this lexicon, and all
that followed (among many other matters).

I haven't read enough of the volume to determine why the 1940 edition
rather than the expanded 2d ed. was reprinted, but I suspect it is because
in 1940 those Jews recorded as living were still making music in Germany
and elsewhere, whereas by 1943 most had already been "weeded."=20

The foreword to the Lexikon opens: "Die Reinigung unseres Kultur- und damit
auch unseres Musiklebens von allen juedischen Elementen ist erfolgt." (The
purification of our culturural--and thus also our musical--lives from all
Jewish elements has taken place.) Weissweiler's monograph reminds us just
how thorough this process was (Gerigk, by the way, published studies of
Rossini and Verdi, and edited "Meister der Musik und ihre Werke"). In page
after page following the facsimile reprint--starting at p. 386--Weissweiler
lists all of the entrants whose deaths can be documented during the
Holocaust.  252 of the names alone were found on deportation rosters or
other records (most dated 1942-43), which have been used as resources for
various Gedenkbuecher and other key resources published in the last 20
years or so. Entry after entry records the transport dates, usually
followed by "verschollen" (lost without trace) in Riga, or in Auschwitz, or
in Theresienstadt, etc. Occaisonally there is something more definite,
like: "fuer tot eklaert in Sobibor" (declared dead in Sobibor). Several
entries are followed by "Selbstmord" (suicide).=20

I've often wondered what happened to all of the unfamiliar contemporary
piano and violin teachers, orchestral musicians, singers, choral directors,
theory teachers, composers, publishers, etc. listed in the Lexikon. It's
chilling indeed to flip to Weissweiler's addendum for the "murderous
results" and to get some sense of the horrific loss to professional and
day-to-day music during this period--as well as the decades after. Entries
for more well-known figures (Hans David, Richard Fall, Richard Hohenemser,
Schulhoff, Kurt Singer) provide more details.=20

Newer collections that missed out on obtaining the original version of the
1940 or 43 editions of this important reference resource or those that have
a copy in tatters will welcome this publication.

There is one glaring error that I caught (and there are several typos). The
singer Paula Lindberg Salomon did not die in Auschwitz. Indeed, she is
still alive at the age of 103! She is the stepmother of the artist
Charlotte Salomon (died in Auschwitz at age 26), whose huge series of
semiautobiographical paintings "Leben? oder Theater? painted while in
hiding in the south of France in 1941-42 have been making a huge stir
lately in the art world. We had an exhibit of 70+ facsimiles here at
Brandeis last semester (a traveling exhibit that is now in Atlanta)--and
about 450 of the originals will be at the Boston MFA this summer. Paula
Lindberg Salomon and Charlotte's father Albert (an eminent Berlin
physician) had emigrated to Holland and were eventually rounded up. Indeed
they were scheduled to be on the 5/17/43 transport to Auschwitz from
Westerbrook, but managed to escape by a twist of fate.

This whole story, plus Lindberg's amazing career, is captured in a 1995
documentary Paula Paulinka / ein film von Christine Fischer-Defoy, Caroline
Goldie and Daniela Schmidt, which features the 98-year old Lindberg Salomon
lucidly recalling her life for nearly an hour. It's an amazing film that
ought to be better known. (I was indeed lucky that one of the producers,
Caroline Goldie, was in Boston the night I showed this film, and thus could
give a pre- and post-viewing talk). Lindberg was the leading Bach alto
singer in Germany in the late 20s and early 30s (until Jews were banned
from singing in public in 1933), being the soloist in the  Leipzig
Thomanerchor and performing with Furtwaengler, Bruno Walter, and Erich
Kleiber. At the Salomon's home in Berlin, Albert Einstein (violin) and
Albert Schweizer (organ/piano) were frequent guests (as were Thomas Mann
and the whole cadre of German literati of the time), and the three of them
performed the Bach alto arias with violin obbligato. She also recalls in
great detail the life of  German/Jewish musicians from 1934-39, when the
only outlet for performance for them were the various Jewish music
organizations.

Sometimes my job as music and art librarian at Brandeis has fascinating
intersections!

Regards,

Darwin




___________________________________________________

Darwin F. Scott                         office: 781-736-4680        =20
Creative Arts Librarian                fax: 781-736-4675
Brandeis University Libraries       e-mail: dscott (at) brandeis(dot)edu
Mailstop 045                                                     =20
Waltham, MA 02454-9110          Notes (MLA) Music Editor =20

http://www.library.brandeis.edu/staff/creative_arts/dscott.html
___________________________________________________

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