MY SAY: MUSIC TO DEFY THE SAVAGE BEAST….SEE THIS MOVIE
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/orchestra-of-exiles/
Orchestra of Exiles is the suspenseful chronicle of how one man helped save Europe’s premier Jewish musicians from obliteration by the Nazis during World War II. In three years, Bronislaw Huberman transformed from a world renowned violinist to a humanitarian racing against time. With commentary by Itzhak Perlman, Zubin Mehta, Pinchas Zukerman, Joshua Bell and others.
But it is so much more. It chronicles Huberman’s dream of creating the Palestine National Orchestra with Jewish musicians from the best orchestras of Europe- Germany, Poland, Hungary- who came to Israel when Ben Yehuda Street in Tel Aviv was not even paved. Toscanini, the most famous conductor in the world snubbed the Nazis and conducted the first performance in 1936. William Steinberg who became one of America’s top conductors had rehearsed the audience in makeshift conditions. Leonard Bernstein played the piano and conducted after the 1948 War when David Ben Gurion renamed it the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra- today one of the leading orchestras in the world.
This is a wonderful movie presented by PBS in April 2013 during their fund raising season (natch!)…..
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