THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 12, 1995 TAG: 9503110059
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E9 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Mark Mobley
LENGTH: Short : 47 lines
Koch International Classics is producing a nine-volume Terezin Music Anthology. The series began auspiciously with piano sonatas and a string quartet by Viktor Ullmann, as played by performers including pianist and Terezin survivor Edith Kraus. Volume II features works of Gideon Klein, including Czech folk songs for male chorus and an intense fugue for string quartet.
``Silenced Voices: Victims of the Holocaust'' (Northeastern) includes an impassioned performance of Ervin Schulhoff's First String Quartet by Boston Symphony members, and the young Czech composer Vitezslava Kapralova is represented by her ``Dubnova Preludia'' Suite. The disc ends hauntingly, with the unfinished Duo for Violin and Cello of Gideon Klein.
``I am boundlessly fond of nightclub dancing,'' Schulhoff once wrote to fellow composer Alban Berg. Schulhoff's cerebral but charming versions of the foxtrot, tango and ``shimmy-jazz'' are available on a Supraphon disc by pianist Tomas Visek.
London Records' ``Entartete Musik'' edition includes ``degenerate music'' banned by the Nazis. Ullmann's one-act opera ``Der Kaiser von Atlantis'' is an amazing testament to the durability of the human spirit. Its lively music has echoes of Berg and Kurt Weill. Another ``Entartete Musik'' disk collects string quartets of Pavel Haas and Franz Krasa. Haas' Second Quartet has the vibrant tonality and driving rhythms of music by his countryman Leos Janacek.
Neither did the Nazis look favorably upon the politics of Paul Hindemith's 1934 opera ``Mathis der Maler'' (Matthias the Painter). The opera has recently been released in a new Wergo recording with the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus.
Two modern works use harmonious, minimalist techniques to explore the sadness of the Holocaust. Steve Reich's imaginative and deeply moving ``Different Trains'' (Elektra Nonesuch) combines taped statements of survivors with the rich sound of overlapping string quartets. Henryk Gorecki's glowing Symphony No. 3, ``Symphony of Sorrowful Songs'' has become a hit record for soprano Dawn Upshaw, conductor David Zinman and the Orchestra of St. Luke's (Elektra Nonesuch). by CNB