Instruments of remembrance
Instruments of remembrance
A certain circle of
synchronicity will close on Thursday 29 September when the
New Zealand School of Music Orchestra presents a concert on
the 70th anniversary of the Babi Yar massacre in
Kiev.
The concert, entitled ‘In Remembrance’,
features Requiem ‘The Holocaust’, a work written by
Boris Pigovat in commemoration of this horrific event in
which 34,000 Jews were murdered by Nazi forces. And two of
the violins being played in the concert were donated to the
School by Holocaust survivor Clare Galambos
Winter.
“There is a real poignancy in this
connection,” says NZSM Events Coordinator Stephen Gibbs.
“Clare is a generous supporter of the performance
programmes at NZSM and has endowed the School with both
scholarships and instruments through the Victoria University
Foundation. The 2011 recipients are postgraduate Jonathan
Tanner and third-year student Arna Shaw, both of whom are
playing in the concert. In fact, Arna will be leading the
orchestra in their performance of the Pigovat
Requiem.”
The remarkable story of Clare Galambos
Winter’s survival has recently been published by Victoria
University Press in The Violinist by Sarah Gaitanos It
details her arrest, confinement in Auschwitz and transfer to
a slave labour camp, the loss of her family and her journey
to New Zealand where she played violin with the New Zealand
Symphony Orchestra for 33 years.
“In New Zealand we
may feel isolated from the world and these sorts of
events,” says Professor Elizabeth Hudson, Director of
NZSM, “but a concert such as this emphasises just how
interconnected we all are. It is certainly fitting that
these instruments will be played in this concert of
commemoration.
“The subtitle of the concert is
‘facing conflict through music’ and the four works being
performed were created in response to four very different
situations. Music encourages us to remember and honour
victims and to share and reflect on our own relationship to
these tragedies in a very special way.”
The NZSM
Orchestra will be conducted by Kenneth Young and violist
Professor Donald Maurice and Inbal Megiddo, NZSM’s newly
appointed lecturer in cello, will feature as soloists. As
well as the Pigovat Requiem, the programme includes Schelomo
for orchestra and cello by Ernest Bloch, and two New Zealand
works: Anthony Ritchie’s Remember Parihaka and NZSM
lecturer Professor John Psathas’s Luminous.
The
concert will take place from 7:30pm in the Wellington Town
Hall on Thursday 29 September. Tickets are available through
Ticketek.
ends