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Home , Amnon Weinstein, Ivry Gitlis, Severance Hall, Shlomo Mintz, Violins of Hope

In The News April 26, 2015 – Jan. 20, 2016 UMC_3041_2015 April 26, 2015

Violins of Hope: Instruments restored from Holocaust coming to Cleveland for wide-ranging cultural project by ZACHARY LEWIS

CLEVELAND, – You can break bodies. violinmaker at the heart of the project, titled Details are still being finalized. In terms You can extinguish voices. You can even “Violins of Hope.” of scheduling, “Violins of Hope” remains a rend souls, temporarily. multimillion-dollar work in progress. The “These violins, for me, represent six million scope and cast of major players, however, You cannot, however, silence music. Not people. To me, they say ‘You cannot win. We have long been clear, and both, simply put, with gas chambers. Not with firing squads. are here.’” are remarkable. Not by means of starvation. Cleveland, and most of the world, has never In addition to an exhibit at the Maltz No, as a major exhibit and series of seen anything like it. When “Violins of Museum of Jewish Heritage Oct. 1-Jan. 3, concerts featuring violins restored from Hope” arrives in the fall, the project won’t “Violins of Hope” will entail performances will make poignantly clear in just showcase objects of inestimable value; on the violins by the Cleveland Cleveland this fall, music always survives. some 25 instruments brought back to life with conductor Franz Welser-Most, Even under horrific conditions, music unites, from near ruin over the last 20 years. It violinist Schlomo Mintz and artists from saves and transcends. also will tie together more the Cleveland Institute of Music, as well securely than any cultural effort in recent as related coursework and public talks “It’s a monument to all those who can’t talk history. through Case Western Reserve University anymore,” said , the Israeli and an ever-expanding array of educational

Certain instruments that found their way to violinmaker Amnon Weinstein had to be restored piece by piece. (Photos courtesy of Debra Yasinow/Jewish Federation of Cleveland)

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programs at area schools. WVIZ-PBS also soul even used his violin case to carry out a compiled into a book by James Grymes, will produce a documentary and broadcast bomb attack. Those who literally escaped, consulting curator of the Maltz exhibit. the project’s main events. A dedicated meanwhile, often ceased playing, viewing website, violinsofhopecle.org, is set to go live their violins as little more than painful Still, the Northeast Ohio version is certain to Sunday. reminders. be in a class by itself. In no other place will so many of the violins find their way into The goal, said organizer Dick Bogomolny, Imagine, then, how Weinstein – who lost the hands of musicians, or will such a broad chairman of the orchestra’s board of relatives in the Holocaust and whose in- effort be made to engage children and the directors, is to stoke a visceral response to laws were among those depicted in the film public. the Holocaust and thereby to open young “Defiance” – felt, and still feels, as the one eyes to contemporary genocidal threats. charged with revitalizing the instruments. “It’ll be unique, there’s no question,” said For him, to handle such objects and philanthropist and onetime violinist Milton By itself, he said, as history, the Holocaust encounter all the ways in which they and, by Maltz, a lead supporter of the project along “has about as much emotional appeal extension, their owners, were mistreated, is with his wife, Tamar. “We knew from the as the pharaohs and pyramids.” Through to experience waves of conflicting emotion: outset this was going to be something Weinstein’s violins, however, “we can use revulsion and curiosity, sorrow and elation, very, very special. It’s something we’re very that story to make a powerful connection. frustration and pride. honored to be involved with.” The lessons of the Holocaust don’t matter much without that. The carrying it forward “You’re holding the soul of somebody,” is going to be the critical thing.” Weinstein said. “You’re touching this thing and you’re thinking, ‘Ay, ay, why can’t you The appeal of the instruments is talk to me? You’ve seen the worst scenery in considerable, even from a distance, months human history.’ ahead of their arrival in Cleveland. Long before it will be possible to behold or hear “But then you have to do your job. You have them, even to read of violins recovered to show that people resisted the Nazis with from concentration camps and Holocaust their violins. You have to show that there survivors is to travel straight back in time, was another kind of resistance. The power to imagine their former owners and to of this little, 350-gram (3/4-lb.) instrument appreciate something of what those objects is incredible.” must have meant to them. Cleveland is not the first to host “Violins For those who played for their Nazi captors, of Hope.” Earlier this year, the the violin was a lifeline, a critical link to Philharmonic gave a high-profile concert food and other supplies. For others, it was on the instruments, and in 2012, a smaller an escape mechanism. Through music, collection than will be shown here was prisoners enjoyed momentary respites from displayed in Charlotte, . omnipresent terror and misery. One brave Detailed stories of the violins also have been

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The collection features some 45 Holocaust- Holocaust-era era violins, restored by violin maker Amnon Weinstein over a period of two ‘Violins of Hope’ to decades. The instruments have since been be performed and performed in concerts around the world, most recently by the in exhibited in Cleveland January 2015. The Cleveland visit will mark the violins’ second trip to the US following The collection of instruments performed on their two-week residency at the University by Jewish musicians during the Nazi regime of North Carolina in spring 2012. was restored by Amnon Weinstein The Cleveland project, supported by seven Violins of Hope – a collection of instruments local organisations, will include orchestral, played by Jewish musicians before and chamber music, and klezmer concerts; an during the Holocaust – is to form the basis exhibition at the Maltz Museum of Jewish of a programme of concerts, exhibitions Heritage; lectures; films; and educational and educational opportunities in Cleveland, programming in schools throughout Greater US, running from 27 September 2015 to 3 Cleveland. Highlights include a September January 2016. concert featuring The and violinist , under the direction of Franz Welser-Möst. Amnon Weinstein discovered a swastika and “Heil Hitler” penciled inside the body of this violin.

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Violins of Hope Coming to Cleveland by STEPHANIE POWELL

Violins of Hope, a collection of 45 Holocaust- era violins, will arrive in Cleveland this fall for a community collaboration of concerts, exhibits, and educational opportunities focusing on the role of music and musicians during the Holocaust.

The violins have been restored by Amnon Weinstein, a second-generation violin maker based in Tel Aviv, . Cleveland marks the second time the violins have visited the US—the first in 2012 at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte.

The Violins of Hope Cleveland, the official moniker of the Cleveland-based effort, will offer a slew of performances, exhibits, and Violins of Hope founder Amnon Weinstein in his workshop workshops surrounding the violins’ visit, including a September 27 concert, where the Jewish Heritage, represents a remarkable an indelible impact on every person who restored instruments will be played, with opportunity for education of people’s hearts sees and hears them.” Israeli violin virtuoso Shlomo Mintz and the and minds.” Cleveland Orchestra under the direction of For more information, visit the Violins Franz Welser-Most, the dedication of Case Seven local organizations, including the of Hope Cleveland’s website at www. Western Reserve’s Milton and Tamar Maltz Cleveland Orchestra, Case Western Reserve, violinsofhopecle.org. Performing Arts Center at The Temple— the Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM), Tifereth Israel’s newly renovated Silver Facing History and Ourselves, ideastream, Hall to Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, who played the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, and a role in establishing the nation of Israel the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage, post-World War II, and an exhibit displaying partnered to bring the collection of violins to the violins at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Cleveland. Heritage. “The opportunity to bring these “These violins carry extraordinary meaning extraordinary instruments to greater across generations,” said Milton Maltz, Cleveland immediately united organizations one of many who championed the effort and individuals across the region,” Richard to bring the instruments to Cleveland. Bogomolny, Musical Arts Association “To have members of one of the world’s chairman of the board and one of the finest play them in the newly leaders of the Violins of Hope Cleveland renovated Silver Hall, and also have them effort, said in a statement. “A profound available to view at the Maltz Museum of personal story lives within each violin, and together they possess the potential to leave

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Details about all of these programs and perform with one of the instruments. The Violins of Hope coming events, including ticket information, will be hall is named for The Temple’s longtime available this summer. More details about leader, Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, who also was to Cleveland the project and associated activities can among the leaders in the effort to establish be found at violinsofhopecle.org. Amnon the nation of Israel after World War II. by ELIZABETH BLOOM Weinstein, a second-generation violin- maker based in Tel Aviv, Israel, has collected “We can think of no more fitting way to It might be worth a visit to our neighbors in and repaired more than 45 Holocaust-era mark the opening of Silver Hall than this Ohio this fall to check out a project to bring violins from around the world, some with extraordinary concert,” Case Western the Violins of Hope to Northeast Ohio. The the Star of David on the back and others Reserve President Barbara R. Snyder 45-plus instruments were played by with names and dates inscribed within the said. “We also look forward to hosting imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps instrument. The violins have been played in extensive public programs featuring our and have been restored by an Israeli violin- concerts around the world, most recently faculty and collaborating with the rest of maker. The project includes a collaboration by the Berlin Philharmonic in late January of the organizations involved.” ideastream, between various institutions, including the this year. the region’s nonprofit public media Cleveland Institute of Music, the Cleveland organization that includes WVIZ/PBS, 90.3 Orchestra and Facing History and Ourselves. The Cleveland visit will mark the violins’ WCPN, and WCLV 104.9 Classical, will record More details about concerts and other second trip to the U.S. The violins first September’s Violins of Hope Cleveland events will be announced at a later date; came to this country in the spring of 2012, Concert live for broadcast by WVIZ/PBS until then, here is the press release: when the University of North Carolina and WCLV Classical 104.9 radio. ideastream Charlotte hosted a two-week visit. UNC also will develop a half-hour documentary CLEVELAND – More than a half dozen Charlotte musicology professor James A. highlighting Northeast Ohio’s experiences organizations across the community Grymes published Violins of Hope: Violins with the project as well as individual stories have come together to bring the historic of the Holocaust – Instruments of Hope involving the instruments. Violins of Hope to Northeast Ohio this fall. and Liberation in Mankind’s Darkest Hour Played before and during the Holocaust, last year and is curating an exhibition of “This is a once-in-a lifetime event for the the instruments have been painstakingly the violins at the Maltz Museum of Jewish community, and it’s restored and serve as testaments to the Heritage that runs from Oct. 1 through Jan. essential to record and document the series resilience of the human spirit and the 3, 2016. of Violins of Hope events and exhibitions,” power of music to lift hearts in even the said Kit Jensen, ideastream chief operating most horrific of circumstances. Among the highlights of Violins of Hope officer. ”The live broadcasts and recordings Cleveland will be a September concert will amplify the amount of people who can Among the organizations inspired to partner featuring The Cleveland Orchestra, under participate in this uniquely historic project, on a project combining performances, the direction of Franz Welser-Möst, which both today and in the future.” educational programs and a major exhibition will dedicate newly renovated Silver Hall, are: The Cleveland Orchestra, Case Western part of Case Western Reserve’s Milton and Case Western Reserve faculty already have Reserve, the Cleveland Institute of Music, Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at The begun planning lectures and programs Facing History and Ourselves, ideastream, Temple – Tifereth Israel. that will provide students and the broader the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, and the Cleveland community opportunities to Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. “These violins carry extraordinary meaning learn more about the complex role of music across generations,” said Milton Maltz, one in concentration camps and the larger “The opportunity to bring these of those who catalyzed the effort to bring religious, cultural and historical contexts extraordinary instruments to greater the instruments here. “To have members involved. The university’s Laura and Alvin Cleveland immediately united organizations of one of the world’s finest orchestras Siegal Lifelong Learning Program will play and individuals across the region,” play them in the newly renovated Silver a pivotal role in outreach across the region, said Richard Bogomolny, Musical Arts Hall, and also have them available to view and also will join with the Department Association Chairman of the Board and at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage, of Judaic Studies to bring internationally one of the leaders of the Violins of Hope represents a remarkable opportunity for renowned Jewish scholars to speak in Cleveland effort. “A profound personal story education of people’s hearts and minds.” Cleveland. lives within each violin, and together they possess the potential to leave an indelible Members of the Cleveland Orchestra will Local students also will have ample impact on every person who sees and hears play the restored violins, while the Israeli opportunity to participate in public them.” violin virtuoso Shlomo Mintz also will programming, and to consider the violins

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within their classrooms. The Cleveland The breadth of activities planned for unique stories behind each instrument regional office of Facing History and Violins of Hope Cleveland touches multiple and the individuals who owned them. Ourselves has scheduled teacher workshops elements of the mission of the 112-year-old Throughout the fall of 2015, a diverse range and is developing lessons and other Jewish Federation of Cleveland – perhaps of nonprofit organizations will sponsor materials for Northeast Ohio educators most significantly in the organization’s performances, lectures, an exhibition and to use. Facing History is an international commitment “to promote the well-being of other public programming. The partners non-profit education organization dedicated our community.” are: The Cleveland Orchestra, Case Western to using lessons from history to encourage Reserve, the Cleveland Institute of Music, students to consider how their own choices “The Jewish Federation of Cleveland is Facing History and Ourselves, ideastream, can make a positive impact on society. thrilled and proud to be a partner in bringing the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, and the the Violins of Hope to Cleveland. Through Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. For more “These violins are a dramatic memorial to this program, our entire community will information, please visit violinsofhopecle. the lives lost in the Holocaust,” said Mark have the opportunity to learn about the org. Swaim-Fox, Director of the Cleveland office enduring lessons of the Holocaust–not of Facing History. “Learning about their only the tragedy brought about by baseless story is an emotional lens that allows hatred but also the resilience of the students to experience the many ways that Jewish people,” said Hedy Milgrom, Chief Jews in Europe used music to survive and to Development Officer at the Federation. “One resist the Nazis.” manifestation of that resilience is embodied in the violins owned and played by The Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM) thousands of Jews, most of whom perished, Orchestra, meanwhile, will present Music but some of whom survived. These violins of the Violins of Hope, a free concert for the were played throughout the years of the community at Severance Hall on October Holocaust–because where there was music, 14 in which CIM students play the restored there was hope. And through these violins, violins from the Holocaust. In addition, CIM the Jews who perished are immortalized will present several faculty and student and serve as an inspiration for us today.” concerts featuring chamber music of the time, including music written by composers To learn more about programming and held in concentration camps. CIM’s Distance events, please visit the Violins of Hope Learning program will support the project’s Cleveland website, www.violinsofhopecle. education efforts with offerings that org. prepare students and area residents for their visit to the exhibition and concerts. Violins of Hope Cleveland is a community- wide collaboration that aims to inform, “The Violins of Hope will serve as a reminder educate and inspire people throughout the to us all of the timeless power of music Midwest. Played by Jewish prisoners in over adversity,” said Joel Smirnoff, President Nazi concentration camps, the instruments and CEO of CIM. “The Cleveland Institute of have been collected and restored by Music is proud to partner in bringing these Israeli violin maker Amnon Weinstein historic instruments to Cleveland and in for more than two decades. The historic bringing their sound back to life for our violins have been played in concerts from community.” to Berlin and Charlotte, NC, and provide a rare opportunity to explore

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This is only the second times the violins the instruments’ very different stories and Holocaust-Era Violins have been seen and heard in the U.S. (they further illustrates both the strength of the were first hosted in Charlotte in 2012). human spirit and the power of music.” to Be Played in Violins of Hope Cleveland will launch Sept. Cleveland This Fall 27, 2015 and will conclude on Jan. 3, 2016. The program is organized by Case Western The months of programming with be Reserve University, The Cleveland Orchestra, by ERIC SANDY anchored by a major exhibition at the Maltz the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage, the Museum of Jewish Heritage, and events will Cleveland Institute of Music, the Jewish A very special and unique musical arts take place all over Northeast Ohio. Federation of Cleveland and ideastream. exhibition is coming to Northeast Ohio, giving us all a look and a listen into history. From the exhibition hosts: “The multimedia exhibition contextualizes and shares each of Violins of Hope builds a bridge to Nazi Germany, where music played a vital role in the minute sense of hope that was illuminated for the dying.

The group’s founder, Amnon Weinstein, first encountered a customer at his restoration businesses who described violins being played by Jewish musicians while Nazis marched other victim to death. Almost 20 years ago, Weinstein began actively collecting and restoring violins that had been played during the Holocaust.

“Wherever there were violins, there was hope,” Weinstein says of the program.

“A profound personal story lives within each violin, and together they possess the potential to leave an indelible impact on every person who sees and hears them,” says Richard Bogomolny, Cleveland Orchestra chairman of the board and one of the leaders of the Violins of Hope Cleveland Amnon Weinstein in his studio effort.

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at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Maltz Performing Arts Beachwood through much of the fall and Center, Maltz Museum winter. to spotlight Holocaust Four days after Mintz plays the Mendelssohn, “Violins of Hope” opens – by strings invitation only – at the Maltz Museum, showcasing about 20 of the violins by CARLO WOLFF Weinstein has amassed over nearly 20 years. Its purpose is to make voices long It has been said that the sound of the violin gone speak anew. Its vehicle is everyday instruments that, as doppelgangers of their resembles that of the human voice. The Orchestra members warm up on violins that survived proximity will come clear both actually and onetime owners, are Holocaust survivors. the Holocaust. symbolically on Sept. 27, when violins of The official opening of “Violins of Hope” singular provenance, played by musicians of at the Maltz Museum is Oct. 2. It will run “Once people asked him why so many singular prominence, star at Silver Hall. through Jan. 3. Jewish people played the violin, and so good, Silver Hall, in case you haven’t heard, is the by the way,” Weinstein said. “He said it was name of the imminent 1,200-seat theater Mid-July conversations with representatives the easiest instrument to pick up and run at the Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing of some of those sponsoring institutions away with.” Arts Center on the campus of Case Western – the Cleveland Orchestra, Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. That arts Reserve University, the Cleveland Institute During the pogroms of the early 20th center is a story unto itself. Another time. of Music, Facing History and Ourselves, century, Jews tried to escape with their At Silver Hall, Shlomo Mintz, the Israeli ideastream, the Jewish Federation of pianos; the violin, “a very, very Jewish virtuoso, will perform the Mendelssohn Cleveland and the Maltz Museum – attest to instrument” that is far more portable, got with the Cleveland Orchestra the scope and profundity of a project years away far more often, Weinstein said. under the direction of Franz Welser-Moest in gestation. They also signify an alliance of in a program also featuring works by Ludwig a type that might not be able to be forged The violin was an integral part of European van Beethoven and Arnold Schoenberg. anywhere but Cleveland, according to life, first through the Italians, then the Jews, That Sunday afternoon, Mintz will play Richard Bogomolny, who as chairman of the and then the gypsies. “Today, it’s not the a Violin of Hope, one of nearly 60 such board of the Cleveland Orchestra is in effect same anymore,” he said, adding that in the instruments collected, restored and revived the program’s orchestrator. 20th century and into the 21st, many major by Tel Aviv violinmaker Amnon Weinstein. violinists were and are Jewish: Joshua Bell, Ideastream will broadcast the Sept. Many movers and shakers are responsible , , Nathan Milstein, 27 concert live over WVIZ/PBS and for Violins of Hope, principal among them Mintz, , Stern, and Pinchas WCLV/104.9 FM. violinmaker Weinstein and Bogomolny, who also holds the title of chairman of the Zuckerman. The gala is designed for donors to Violins of Musical Arts Association, the Cleveland Weinstein, who was born in 1938 in Israel Hope, an ambitious, multidisciplinary project Orchestra’s nonprofit parent. after his parents emigrated from , involving seven of the most significant lost all his relatives but his parents in World cultural institutions in Greater Cleveland. The repairman War II. His extended family numbered about The orchestra’s performance, and Mintz’s 380. Violins of Hope, he suggested, is his turn in particular, signal the launch of a Weinstein sounds like a man of zest and way to reconnect with murdered kin. venture so rich it promises to resonate in passion; he’s also a musical curator of the perpetuity. At least that’s the goal. highest sort. He breathes and thinks violins. He aches for them. He exults in them. “It’s like a memorial to the memory of, first of all my family, and then to the six million,” This story deals with the first two Violins of In a telephone conversation from his he said. “The violin didn’t change from Hope expressions: the Sept. 27 concert and workshop in Tel Aviv, Weinstein name- 1500, when it was created in ; we are “Violins of Hope,” an exhibition that will run checked the great Jewish violinist in a parable-like anecdote. playing on the same instrument, with some

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improvements, but (it is) the same sound The orchestrator The facilitator people had in the Second World War, in the last minute of their lives. Maybe nine years ago, Israel Wiener, arts As vice president of development and and culture consultant for the Jewish university relations at Case Western “It was the last human sound that they Federation of Cleveland, told his friend Reserve University, Lara Kalafatis, who heard. So if you’re coming to a concert Richard Bogomolny about Weinstein and his oversees events and donor relations, makes and you can feel the violins, you can hear phoenix-like violins. Bogomolny did nothing “sure the trains run on time” in regard to something that is talking for all this lost with the information at the time. Violins of Hope. generation. For them the violin was the last human voice to listen to,” “We were right in the midst of the Kalafatis said talks between Case Western recession,” said Bogomolny, adding he didn’t and the Cleveland Orchestra led to the idea The curator feel Cleveland’s cultural movers and shakers of opening the Violins of Hope program would then “take their eyes off” efforts “to with the concert in Silver Hall, the theater James A. Grymes came to know Weinstein save their own institutions.” memorializing The Temple-Tifereth Israel well in researching his book, “Violins of Hope: leader and prominent Zionist Rabbi Abba Violins of the Holocaust – Instruments of Gradually, the economy brightened, so Hillel Silver. Hope and Liberation in Mankind’s Darkest when the shaliach revived the idea with Hour on the project.” Grymes said the Bogomolny a few years ago, Bogomolny A steering committee with representatives day Weinstein’s father learned what had told Wiener he would “talk to certain people from all the institutions involved – “we happened to the rest of the clan, Moshe in the community.” His first contact was prefer to refer to those entities as our Weinstein, who also was a violinmaker, had Milton Maltz, founder and president of partner organizations,” Kalafatis said – a heart attack, “and from that point on, the Maltz Museum in Beachwood. Maltz, first met in October 2013. The committee he refused to ever talk about the family.” according to Bogomolny, “immediately said includes Hedy Milgrom, vice president, Weinstein’s mother was so grief-stricken he would like to do a major exhibition at endowments and development at the she joined her husband in Holocaust the Maltz Museum including the violins,” Federation; Jerry Wareham and Kit Jensen, muteness. and, after Bogomolny told him Weinstein respectively president/CEO and COO, believed repairing and playing them prove ideastream; Ellen Rudolph, executive At the same time, his parents hosted “that the voices of their former owners” director of the Maltz Museum; and, of visitors who were among the first wave of survive at least symbolically,” the show course, Bogomolny. immigrant Holocaust survivors. Weinstein, should tell some of their stories. in his bed, would hear these poor souls In addition to the programming – musical, thrashing and moaning at night in an After Maltz committed to a major show, artistic and educational – the group raised adjacent room, so the boy “had the physical Bogomolny recruited Barbara Snyder, $1.2 million to fund the project, which also presence of the Holocaust without the the president of Case Western Reserve will feature special educational programs at mechanism to talk about it with his family.” University, to the cause. Snyder, he said, Case for incoming freshmen, a free concert To Grymes, who attended the first U.S. noted the development of the Milton and by Cleveland Institute of Music students Violins of Hope-related events in 2012 at Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center on Oct. 14 at Severance Hall, and community the University of North Carolina in Charlotte, the Case campus. Wouldn’t a Cleveland outreach education programs under the Weinstein “is the thread that holds the Orchestra concert with conductor Franz auspices of Case Western’s Laura and Alvin project together and the thread that holds Welser-Moest and a soloist playing a Violin Siegal Lifelong Learning Program. my book together.” Grymes’ book won the of Hope be a perfect inaugural event? She National Jewish Book Award in 2014. asked Bogomolny. The answer will ring “Not only have we programmed together, Grymes, who is neither Jewish nor a violinist, loud and clear Sept. 27, when Mintz plays we have raised money together,” Kalafatis also is curator of the Maltz exhibition. “I’m the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto and the said, “and I think that is something really a music historian and I was so inspired by orchestra performs Beethoven’s “Overture special.” these stories that I had to write them,” he to the Creatures of Prometheus” and Arnold said. Schoenberg’s “Kol Nidre.” The concert will “Instead of piece-mealing this, we came end with Beethoven’s “Leonore Overture No. together and said, what do we want to 3”; Bogomolny said Mintz is likely to perform stage?” an encore, noting almost every Orchestra violinist will be playing a Violin of Hope.

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The impresario “It’s meant to feel like you’re entering a Encores for the repairman, the orchestrator kind of jewel box-like space with dramatic Don’t forget, Amnon Weinstein said, that The violins Weinstein resurrects spoke to lighting, with circular pods that contain the “one of the most beautiful pieces for violin,” Milton Maltz with eloquence. To Maltz, who violin cases and spaces that are comprised Ernst Bloch’s “Baal Shem,” was written in played the violin as a boy, the Violins of of strings, which are of course meant Cleveland. Hope represent above all the Jews murdered to evoke the violin,” Rudolph said. “The in the ghetto, including people who exhibition will be a multisensory experience, “The meaning of that is that we are the “made beautiful music and knew they really so it integrates the actual violins with the winners of this war, not the Germans, had no real way to rebuff the Nazis.” stories of the people who owned and played not the Nazis. They wanted to kill this When Maltz and his wife, Tamar, visited them.” outstanding tradition and this tradition is Weinstein in his workshop three years ago, existing, not the Nazis,” Weinstein said. Weinstein showed them a violin with a There will be appropriate images and He collects these violins “all the time, every swastika and a “Heil Hitler” inscription inside videos as well as a soundtrack blending day” and hopes one day to have them all. its body. Years ago, it seems the owner had classical and klezmer strains. At times, local “What Cleveland is doing for this project is had the instrument repaired by a German musicians will play the actual instruments. beyond all my dreams,” Weinstein said. “It is who may have meant to deliver a message “We’ll take the violins out of their cases something so great, so big, so wonderful. I warning “the Jews Hitler was going to be our and they’ll literally be brought to life in the don’t have the words in English to say what leader,” Maltz said. These violins speak to a exhibition space,” Rudolph said. “Amnon I think.” vanished, complicated culture, he suggested. has pointed out that not only have the What better way to inaugurate the Maltzes’ construction and sound of the violin not “This is a program that was brought to namesake performing arts center at Case changed in hundreds of years but the the community by some of the heaviest Western than the Sept. 27 concert featuring instruments themselves replicate closely hitters in the nonprofit world in Cleveland,” these remarkable instruments? the human voice. Hearing them played is said Richard Bogomolny. “We all realize the the closest thing to being able to connect slogan ‘never again’ doesn’t mean anything The overseer with them. The other thing I’m learning unless you have many more than just the about violins and violinists is that the people Jewish people involved in that promise.” Ellen Rudolph, executive director of the who play them leave an imprint of the Maltz Museum, said “Violins of Hope” will patterns of their play on the instrument. be a “design-forward exhibition” created That’s an incredible continuity from the from scratch. It sounds like it will be an owners of these instruments to the people environment unto itself. As of mid-July, it who are playing them today and the people was still being put together. who are hearing them today.”

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exhibit is on display, musicians from Baldwin Temple-Tifereth Israel), a venue that is in Local Arts Institutions Wallace Conservatory and the Cleveland the midst of an extensive renovation. “The Institute of Music will stop in the gallery ground rules for this exhibit are that we Collaborating to Bring to play on the actual Violins of Hope in the operate as one organization,” he said with Violins of Hope to exhibition. “It’s an amazing opportunity to regard to the collaborative nature of the bring those voices to life and connect with event. “I have never seen an organization Cleveland those who are lost,” said Rudolph. work like this one has where it’s all for one and one for all.” by JEFF NIESEL The press conference included a video Maltz talked about his own personal For the past two decades, Amnon Weinstein greeting from master violin maker Amnon connection to Cleveland and spoke about has restored violins that survived the Weinstein, who recalled finding a violin the renovation of Silver Hall, which he Holocaust. The violins in his collection have with a Cleveland connection — it belonged said is slated to re-open as part of CWRU been played in concerts in Jerusalem, Berlin to former Cleveland Institute of Music on Sept. 27 with the Cleveland Orchestra and Charlotte. This fall, seven cultural arts director . He talked about the performance featuring the violins. “I’m organizations are working together to bring various organizers who have helped put the so proud of all the friends I’ve made in the instruments to Cleveland with an array program together. “My English is not good Cleveland, Ohio,” he said as he recounted the plays, concerts, lectures, exhibitions, films, enough to praise all the people and efforts circumstances that brought him to the city. and other public events. A Violins of Hope for this outstanding project,” he said. “I hope Case Western Reserve University president exhibition featuring the violins and their people will be able to listen to the sounds Barbara R. Snyder said she was “thrilled” individual stories at the Maltz Museum of and stories.” about the performing arts center, the Jewish Heritage anchors the community- collaboration and all of programming that wide collaboration. Earlier this morning, The Cleveland Orchestra chairman Richard would be coming out over the next three the museum hosted a press conference Bogomolny then provided background on months. “The hall is stunning,” she said in to announce details around the program, how the project got started. He initially reference to new performing arts center. which brings together nearly 20 local arts heard about the violins in 2007 when there She talked about the various courses that institutions and more than 50 funders. were only 14 or 15 instruments (there are Case will offer in conjunction with the arrival now about 50) in Weinstein’s collection. He of the Violins of Hope. Filmmaker Malcolm At the start of the press conference, Maltz wanted to bring the violins to Cleveland but Clarke, the director of The Lady in Number 6: Museum director Ellen Rudolph provided an because of the recession, he didn’t think Music Saved My Life, will even be on hand to overview of the exhibition, which will open Cleveland’s art institutions could find the conduct a class. “We hope to attract families on Oct. 2 and be on display until Jan. 3. The finances at that time to put the exhibit on. from across the region,” Snyder said. “I think exhibit will include 19 violins, one of which we’ll remember Violins of Hope Cleveland for is coming from Holocaust authority Yad “This project could have only happened many, many years.” Vashem and will make its American debut. in Cleveland,” he said. He said he first Historically, concentration camp orchestras approached Maltz Museum chair Milton Details on all the programs being offered often played to entertain SS officers or while Maltz, who immediately wanted to do an can be found at violinsofhopecle.org. prisoners marched to their deaths. But the exhibition at the museum. “[Maltz] said, ‘I orchestras’ music also “reminded prisoners want this exhibition to be good enough that of their own humanity.” The exhibit will we could take it on the road to New York or touch on these aspects and be multi- Washington D.C.’” Bogomolny also quickly sensory; it will feature circular pods that scheduled a performance with the Cleveland will be “dramatically lit” as a soundtrack of Orchestra at Silver Hall (now the Milton and klezmer and classical music plays. While the Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at The

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 11 Sept. 1, 2015

Hope; and Mark Swaim-Fox, director of ‘Violins of Hope’ goal: the Cleveland office of Facing History and Ourselves, which has developed Violins become Holocaust of Hope-related teacher workshops and teaching instrument Holocaust-based lessons for Northeast Ohio educators. by CARLO WOLFF The new Maltz performing arts center is a Richard Bogomolny, one of the top two-phase, $59.3 million renovation and stakeholders in “Violins of Hope,” said Aug. repurposing of The Temple-Tifereth Israel, 28 that he hopes the “emotional content” of a striking, domed 1923 structure, blending Byzantine and Romanesque styles, on the the project resonates with today’s students Cleveland Orchestra board chairman Richard Bogomolny, so deeply that the lessons of the Holocaust north side of Case’s campus. from left, listens as Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage will never be forgotten. co-founder Milton Maltz discusses “Violins of Hope” Bogomolny first heard of Amnon Weinstein Aug. 28. Bogomolny, the board chairman of the and his Violins of Hope from Israel Wiener, instrument. One day, Maltz turned on his Cleveland Orchestra, who was instrumental the Tel Aviv-based arts and culture tormentors, smashing them with his violin, in putting together the multifaceted project, consultant for the Jewish Federation of which broke in the process. From then on, made the remark at a news conference Cleveland, seven or eight years ago. The idea he played harmonica, Maltz said. But the about Violins of Hope at the Maltz Museum of an exhibit intrigued him, but the economy violin still occupies a special place in his of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood. was in recession. A few years later, Wiener heart. revived the idea with him, and the economy A multimedia exhibition featuring 18 had improved. Bogomolny said he soon Besides the Cleveland Orchestra, which will violins from the collection of Tel Aviv approached Maltz, who “listened to the perform under Franz Welser-Moest at Silver violinmaker Amnon Weinstein and one story, and it took him at least two minutes” Hall Sept. 27, participating organizations from Yad Vashem, the center of Holocaust to agree to mount an exhibition. include ideastream, which will broadcast the research in Jerusalem, will run from Oct. 2 concert from Silver Hall live over WVIZ/PBS through Jan. 3 at the Maltz Museum. The The project mushroomed when Maltz and WCLV/104.9 FM; the Cleveland Institute violins were played before or during the connected it to Case, where the performing of Music; and the Federation. Holocaust. Weinstein has spent decades arts center named after him and his wife, restoring some 60 of these violins, workaday Tamar, was in the works. According to Silver Hall is a 1,200-seat theater instruments largely made in Germany. Bogomolny, all the elements fell into place memorializing The Temple-Tifereth Israel over about three weeks; to hear him tell it, leader and prominent Zionist Rabbi Abba Other stakeholders at the conference were everything has run as smoothly as a Swiss Hillel Silver. Maltz Museum co-founder Milton Maltz, watch. whom Bogomolny turned to jumpstart the project; Barbara R. Snyder, the president “I’ve never seen an organization work the of Case Western Reserve University, where way this one has,” said Bogomolny. Silver Hall, the core of the imminent Milton Maltz jokingly referred to Violins of Hope as and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center, a form of personal redemption. will debut at 3 p.m. Sept. 27 with a gala When he was a little boy, his mother made featuring the Cleveland Orchestra and Israeli him learn violin and bought him one three- virtuoso Shlomo Mintz playing a Violin of quarter size. Bullies taunted “Miltie and his fiddle” as he walked to school toting his

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 12 Sept. 1, 2015

Eighteen of these restored “Violins of Soul Music Hope” will come to Cleveland for an Oct. 3 to Jan. 1 exhibit at the Maltz Museum of by REBECCA MEISER Jewish Heritage along with programming at other institutions, including the Cleveland Holocaust-era instruments make music Orchestra and Case Western Reserve again with the three-month-long Violins of University. Hope movement. “In the violin, you can hear the human voice. Amnon Weinstein remembers when an old It can cry. It can smile,” Weinstein says. man walked into his Tel Aviv, Israel, violin “They are living tombstones.” repair shop in the ‘80s carrying a battered violin. The man told Weinstein how he One of the violins belonged to Feivel played the instrument in Auschwitz as Wininger, who saved 16 family members a member of the concentration camp’s and friends, by playing the violin in the orchestra. The Nazis had musicians play as Transnistria ghetto in exchange for extra a calming mechanism for when prisoners food, water and firewood. Another one were taken to the gas chambers. The violin belonged to a teenage resistance member in front of Weinstein saved the man from who used his violin case to sneak in death, but after the war, the man had explosives at a Nazi social club. stopped playing music. Now, he wanted the The best way to remember and honor these violin fixed, to give to his grandson. musicians, Weinstein realized, was to fix these instruments, tour with them publicly Weinstein got to work repairing the and have them played again. instrument, but when he opened the violin, he discovered ashes — possibly the The Violins of Hope were last played publicly incinerated remains of Auschwitz victims. in January by the Berlin Philharmonic at Weinstein tried to block the incident from the 70th anniversary of the liberation of memory. Auschwitz. “For years, I was haunted by it,” he says. “Nazism wanted to kill all the Jewish voices,” Weinstein explains. “Yet at the concert in It was also a painful reminder of his history: Berlin — the seat of the Nazis — the house Weinstein had lost nearly 400 family was full. When the [orchestra] began to members in the Holocaust. The experience play, the violins came alive, and together, helped him to realize these instruments they sounded like victory over evil.” were important artifacts. He put out a call for Holocaust-era violins and received more than 58.

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 13 Sept. 2, 2015

the first of which will feature The Cleveland Overture No. 3. The concert will be Violins of Hope Project Orchestra under Franz Welser-Möst on broadcast live on WVIZ/PBS and WCLV Sunday, September 27. That already sold- 104.9 FM and streamed live at ideastream. Creates Unprecedented out event will also inaugurate the new org at 3:00 pm and broadcast on WVIZ/PBS Coalition Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Friday, October 2 at 9:00 pm and Sunday, Center at Case Western Reserve University. October 4 at 3:00 pm. by DAVID C. BARNETT A press conference at the Maltz Museum Other concerts scheduled at the Cleveland What may be the largest group of Cleveland on August 28 traced the evolution of Violins Institute of Music, Anshe Chesed Fairmount cultural institutions ever to circle their of Hope Cleveland. Cleveland Orchestra Temple, Park Synagogue, the Maltz wagons around a single project will come chairman Richard J. Bogomolny and Maltz Museum, and Ideastream will feature CIM into play this fall when Case Western Museum Founder Milton Maltz spoke about faculty, the Cleveland Women’s Orchestra, Reserve University, the Cleveland Institute the early stages of the idea of bringing the the Imani Temple Ministries Choir and the of Music, The Cleveland Orchestra, Facing violins to Cleveland and their success in Greenman/Rushefsky Duo in programs History and Ourselves, ideastream, the lining up partners for the project, a process ranging from music by Holocaust composers Jewish Federation of Cleveland, and which came together in the short space to Klezmer music, songs of resistance the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage of three weeks. CWRU president Barbara from the era of slavery, a commemoration join together to present Violins of Hope R. Snyder talked about the decision to of the women’s orchestra at Auschwitz, a Cleveland. hold the opening concert in the new Maltz Klezmer band of Holocaust survivors, and Performing Arts Center, which was formerly the world premiere of a new work by David Four months of concerts, exhibitions, the Sanctuary of The Temple-Tifereth Israel. Shimotakahara for Groundworks Dance screenings, lectures, theatrical productions, Mark Swaim-Fox of the Cleveland office Theatre. and educational offerings will center around of Facing History and Ourselves detailed the extraordinary collection of violins the vast range of educational activities Among the planned educational programs amassed by Tel Aviv violinmaker Amnon for adults and children which will center are seven early December concerts for Weinstein, instruments that managed to around the Violins. Some twenty Northeast Grades 6-12 by The Cleveland Orchestra survive the Holocaust. Ohio organizations will offer programs and (Brett Mitchell, conducting) in collaboration events during the four-month period. with CWRU and the Weinstein, who emigrated from Eastern MFA program. Europe to open a violin shop in Palestine in The Violins themselves — eighteen 1938, learned after World War II that some from Weinstein’s collection and one Amnon Weinstein himself will be on hand four hundred of his family members had from Yad Vashem, the World Center for for conversations with Rabbi Roger Klein perished under the Nazis. Later, he heard a Documentation, Research, Education, and (September 25), Shlomo Mintz (September heartfelt account from a survivor who had Commemoration of the Holocaust — will 28), Eric Kisch (September 30), and James A. brought an instrument in for restoration be on display at the Maltz Museum from Grymes (October 4). Grymes is the author of what the violin and its music had meant Friday, October 2 through Sunday, January 3, of Violins of Hope: Violins of the Holocaust to Jews during those horrific days. In 1996 2016 in a special, multisensory installation — Instruments of Hope and Liberation in — and now recognized as one of the finest featuring circular pods and dramatic Mankind’s Darkest Hour, and will share violinmakers in the world — Weinstein lighting. But since violins need to be played, some of the poignant stories behind the decided to put out a call for Holocaust-era the instruments will sing out on a regular violins. violins. To date, he has restored nearly fifty basis in the hands of students from CIM and such instruments to playing condition, a Baldwin Wallace. collection he dubbed “Violins of Hope.” The instruments will also be played Those instruments have already been heard by Cleveland Orchestra members and in concerts in London, , , Tel Aviv, soloist Shlomo Mintz in the September Jerusalem, and Berlin. This month, eighteen 27 concert, which will include the of Weinstein’s violins and one from another Mendelssohn concerto, Schoenberg’s Kol collection will journey to Cleveland to go Nidre with narrator Thomas Hampson, and on display at the Maltz Museum and to be Beethoven’s Overture to The Creatures involved in an amazing series of concerts, of Prometheus, as well as his Leonore

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 14 Sept. 9, 2015

NE Ohio man helps lead effort to bring Violins of Hope to Cleveland: Faces of the Suns (photos, video) by LINDA KINSEY

GATES MILLS, Ohio -- Voices of Holocaust victims may have been silenced, but their stories will be told in Cleveland in a far- reaching series of concerts, educational programs and and exhibits, thanks in large part to Richard Bogomolny, of Gates Mills.

The philanthropist and retired business executive has made it his mission to bring the “Violins of Hope,” a collection of violins played before and during the Holocaust to Richard Bogomolny, of Gates Mills, played a major roll in bringing the historic Violins of Hope to Northeast Ohio this Cleveland – both as an exhibit and as a way month. It’s a far-reaching exhibit that he hopes will changes lives and get people thinking about the lessons of the of making a lasting emotional impact on the Holocaust. (LINDA KINSEY/NORTHEAST OHIO MEDIA GROUP) hearts and minds of those who hear and His idea resonated with those he spoke lived a purpose-driven life – from significant see the beautifully restored instruments. to, and plans quickly leaped from the contributions and accomplishments in drawing board to a real effort backed by the business world to nearly endless Amnon Weinstein, a second-generation some of Cleveland’s major institutions. philanthropic projects. As longtime violinmaker from Israel, has painstakingly He became chairman and founder of the chairman of the Cleveland Musical Arts restored and repaired more than 45 committee of partners, which includes Association, which operates The Cleveland Holocaust-era violins. The Cleveland exhibit the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, Maltz Orchestra, and will mark the second time Violins of Hope Museum of Jewish Heritage, Case Western Severance Hall, the Violins of Hope project has visited the U.S. Reserve University, Cleveland Institute of may count as one of his most noteworthy. Music, Facing History and Ourselves, and Bogomolny approached the Jewish ideastream, representing local PBS-TV and For Bogomolny, it is a passionate Community Federation of Cleveland about NPR-radio, as well as WCLV, the classical undertaking brought about by his conviction two years ago to see if there would be an music station. that the U.S. knew about the Holocaust interest. Bringing the violins here would be a yet did nothing and, in fact, was aided by hugely expensive and difficult project, but he In the course of about three weeks, corporate giant IBM. When he hears others was willing to take it on. “With your blessing, Bogomolny’s dream to bring the violins to say that the U.S. didn’t find out about the I’m going to give this a try,” Bogomolny told Cleveland looked like it would become a Nazi concentration camps until it was Stephen Huffman, president of the Jewish reality. The swiftness with which the project too late, he is unequivocal: “It’s just crap, Federation. gained momentum surprised even him. frankly.” What happened next was beyond Maybe it was because when Bogomolny Born in Cleveland and raised in Cleveland Bogomolny’s expectations. speaks, people listen. The 80-year-old has Heights, Bogomolny grew up in a musical

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 15 Sept. 9, 2015

household. “There was a lot of music in the and that’s where I stayed pretty much,” But for now, at least, his attention is house,” he says. “There were no computers Bogomolny says, reflecting on the direction focused on Violins of Hope. The program and not much television. We used to listen his life took. He thought seriously about featuring the violins – about 16 of them to classical music on the radio.” becoming a professional violinist but set -- kicks off Sept. 27, when the Cleveland that idea aside after attending the highly Orchestra and Chorus, under the direction His mother, Hilda Bogomolny Faigin, was acclaimed Interlochen Center for the Arts, of Franz Welser-Möst will perform on an accomplished violinist and studied at the international music camp in Michigan, the instruments. The concert will be the Institute of Musical Arts, later known and “saw what kids were doing there. I broadcast live on WVIZ/PBS and WCLV as Julliard. Bogolmony also studied violin knew I couldn’t play as well.” 104.9 ideastream and live streamed on for many years with Hyman Schandler, ideastream.org. And the Maltz Museum will principal of second violins of The Cleveland But he played well by most standards – so then open a specially curated exhibition of Orchestra, and continued to play until about well, in fact, that he was concert master of the violins, along with their stories. 10 years ago when serious back injuries and the Cleveland Heights High School Orchestra subsequent surgeries made it too painful. and later the Harvard University Orchestra. Bogolmolny hopes Violins of Hope will make “I always considered myself to be a good In the 1970s, he was principal violinist and a lasting impression on the community. amateur,” he says. “I was good enough to soloist for the Cleveland Philharmonic “A real lasting part of this has to be on appreciate what it took to get where the Orchestra. All continued to nurtured a deep the education side,” he says. So far, that great violinists were.” love and appreciation for classical music. seems likely as area schools, including the Cleveland schools and Cleveland Bogomolny’s early years seemed ideal. Although armed with a law license, Catholic Diocese schools, as well as a Following graduation from Cleveland Bogomolny seemed destined for a career group of independent private schools will Heights High School in 1953, he was in the food industry, a journey that would work lessons of the Holocaust into their accepted at Harvard University. Majoring take him to the top his field, both here and curriculum. in economics, he attended Harvard his abroad. freshman and sophomore years, until Unlike the typical history lessons on the his father died at 47. His brother, Robert Throughout his career, however, he has Holocaust, which can sound like “ancient Bogomolny, who would later graduate held a deep commitment to give back history” to students, he says, Violins of from Harvard, was still in high school. At to the community through a variety of Hope offers “the emotional hook” to make a that point, Richard Bogomolny returned to philanthropic endeavors. And his work lasting impact. Cleveland to support the family by operating hasn’t gone unnoticed. Among his many the family ice cream manufacturing awards is the Distinguished Service Award, But above all, he says, “when the violins business, The Eagle Ice Cream Company. given by the Musical Arts Association – the are played – no matter how Hitler tried to Cleveland Orchestra’s highest honor -- silence them -- you will hear the voices of Back home, he earned his bachelor’s degree and the President’s Humanitarian Award, those who played the violins before.” in English by attending night classes at presented by the United Cerebral Palsy Western Reserve University, now known Association. as Case Western Reserve University. He earned a law degree at Cleveland-Marshall He remains involved in a number of Law School and was admitted to the Ohio organizations for which he’s given time and bar in 1961. treasure, including the Cleveland Food Bank, where he was a founding member and He married and had three sons and now trustee and adviser to a successful capital lives in Gates Mills with his second wife campaign that resulted in construction of its of 28 years, Patricia Kozerefski. The two greatly enlarged facility. He is also a trustee adopted a baby girl from China 19 years ago and past chair of the Anti-defamation League, Northern Ohio Region, and a former “I never planned to go into the ice cream member of the Cleveland Task Force on business. But I ended up in business Violent Crime. The list goes on.

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 16 Sept. 17, 2015

‘Violins of Hope’ in Cleveland tell the story of the victory of humanity over the Holocaust’s depravity: editorial by EDITORIAL BOARD

The extraordinary “Violins of Hope” concerts and exhibitions about to open in Cleveland are about more than just the physical and emotional miracle of one man’s decision to collect and preserve instruments of the Out of the ashes of the Holocaust come “Violins of Hope,” from the Israel-based workshop of violin maker, Holocaust that during those terrible times collector and preserver Amnon Weinstein to Cleveland, for a series of extraordinary concerts, exhibitions and other had helped keep people -- and hope -- alive. commemorative events beginning this month. (Plain Dealer file, 2014) Roma, Slavs, Soviet POWs, the disabled, Weinstein’s collection is now nearly 50 They also are a celebration of the will to dissenters from Naziism. But the Holocaust instruments, about half of which, reports survive and of the overarching power of did not succeed in crushing the human soul, Plain Dealer classical music critic Zachary music to triumph. and music was part of the reason. Lewis, will be on display in Cleveland. This follows a Berlin Philharmonic concert using And underlying all, these violins -- to be When a visitor first brought Israeli violin the instruments earlier this year and a 2012 played a week from Sunday by Cleveland maker Amnon Weinstein a violin for repair, exhibition and performance of the violins in Orchestra musicians as part of a special, explaining that it had helped him survive the Charlotte, North Carolina. The violins have sold-out concert featuring violinist Shlomo Holocaust as he played for Nazi soldiers in also been exhibited and played in Jerusalem Mintz at the new Milton and Tamar Maltz the death camps, Weinstein -- as a “Violins and , but the Cleveland events Performing Arts Center at The Temple- of Hope” brochure puts it -- saw only stand out for their breadth, the several Tifereth Israel in Cleveland, and that go ashes. The ashes of Weinstein’s own 400 months during which commemorative on display Oct. 2 at the Maltz Museum family members who did not survive the events will be held, and the involvement of of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood -- are a Holocaust. so many in the community. reminder of the depraved reality of that time. Three decades later, in 1996, Weinstein was This Sunday, from 1 to 4 p.m., Amnon’s ready to take on the project -- one to which Workshop, a photographic documentary, It is a reality and a history that must never he would dedicate his life as he tracked opens in Beachwood at the Jewish be forgotten, when Jewish musicians down more and more of the violins Jewish Federation of Cleveland, 25701 Science Park survived the death camps playing their musicians played during the Holocaust to Drive. Next Thursday, in a live interview at music, playing as much for themselves, sustain hope and life, often in death camps 2:30 p.m., Mark Satola of WCLV 104.9-FM for the remembered civilization that those where musicians were accorded some interviews Weinstein. And on Friday, Sept. instruments represented amid the cruel privileges, including the privilege of life. 25, at 8 p.m. at Temple-Tifereth Israel, inhumanity around them. as for their 26000 Shaker Blvd., Beachwood, Weinstein tormentors. The violins then were the slender thread will talk with Rabbi Roger Klein about the connecting those prisoners with their violins and their history, and what “Violins of The Holocaust was an attempt to crush former lives. Today, through their music, Hope” mean in today’s world. the human soul. It extinguished six million we can hear again the voices of those long Jewish lives, and an estimated five million gone, the ones who didn’t survive. Although the Cleveland Orchestra’s 3 other souls -- Catholics, homosexuals, p.m. concert on Sept. 27 is sold out, it

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 17 Sept. 17, 2015

will be broadcast live on WVIZ/PBS, on society and low, sophisticates with country WCLV 104.9-FM, and live-streamed on girls, French Jews and German Jews, Polish ideastream.org. There also will be a free and Ukrainian Christians, mandolins and community viewing at the Parma-Snow accordions with violins -- yet they all found branch of the Cuyahoga County Library. within themselves the unity of music.

And that’s just the start of several That, in essence, is what “Violins of Hope” months of events, with one of the last will capture for the next few months. It is a commemorations a 3:30 p.m. concert Dec. 6 journey worth taking. by the Cleveland Women’s Orchestra at the Park Synagogue Main, 3300 Mayfield Road, in Cleveland Heights, in memory of the Women’s Orchestra of Auschwitz.

Sometimes called the Girl Orchestra of Auschwitz, and the subject of several books after the war and a (controversial) movie, the ensemble was molded and long led by violinist Alma Rosé, an Austrian Jew and niece of the composer Gustav Mahler, who tragically died at Auschwitz of suspected botulism in April 1944. Extraordinarily, at least one of the Auschwitz musicians still survives -- German-born cellist Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, whose son Raphael Wallfisch, born in Great Britain after the war, also is a cellist.

As brilliantly captured by the outspoken French cabaret singer and orchestrator Fania Fenelon in her controversial 1977 book, “Playing for Time,” the Auschwitz Women’s Orchestra was a mix of clashing egos, cultures and outlooks, mingling high

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 18 Sept. 19, 2015

Eighteen of the instruments are from imagery, recorded music and live Nineteen Violins - Weinstein’s own collection. The 19th is on performances on restored violins,” said loan from the Yad Vashem, the World Center museum Executive Director Ellen Rudolph. Holocaust instrument for Documentation, Research, Education and “Sharing the individual stories behind the exhibit begins Oct. 2 Commemoration of the Holocaust, in Israel. instruments illustrates the diversity of Jewish experiences during World War II, and The Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage at The exhibit also will include the personal the complex realities of the Holocaust. 2929 Richmond Road is about to debut stories behind the instruments. During “Violins of Hope Cleveland,” a multi-media the Holocaust, the Nazis organized Jewish “Sharing these stories through music is an exhibit that illustrates beauty and hope in musicians being held in concentration opportunity to connect with an important the midst of horror. camps into orchestras. For some, being able part of our past - one that can seem very to play an instrument saved their lives. distant to younger generations of visitors - The instruments, 19 in all, once belonged to in a very immediate, intimate and expressive Jewish musicians, some of whom perished “When my violins are on stage, 6 million way.” in Europe during the Nazi Holocaust people are standing behind them,” between 1939 and 1945. Weinstein said in a statement. The exhibit, which will run through Jan. 16, will include workshops, lectures, concerts Of the 11 million people systematically killed The exhibit, which opens Oct. 2, is being and a performance by the GroundWorks by the Nazis, 6 million were Jews, and 1 presented in collaboration with Case Dance Theater. million were children. Western Reserve University, Cleveland Institute of Music, the Cleveland Orchestra, The violins were restored by Ammon Facing History and Ourselves, WVIZ/ Weinstein, a second-generation violin- ideastream and the Jewish Federation of maker and descendant of Holocaust victims. Cleveland. Weinstein has been working on the project for 20 years. “This visually striking, multi-sensory exhibition includes video, mural-sized

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 19 Sept. 22, 2015

What’s now known as the “Violins of Hope” Holocaust Violins project began 50 years ago when a Tel Aviv customer asked Weinstein if he could Arrive for Local Exhibit repair a battered instrument. It turned out that the man had been a concentration A collection of stringed instruments camp prisoner who played in a death camp originally owned by Holocaust prisoners orchestra. Weinstein realized that he was has arrived in Northeast Ohio for a series of holding a history lesson in his hands. He exhibitions and concerts. put out a call for more instruments. Tuesday morning, Israeli violinmaker Amnon “I had a radio program, and I asked for Weinstein handed a restored instrument violins with a story from the Holocaust,” to Cleveland Institute of Music president Amnon Weinstein, CIM President Joel Smirnoff and Weinstein recalls. “And one-by-one, it was Joel Smirnoff, who gently twisted the Milton Maltz like a snowball at the beginning --- one, tuning pegs to tighten the strings. It’s one two, three, four. And, it’s not stopping, it’s addition, the instruments themselves will be of 19 violins with histories connected to coming all the time.” played in a series of concerts, starting with the Holocaust that Weinstein delivered the Cleveland Orchestra, this weekend. for display at the Maltz Museum of Jewish The violins will be part of several educational Heritage. programs, during their local stay. In

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 20 Sept. 24, 2015

First Look: Completed renovation makes Temple-Tifereth Israel ready for Sunday debut as Maltz arts center

By STEVEN LITT

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Time travel may be physically impossible, but a visit to the newly renovated Temple-Tifereth Israel at the edge of gives you an inkling of what it would be like to turn back the clock.

A thorough, tender and respectful renovation of the historic house of worship, built in 1922-24, creates the odd sensation of seeing something old made strikingly The former Temple Tifereth Israel is renovated and renamed the Maltz Performing Arts Center September 22, 2015. (Gus Chan / The Plain Dealer) new again, as if the decades of wear, tear and soot had somehow never happened. auditorium -- named for Abba Hillel Silver such as the new Innova apartments. You can’t literally go back to the Roaring (1893-1963), the Zionist rabbi who led the The Temple project, designed by MGA Twenties, but you can go to the Temple, congregation from 1917 until his death Partners Architects of Philadelphia with a National Register of Historic Places at age 70, and his son, Daniel Silver, who Westlake Reed Leskosky of Cleveland, is also landmark at 1855 Ansel Road, next to East served as senior rabbi from 1963- 1989. an outstanding example of collaboration. 105th Street and west of . As such, the Temple has played an On Sunday at 3 p.m., the Temple will important role in American and Jewish The Temple’s congregation essentially have its debut as Case Western Reserve history, a role that will be underscored by donated the landmark facility, which it University’s Milton and Tamar Maltz the “Violins of Hope” performance. could no longer afford to maintain, to Performing Arts Center, with a sold-out the university, which plans to house its performance “Violins of Hope,” an event Layers of meaning departments of music, dance and theater related to an upcoming exhibition at the there. Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. But the adaptive reuse of the Temple also encapsulates the ways in which the striking For 99 years, however, the Temple, now Big event rebirth that has graced some parts of based in Beachwood, will retain access to Cleveland in recent decades has been based the University Circle facility for eight days In Sunday’s concert, which will be on the preservation of historic buildings. a year on major holidays and for additional simulcast live on WVIZ Channel 25 and It’s the latest example of a trend that events as arranged with CWRU. WCLV FM/104.9, and live-streamed on started with the revival of Playhouse ideastream.org and to remote viewing Square’s theaters in the 1970s and has It’s a win-win for all concerned, and sites, members of the Cleveland Orchestra since spread across the city, sparking especially for the public, which through with soloist Shlomo Mintz will perform neighborhood revitalization. CWRU programs and events will gain access on historic violins once played by Jews to a spectacular performing arts venue that imprisoned during the Nazi Holocaust. The Temple project, for its part, could hasten is both new and old. The event is likely to resonate on many the redevelopment at the southeastern levels. corner of Hough, a predominantly African- A new sound American neighborhood famously riven by Not the least of these is that the Temple, a riots in 1966 and now poised to capture Sunday’s concert will provide the first real masterpiece designed by Boston architect energy spilling over from University Circle test of the facility’s acoustics, shaped in the Charles Greco, features a sanctuary – now and the nearby , in projects renovation by acoustician Paul Scarbrough,

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 21 Sept. 24, 2015

who consulted on the design of Mixon Hall At the Temple, Greco blended a hint of and their foundation have since more than at the Cleveland Institute of Music. the Hagia Sophia’s mountainous profile doubled their pledge to $30 million. with massive, elegantly detailed facades The university anticipates it will start His touches are evident primarily in the of Indiana Limestone designed with programming the Maltz-Temple facility with 66,000-pound glass and steel acoustical Romanesque Revival styling inflected by 20 to 30 events a year. canopy and lighting framework, suspended geometries that seem to anticipate Art high over the hall’s new expandable stage. Deco. That activity, plus the eventual presence During a tour earlier this week, the canopy, of hundreds of students, will dramatically which has been raised to its final position on The right-angled setbacks and stair-step expand CWRU’s footprint to the west side of cables suspended from steel beams above motifs on upper portions of the Temple’s Rockefeller Park and breathe fresh life into the Temple’s inner dome, resembled a giant, facades echo, ever so slightly, the step-back an architectural masterpiece that now looks diaphanous bat wing, with panels of glass styling of Manhattan skyscrapers at the completely ready to cruise into its second held in place by a structure of steel tubes time, along with the contemporary stacked- century. and joints. tower furniture of Paul Theodore Frankl. The effect is solemn but graceful, weighty The canopy, potentially the most intrusive but elegant. part of CWRU’s renovation, turns out to be elegantly designed and visually subtle. A thorough cleaning has revealed the soft, golden-beige glow of the Temple’s facades, The same is true of wood-faced adjustable which look uncannily fresh. The cleaning panels, resembling doors, installed on either has also highlighted the rich but restrained side of the auditorium. ornamentation throughout the building, inside and out. The Temple’s richly carved wooden ark and choir loft, inscribed in Hebrew with the These details include the opulent six- Ten Commandments and the Sh’mah, the pointed star motif that Greco deployed linchpin prayer of Jewish worship, are fully like a three-dimensional fugue across the visible and communicate the building’s roots ceiling of the Temple’s main lobby, and the and ongoing alternate life as a sometime richly carved roundels fronting the building’s house of worship. mezzanine balconies, featuring symbols of the 12 tribes of Israel. Elsewhere throughout the building, the Temple feels much the same as it did prior A new cultural venue to CWRU’s renovation, but somehow better. The reconfigured Silver Hall can The same, but better accommodate 1,200 at full capacity, or roughly 950 to 1,000 when the building’s The facility’s once notoriously uncomfortable movable stage is fully deployed. pews have been replaced with newer and more generously proportioned seats. The The work completed so far constitutes number of bathrooms has been increased. Phase I of the Maltz-Temple project. CWRU, And worn tile floors in reception areas have which has raised $59.3 million for the effort, been replaced with durable and handsome plans to raise an additional $15 million to terrazzo. pay for a second phase including an addition to the Temple’s classroom wing, a new The overall effect is to draw fresh attention black-box theater, and rehearsal spaces. to Greco’s remarkable conception of the Classes in music, theater and dance would Temple as something of an early 20th- then commence at the facility. century salute to the Hagia Sophia in , the sixth-century masterpiece Major donors so far have included the Maltz of Byzantine church architecture whose Family Foundation of the Jewish Federation stately dome surmounts a series of smaller of Cleveland, which provided the original domes and buttresses. lead gift of $12 million in 2010. The Maltzes

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 22 Sept. 25, 2015

Cleveland Orchestra, community prepare for special ‘Violins of Hope’ kickoff concert (preview) by ZACHARY LEWIS

CLEVELAND, Ohio – They’ll accept applause, no doubt. But Sunday’s performance by the Cleveland Orchestra will not be about the musicians.

Neither will the music be the focus. Not really. While the material the orchestra will play will be of great significance, the concert launching “Violins of Hope” in Northeast Ohio will have no academic dimension.

Violin-maker Amnon Weinstein shows one of the ‘Violins of Hope’ instruments to project benefactor Milton Maltz. No, playing instruments rescued from the Holocaust, in a new hall fashioned from a partners and the “Violins of Hope” exhibition Of all the projects with which Vernon has working synagogue, the participants will opening Oct. 2 at the Maltz Museum of been associated in his long career, the shed whatever egos they typically have Jewish Heritage in making a powerful only one that compares, he said, is a 1995 and place themselves at the service of statement about the durability of music and performance in Geneva, Switzerland, by the humanity. the ever-present obligation to quell hatred. World Orchestra for Peace.

“In this case, it’s not about us,” said “The music performed on these Sunday’s concert, too, marks a special effort. Cleveland Orchestra music director Franz instruments provided comfort and hope Every Cleveland Orchestra performance Welser-Most, leader of the performance. in an environment of death, despair and entails practice, study and rehearsal. “It’s entirely about people who were hopelessness, and created purpose and This event, though, is literally years in massacred. Music, for them, was something meaning,” wrote principal violist Robert the making, the fruit of a long mission by they could hold onto.” Vernon, one of those who’ll play Sunday. Musical Arts Association Chairman Richard Bogomolny and philanthropist Milton Maltz Now it’s time for the orchestra, and “These instruments are a stirring testament to share the work of Israeli craftsman through it the community, to hold on to to the strength and courage of the human Amnon Weinstein with Cleveland. the massacred. In picking up and playing spirit as well as the victory of good over evil.” 26 instruments pulled from the fires of an “Every institution has spent more than it attempted genocide, the orchestra will, for Here in Northeast Ohio, the instruments expected, and nobody is complaining,” said a few moments, resurrect their original also will underscore the richness and Bogomolny. “This is when the greatness owners. collaborative spirit of the region’s cultural of all the individual institutions begins to sector. Name almost any cultural shine. Each one is going to its own thing, At the same time, they’ll join the organization here, and chances are, it’s what it does best.” instruments themselves, numerous area involved somehow in “Violins of Hope.”

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Thanks to Bogomolny, Maltz and countless And no wonder. Out of an historic structure take in unforgettable sights and sounds, others, 24 violins plus a viola and cello – built in 1923, crews have fabricated a all present will take part in celebrating the each one carrying a story almost beyond lavish concert space – named Silver Hall indomitability of art. imagination – at last made the journey in honor of Rabbis Abba Hillel and Daniel this week from Tel Aviv to Cleveland, under Silver – complete with an acoustic canopy, “We want it to be a positive, optimistic careful watch and in climate-controlled adjustable paneling and hydraulic stage experience, like the message of the shipping containers. extensions, all while preserving and instruments,” said Welser-Most, noting the revitalizing the original Temple. start of a new Severance Hall season in Many had been snatched long ago from tandem with “Violins of Hope.” concentration camps, where they served “Mamma mia,” gasped Weinstein upon officially not to sustain prisoners but to entering Silver Hall. “It takes top people “I don’t think it hurts that we remind entertain guards. One lost its varnish from to do something like this. This has to be a ourselves that there are other things in life, prolonged exposure to the elements. Still super acoustic here.” or that without music, the dark sides in life another bore the mark of pure hatred: a would be even more difficult to overcome.” swastika scrawled for no non-vicious reason Whether he’s right will soon be known. For on an interior panel. Silver Hall will be tested Sunday by more than the Cleveland Orchestra alone. It also Those present to witness their unveiling will host the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus, here Tuesday could hardly believe their eyes, violinist Shlomo Mintz and baritone Thomas or convey what they were feeling. Hampson.

“This is something for which I have no The program, too, will serve as an acoustic words,” said a visibly moved Weinstein, mere trial. Between the Mendelssohn Violin hours after arriving in Cleveland himself. Concerto, Beethoven’s third “Leonore” and “The Creatures of Prometheus” The instruments weren’t the only cause overtures, and Schoenberg’s “Kol Nidre,” of his amazement. No, to Weinstein and a rarely presented work including chorus many others, the sight of the new Maltz and narrator, the artists will expose all Performing Arts Center – embedded within properties of the space. Temple-Tifereth Israel on the campus of Case Western Reserve University – was But that’s not what will matter most. almost equally stirring. Even as the musicians sing and play with unpredictable emotions and as listeners

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 24 Sept. 27, 2015

Cleveland Orchestra’s ‘Violins of Hope’ concert proves musical, humanitarian triumph (review) by ZACHARY LEWIS

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Public Square celebrations. Major international festivals. Local residencies. The Cleveland Orchestra is no stranger to grand welcoming gestures.

The concert it gave Sunday, however, was an event of singular significance. The kickoff to “Violins of Hope” and the first public gathering at the new Maltz Performing Arts Center in The Temple-Tifereth Israel, the presentation was meaningful not just to Cleveland or even the nation, but to the world.

Playing instruments recovered and restored from the Holocaust, the orchestra and director Franz Welser-Most reawakened the spirits of that tragedy’s millions of victims in the most eloquent fashion possible, through music. Beyond that, they demonstrated irrefutably that art always trumps hatred and violence. “Each concert is a victory,” said Amnon Weinstein, the Israeli craftsman at the heart Cleveland Orchestra music director Franz Welser-Most concluded Sunday’s “Violins of Hope” concert by making sure that credit was given where credit was due: to Israeli violin-maker Amnon Weinstein. (Photos by Roger Mastroianni) of “Violins of Hope,” in a pre-recorded video. “The concert you are doing in Cleveland is a victory.” Chorus in luminous shape, the ensemble had accepted Mintz’s departure after the under Welser-Most gave a reading marked Mendelssohn, the violinist returned to Indeed it was. It was also effective as a equally by great gravitas and otherworldly widespread delight and joined the orchestra performance. While not the group’s most radiance. Each note bore traces of passion in a gritty, molten rhapsody. polished-sounding effort – a result of the and mystery. refurbished instruments in the hands of 26 Conceived as an homage to Jewish singing, members – the concert served the occasion But the most moving use of a “Hope” violin “Nigun” in Mintz’s hands, on a Holocaust perfectly and reflected well on both artists Sunday came courtesy of star violinist violin, in fact paid tribute to an entire people, and venue. Shlomo Mintz, a co-founder of the project. to generations past and present. Hope With Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto, on couldn’t have come in a form any purer. Triumphant works by Beethoven, his an instrument rescued from unspeakable overtures to “The Creatures of Prometheus” tragedy, he produced 30 minutes of musical and “Leonore” (No. 3), bookended the joy, a half-hour of melting beauty, heartfelt program, welcoming and sending off lyricism, and playful virtuosity. listeners with displays of technical brilliance and Cleveland’s famous cohesion. Of That the instrument wasn’t up to every task special note in the Maltz Center were those was only fitting. Like the “Violins of Hope” passages in “Leonore” of sublime softness. themselves and all who transcended the More somber but no less stirring was Holocaust, Mintz overcame obstacles. Schoenberg’s “Kol Nidre,” a setting of the Jewish text with chorus and narrator. Joined He also offered an encore: the “Nigun” Sunday by no less a baritone than Thomas from Bloch’s “Baal Shem: Three Pictures Hampson, and with the Cleveland Orchestra of Hasidic Life.” Just when the audience

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The Orchestra and chorus were joined Cleveland Orchestra by baritone Thomas Hampson and violin virtuoso Shlomo Mintz, performing in the Concert Features enormous sanctuary of the century-old Holocaust Violins Temple-Tifereth Israel, recently renovated in partnership with Case Western. In addition by DAVID C. BARNETT to Beethoven, the program featured the works of two Jewish composers --- Felix A musical meditation on the Holocaust, Mendelssohn and Arnold Schoenberg --- performed by the Cleveland Orchestra, both of whom were reviled by the Nazis as inaugurated Case Western Reserve “degenerate” artists. University’s new Maltz Performing Arts Holocaust survivor Roman Frayman says the concert Center, Sunday afternoon. This music had a special meaning to Roman was awe-inspiring. Frayman. As a child living in a Jewish ghetto The concert took place in a Northeast Ohio in Poland, Frayman had many relatives --- most of them perished at Auschwitz. The Sunday event was part of a three- landmark and featured instruments rescued month series of concerts and exhibitions from World War Two concentration camps. “I would have had 85 first cousins,” he called “Violins of Hope”, featuring recalls. “And I’m the only one that’s left.” rehabilitated stringed instruments that When Cleveland Orchestra Music Director have toured the world as testament to Franz Welser-Most was planning Sunday’s human survival in the darkest of times. concert, he knew right away a composer he As such, the concert was very moving to wanted to include. the 77-year-old Clevelander. Frayman says he’s happy to see how good his refurbished “I said we have to play Beethoven, because temple looks, and he found the performance the freedom of the human spirit is more to be overwhelming. present in Beethoven’s music, I think, than in any other.” “I think it’s so amazing that the violins are now playing music for those who perished. I just sat there in awe.”

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ups of process, of affection, of humanity. Weinstein, a journalist, is the daughter of Tri-C professor puts They bring you not only into Weinstein’s Asael Bielski, one of the anti-Nazi Bielski neighborhood, but also into his head. partisans immortalized in the movie, focus on Violins of “Defiance.”) Hope through photos The photographs, the majority of them 22 inches by 17 inches, seem to pop out from “Thank you my friends for letting me invade by CARLO WOLFF the walls of Roe Green. Mostly hung, high- your lives, if only for a brief time,” Levin says tech, in grids secured to galvanized metal in the brochure. When documentary photographer Daniel frames by rare earth magnets, they impress Levin’s “home invasion” of Weinstein in Levin visited violinmaker Amnon Weinstein in mass and warmth. You can almost hear Tel Aviv has resulted in a loving, resonant in May, his goal was to bring Weinstein’s the instruments. exhibit. workshop home to Cleveland through photographs that show the 68-year-old Tel “I was interested in the man and his Aviv man restoring Violins of Hope. identity,” Levin said in a Sept. 18 interview Levin, an associate professor of at the gallery. “I assumed his identity would photography at Cuyahoga Community come through the objects in his workshop, College, visited Weinstein and his wife, Assi, in his place.” Actually, two workshops: A for 3 1/2 days, documenting Weinstein basement one where Weinstein does most as he unpacked violins, treating them of his work and a second-floor workshop in to a loving, detailed process designed to an adjacent building that is more of an office bring back the quality they had during the and waiting room. Holocaust. What also impressed Levin about Weinstein Levin’s project is but one part of Violins of was his historicity. Not only is Weinstein Hope, a multifaceted, multi-institutional dedicated to ensuring that the lessons of project designed to unfold through next these Holocaust violins are never forgotten, spring and beyond. he’s the son of Moishe Weinstein, a violinmaker, and the father of Avshalom Among the imminent, initial highlights of Weinstein, also a violinmaker. this homage to instruments that survived the Holocaust even when the people played “I think of him as a forensic luthier,” Levin them didn’t: an invitation-only concert Sept. said, “almost like a forensic pathologist.” 27, featuring Israeli violin virtuoso Shlomo Weinstein, who apparently can tell the kind Mintz on a Violin of Hope, inaugurating of music that was played on the instrument, is a kind of violin “whisperer,” Levin Daniel Levin, bracketed by two of his “Amnon’s the Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Workshop” photos. Arts Center on the Case Western Reserve suggested. The master violinmaker seems University campus in Cleveland, and the Oct. to tune into a violin’s spirit. 2 opening of “Violins of Hope,” a multimedia WHAT: “Amnon’s Workshop,” photographs exhibit featuring some 50 such violins, at The day he arrived at Weinstein’s workshop, by Daniel Levin the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Weinstein got a package from Germany WHEN: Through Nov. 8 Beachwood. containing a Star of David violin. He opened WHERE: Roe Green Gallery, Jewish the box, tossed out the wrapping paper, Federation of Cleveland, 25701 Science Park The 74 photographs Levin culled from some and discovered that the top of the case Drive, Beachwood 1,700 images he captured track Weinstein had been cut off, presumably to lower INFO: By appointment except at open in Tel Aviv as he meets his wife for lunch, shipping costs. When he rubbed down houses Oct. 11 and Nov. 8. Call 216-593- scours Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff flea market for the fingerboard with linseed oil, Weinstein 2900 or visit Jcfcleve.org memorabilia related to stringed instruments told Levin “the owner had played a lot of associated with the Holocaust, and handles klezmer.” the mainly workaday fiddles he’s dedicated to reviving. In the brochure on “Amnon’s Workshop,” Levin says his show is dedicated to relatives Curated by Levin and Israel Wiener, the of his who were killed in the Holocaust. Jewish Federation of Cleveland’s arts and He applauds his parents, Violins of Hope culture consultant, “Amnon’s Workshop” champion Wiener – and Weinstein and his is a highly tactile exhibit. These are close- wife, the former Assi Bielski, “for allowing me into their two-room universe.” (Assi

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 27 Sept. 25, 2015

See fully-restored Holocaust-era violins on display and in concert only in Cleveland. by ANNIE ZALESKI

Thanks to its world-class museums and arts institutions, Cleveland has hosted many groundbreaking artistic exhibitions and events. But the forthcoming Violins Of Hope Cleveland-whose first major public event, a sold-out concert at Case Western Reserve University’s restored Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at the Temple-Tifereth Israel, is September 27-might be one of the most ambitious cultural projects ever to occur in Northeast Ohio. remained silent even after World War II lifetime. That’s the power of this project-the ended, some because their owners perished power of listening to something that’s on Seven arts, music and educational in the Holocaust and others because those one hand horrible, but on the other hand, it’s organizations are spearheading a series who survived the camps couldn’t bear to wonderful. It’s music.” of concerts, lectures, educational events, play them. musical broadcasts and art installations For the Maltz Museum, translating centered on Violins of Hope, a collection of Nineteen Holocaust-era violins from Violins this powerful sentiment into an exhibit Holocaust-era violins painstakingly brought of Hope will be on display starting October 2 necessitated creating an “immersive back to performance shape by Tel Aviv- at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage, as experience” that would “tell the stories of based violin maker Amnon Weinstein. part of a new exhibit that’s also titled Violins the people who owned these violins in a of Hope. Each instrument in this exhibition, way that would be exciting, interesting and These particular instruments belonged to which runs through January 3, 2016, has a poignant,” says executive director Ellen Jewish musicians, who were an integral compelling backstory. Rudolph. As a result, the 4,000-square- part of Germany’s pre-World War II cultural foot, multi-sensory exhibition space itself landscape, performing everything from All but one of the instruments on display at is distinctive from the museum’s previous classical compositions to traditional klezmer the Maltz Museum are from the collection installations, especially from a design music. Once the war broke out, some of Amnon Weinstein, who has made it his standpoint. musicians hid the instruments or were mission to repair these instruments in forced to set them aside. Others were able order to underscore the resilience of Jewish The Violins of Hope exhibit will also feature to seek solace in the instruments, drawing culture and ensure those who perished in videos, as well as text written by James on the power of music to momentarily the Holocaust are never forgotten. Grymes, the author of the book Violins Of escape from the horrors of concentration Hope, to create emotional resonance and camps and genocidal violence. (In fact, some “If we are listening to the violin today, we impact. violinists played in the camps as part of are listening to the same sound the poor SS-formed orchestras, which often ended people who went to their deaths were Perhaps more important, the violins won’t up saving their lives.) Many of these violins listening to then,” he says. “This was the just be displayed while in Cleveland. In last human sound that they heard in their the Maltz Museum gallery, musicians

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 28 Sept. 25, 2015

from the Cleveland Institute of Music and to his friend Milton Maltz, who immediately partner organizations is just astounding-to Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music will said he wanted to do a major exhibit at his have them come together in this way is very occasionally perform pieces of music using namesake museum. exciting.” the instruments. (Members of the Cleveland Orchestra will also be performing with these The scope of the project quickly expanded These events are frequently cross-cultural. violins during separate concerts.) well beyond just an exhibit. As Bogomolny For example, the Maltz Museum is approached other organizations about premiering an original Violins of Hope piece That these violins are being used is of vital possibly bringing the violins to Cleveland, it commissioned from the Groundworks importance to Weinstein. When he receives he discovered not only great excitement Dance Theater, as well as presenting an instrument to restore, his “main goal is about the project, but an incredible spirit of a concert by the Miami, -based to put them in a condition that you can play cooperation. Holocaust Survivor Band, which is traveling a concert in a concert hall,” he says. Perhaps to Cleveland especially for the show. unsurprisingly, these performances are “Each of these institutions was committed often as moving for the musicians as they to doing what they do very well, and trying And during the first week of December, are for audience members. to make something happen using the the Cleveland Orchestra is holding a series theme of the violins,” he says. “Which has of educational concerts for middle and “Each musician who is playing on one of been the theme from day one, basically: high school students, which will combine these instruments-number one, he wants We’re all in this together.” classical music and dramatic elements with to know everything about the violin,” readings, poetry and tableaus-in short, Weinstein says. “All the stories. Number As a result, Violins Of Hope Cleveland exploring “several ways to bring to life the two, he’s not playing 100%-he’s playing to evolved into an unprecedented collaboration messages of the music, and the messages 500% of his abilities. And number three, as between Case Western Reserve University, of resilience and resistance and hope that they’re giving back the instrument, you can Cleveland Institute of Music, The Cleveland are the enduring themes of this project,” always see wet eyes. It’s difficult for them Orchestra, Facing History and Ourselves, says Joan Katz, the Cleveland Orchestra’s to give it back.” ideastream, the Jewish Federation of director of education and community Cleveland and the Maltz Museum. These programs. The Violins of Hope Cleveland program core partner institutions-and more than was organized by Richard Bogomolny, the a dozen affiliate organizations across Above all, Violins of Hope Cleveland speaks chairman of the Cleveland Orchestra’s Northeast Ohio-are hosting a robust to music’s immense and seemingly endless board of directors. He first learned about number of events as part of the project. capacity to inspire and transform the the opportunity to bring the violins to the human condition. “[Music is] a completely city via Israel Weiner, an arts consultant “It’s such a special opportunity to be a part international language,” Weinstein says. for the Jewish Federation of Cleveland. of this incredible collaboration,” Rudolph “Music is life.” Intrigued, Bogomolny decided to reach out says. “The collective resources of all of these

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 29 Sept. 28, 2015

Fresh from a thorough renovation, the 1924 Violins of Hope fill the Byzantine-Romanesque landmark opened its original, 11-by-4-foot white oak doors air (thoroughly cleaned, of course) to 1,200 people who filled Silver Hall, the concert by CARLO WOLFF space at its center, for a performance by the orchestra under Franz Welser-Moest. The debut of the Milton and Tamar Maltz Silver Hall memorializes Rabbi Abba Hillel Performing Arts Center on the campus of Silver and his son, Rabbi Daniel Silver. The Case Western Reserve University went off father was a pioneer Zionist and famous without a hitch Sept. 27, its centerpiece a orator who was senior rabbi there from stirring concert by the Cleveland Orchestra. 1917 to 1963, when his son succeeded him. The months-long Violins of Hope Orchestra members warm up on violins that survived Rabbi Daniel Silver was The Temple’s senior programming is the fruit of an the Holocaust. rabbi until he died in 1989. His widow, Adele, unprecedented collaboration between attended the opening. Mintz and Welster-Moest presented as an Cleveland cultural institutions including encore (a well-rehearsed one). Case; the Cleveland Orchestra; ideastream, “What a great redo,” said Jules Belkin, which broadcast the inaugural concert who was there with his wife, Fran. “It’s a “I have to come back to reality,” Weinstein from the spanking new Silver Hall live renovation of an icon that’s going to be said at the reception that capped the over WVIZ/PBS and WCLV/104.9 FM; the an even bigger icon.” Belkin is a legendary celebration. “This was really unbelievable.” Cleveland Institute of Music; and the Jewish concert promoter who lives in Mayfield “Everything’s been fabulous, and this is just Federation of Cleveland. Heights. the beginning,” said Richard Bogomolny, chairman of the board of the Cleveland Named to honor chief benefactors Milton The event also marked the launch of Orchestra. and Tamar Maltz, the Maltz Performing Violins of Hope, an ambitious educational Arts Center is a profound reimagining of program celebrating violins that in one way The next event in the unfolding saga of The Temple-Tifereth Israel on Ansel Road or another survived the Holocaust. Amnon Violins of Hope is the Oct. 2 launch of on the western edge of the Case campus in Weinstein, the Tel Aviv violin maker who “Violins of Hope,” a multimedia exhibition Cleveland. inaugurated the resonant project, was on at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in hand, embracing Welser-Moest after the Beachwood. The Temple was his and his wife’s temple, flamboyant Austrian finished leading the Maltz said at the post-event reception. “It orchestra in “Leonore Overture No. 3,” one could have gone down a rathole,” he added, of two Beethoven works Welser-Moest speaking to his motivation to rescue the presented with a joyous enthusiasm. striking building. Shlomo Mintz, the Israeli virtuoso, performed ’s jaunty, Through family and foundations, the romantic “Violin Concerto in E” on a Violin Maltzes have contributed $30 million to the of Hope that was played in the Israeli project, for which $59.3 million has been Philharmonic upon its founding in 1936. He raised. also soared on Ernest Bloch’s “Nigun,” a part of the suite, “Baal Shem.” Bloch was the first The debut was the unveiling of the first musical director of the Cleveland Institute phase. The cost of phase two, which would of Music. include a black-box theater, performance theater and performance spaces, has not Weinstein revived that instrument, which been determined, and construction on that sounded a bit thin on the Mendelssohn, full- won’t begin until the necessary money has bodied and ravishing on the Bloch, which been raised.

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 30 Sept. 30, 2015

As far as “Violins of Hope,” this original music; however, at times the exhibit will Exhibition serves exhibit highlights 19 violins on display feature students from the Cleveland – 18 from Weinstein’s collection and Institute of Music and the Baldwin Wallace as reminder of the one making its American debut on loan Conservatory of Music playing the violins. Holocaust from Yad Vashem (the World Center for Documentation, Research, Education and “I hope visitors seeing the exhibition will be by JOHN BENSON Commemoration of the Holocaust). Each reminded of the power of music,” Rudolph violin comes with a story, which ranges said. “Many people were able to use their There’s no denying the power of music. from being played to entertain SS officers instruments to survive. Their ability to play in a concentration camp to an instrument got them through either literally, because During the Holocaust, Jewish musicians employed in a plot to blow up a Nazi soldiers they were selected to play in an orchestra, lucky enough to escape execution often club. or because playing music sustained them in found solace and dignity through their some ways and made them feel human. violins. Today, those same violins act as a “One of the challenges was trying to reminder of the horrors that came to light display violins in a way that was interesting “The hope is people can get a better seven decades ago with the end of WW II. because violins are, for the most part, all the understanding of the Holocaust and same,” Rudolph said. “So what we came up connect to the people who played those Specifically, the Maltz Museum of Jewish with was a very emotional dramatic space in instruments.” Heritage is spearheading a community- which to display these violins.” wide collaboration – including Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland Institute Designed with dramatic lighting and circular of Music, the Cleveland Orchestra, Facing pods constructed with string to evoke History and Ourselves, ideastream and the the violin, the exhibition is a multisensory Jewish Federation of Cleveland – with the experience that actively engages the visitor “Violins of Hope” exhibition, which is on through narratives, imagery and video. display Friday through Jan. 3 at the Maltz Further, the immersive space allows visitors Museum of Jewish Heritage. to reflect on the transcendent nature of music. “The violins are from the collection of Israeli violin maker Amnon Weinstein, “Something we thought very carefully who gathered violins that made their way about was illustrating the diversity of through the Holocaust in various ways,” said experiences of people during the Holocaust,” Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage Executive Rudolph said. “There were some people Director Ellen Rudolph. “He restored them who got out of Germany and were able to so they could be played on a concert stage.” immigrate. Others wound up in ghettos and concentration camps. We wanted to chart For more than 20 years, the second- the arc of the Holocaust from the rise of generation master violin maker, who lost anti-Semitism through the end of WW II.” hundreds of relatives in the Holocaust, has been restoring violins that have been played Naturally, “Violins of Hope” boasts a musical in concert halls around the world. element. Visitors will hear a soundtrack of period-appropriate classical and Klezmer

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 31 Oct. 1, 2015

millions, including six million Jews. In Middle Our friend John, who was in our wedding, Violins of Hope School, I read The Diary of Anne Frank, but designed the lighting systems in Hall -- a there were few Jewish girls in my school; I gorgeous lighting grid that floats over the by ANN V. KLOTZ had little context for what felt like a faraway bima, but we had no idea he had been in tragedy that did not affect me. Cleveland in recent months to do so. He Though I’ve been home for several hours, I feels like one more ghost in an afternoon still hear violins -- Violins of Hope -- echoing Two years ago, I took an online course in which ghosts swirl in the music, touch through Silver Hall at The Temple-Tifereth offered by Facing History and Ourselves down, wail and console. The Israeli violin- Israel, built in Cleveland in 1924. (FHAO): The Holocaust and Human maker Amnon Weinstein has been restoring I am too full of feelings. I, Christian woman Behavior. I thought by that point that I violins that belonged to victims of the in a Jewish family, teacher, mother, daughter knew quite a bit about the Holocaust. I Holocaust for several decades. In the am struggling to make sense, once again, knew so little. Now, Laurel, the school I lead video that precedes the concert, Weinstein of man’s inhumanity to man, the story is a FHAO School as we work to weave the explains that the job of the violin is to be that has caught me since I was a young FHAO vocabulary of upstander and victim played, to speak. These violins speak for woman in college and my beloved professor and bystander and perpetrator through our those who were lost. Each concert is a Dorothee Metlitski first introduced that whole school, for this, it seems to me, is the victory. phrase to me, “Man’s inhumanity to man.” language of humanity, over and over again. Iago, of course, so consumed with jealousy Because the TV and radio crews are live for Othello; Regan and Goneril so hateful Then, ten days ago, survivor Joe Klein came streaming the concert, people are punctual. to their father, the dependent, doddering to speak to our Upper School girls about There is a buzz of excitement. Cleveland’s Lear; Macbeth so drunk on power and fear his experience of the Holocaust, his time Jewish community is out in force, dressed that he orders the slaying of Lady Macduff at Auschwitz and Birkenau. Mr. Klein is a nicely in these early days of the new year. and all her little “pretty ones.” I took several superb speaker, wise and optimistic and Tucked into a balcony pew through the classes with Dr. Metlitski, mesmerized by hugely inspirational. I trembled in the largesse of my friend Dan, I watch the her brilliance and clarity, coming to love her. audience, bearing witness to the atrocities crowd flow to their seats. I’m reminded of his boyhood. Later that afternoon, one of a Russian novel in which people crane of the Ninth Graders in my English class their necks to see who’s there, who is with murmured, “I’ve had an experience listening whom. to Mr. Klein that my own children and grandchildren will never have because Looking up at the slender stained glass there won’t be anyone left.” And, suddenly arches, which alternate with modified I am thinking of beautiful Betty Gold, who arches full of theatrical lighting, I wonder shared her story with a class of mine only about those who worshipped here in the weeks before she died and of my beloved late 30s and during the war. Were their college professor, gone now, too. I imagine prayers filled with dread and foreboding? my mother-in-law, as a little girl, with Today, I sense only joy, not anguish, but her mother and sister on the gangplank once again, I marvel at how recent the of the ship they were so lucky to board Holocaust was. to flee Berlin in 1939. Awash in personal connections, this shiksa teacher is struck Both my daughters are bat mitzvahs. I It was not until my last semester with her by how recent the Holocaust actually was am not Jewish, but the Holocaust gained that her sleeve slipped back and I saw the -- am I experiencing a telescoping of time? immediacy for me when I fell in love with number. It had never crossed my mind that Some inversion that events in the recent and married a Jewish man. On our way to she was teaching not literature but life. past feel closer as we age? the concert, a friend and I pick up her friend, When I was a child, my Protestant family who told us of a photograph she looked rarely spoke of the Holocaust and it seemed And sitting in luminous Silver Hall, re- at recently. In it, her mother and aunt are to have happened a long time ago. What consecrated today in the new Maltz dressed in matching outfits; both girls are I knew of the war I knew because I’d lost Performing Arts Center in the Temple- holding violins. Her mother was one of very an uncle at Anzio, but the whole war was Tifereth Israel, awaiting a concert played on few in her family to survive -- all others explained gently -- Victory Gardens and violins that once belonged to victims of the perished; but someone gave the family scrap metal collections, ration cards and no Holocaust, I am overcome, verklempt. photographs to friends who weren’t Jewish silk stockings. No mention of the murder of before her family was taken away by the

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 32 Oct. 1, 2015

Nazis. That is why Margie has many family Do I hear this music differently because I offering solace, and inspiration. Thank you, pictures. At the end of the war, Margie’s am not Jewish? How can I know? I know Mr. Weinstein, for restoring these violins mother must have returned to her village in only that I feel grateful to be in this lovely so the story of their owners is never lost. Hungary to claim them -- pictures instead space, the circular space inviting with warm Thank you to the visionary donors whose of people. Imagine handing over your stone walls into which motifs of Judaism imagination and generosity made this photograph albums because you sensed have been carved -- I see a menorah across extraordinary sequence of events possible your time was short; imagine that neighbor the way from me. The curtain covering for Cleveland. Where there is music there is placing the album carefully in the bottom the Ark is a russet fabric, an autumn leaf. hope. drawer of a dresser -- perhaps even that The elegance of the space feels worthy small act a dangerous one. of the carefully restored violins, artifacts that survived. How intimate it is to watch As I watch the Cleveland Orchestra the orchestra before we actually begin. members take their places and tune their They handle these violins with reverence. I instruments, some decorated with inlaid wonder how it feels to play an instrument Jewish stars, I think about the lives of those that is not one’s own; if it moves differently who perished, each one a person with a in one’s hands, sounds different to one’s family, each one loved, each one trained to ears? play the violin. How many of them played the very pieces we will hear today? The Then, we are ready. The musicians I can program has not yet begun and tears prick see tuck the violins competently under at my eyes. Gentile guilt? This is an old their chins, flourish their bows. They are theme for me; I used to have a nightmare professionals of all nationalities it seems, that the Holocaust was happening again of all faiths perhaps. Music is their shared and that I could not save my family, my language. And, isn’t that the point? Music Jewish daughters and young son. Man’s speaks to us across horror and across inhumanity to man. time. The beautiful strains of Beethoven, Mendelsohn float through the sanctuary,

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 33 Oct. 2, 2015

her violin is deeply personal. After making Restored Instruments this initial acquaintance, he rested the scroll of the instrument gently against his cheek From Concentrations and tried to imagine its previous owner. Camps Give Rise To “I’m right now holding something in my ‘Violins Of Hope’ hand that someone at some point cared very deeply for. And that hopefully gave by DAVID C. BARNETT this person some sort of --- I don’t want to say ‘peace’ --- but even if it’s just a way to A collection of stringed instruments --- express their suffering.” largely silent for seven decades --- is giving twenty years, he’s been on a quest to collect Amnon Weinstein says, for him, each violin voice to the horrors of the Holocaust. The and repair violins of the Holocaust. Violins of Hope were once owned by the is like a memorial. inmates of Nazi concentration camps, Weinstein’s Tel Aviv shop is filled with “In part for my family, a memorial in part for during World War Two. violins, violas and cellos in various states of the six-million people. But, this is a forest of repair, and he reckons he’s restored about sounds for all those people. And this is very, Clevelander Stanley Bernath got his first 60 instruments, so far. About a third of his very important.” look at the Mauthausen concentration collection, called the “Violins of Hope”, has camp through the slats of a cattle car, in come to Cleveland for an exhibition at the And Weinstein says that’s why he continues 1944. The teenager and his fellow Jewish Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. to look for more violins to bring back to life. prisoners were yanked off the train --- Weinstein is happy that hundreds of people some were beaten and some were shot as will get the chance to see these historic they marched to the front gate. instruments up close, but he’s really excited about a series of concerts with local “As we entered, a symphonic orchestra performers actually playing them. was playing Beethoven,” he recalls. “It was an unbelievable sight. People were being “Violins have to speak,” he says. “And the beaten and killed and there’s an orchestra most important part of the life of a violin is playing.” to be played in concert. And then, they can tell stories.” That’s a story that Israeli violinmaker Amnon Weinstein has heard before. The Jay Geller says the ability to play an first time was fifty years ago, when a man instrument saved some prisoners from brought a battered, old instrument into his the gas chambers. Geller is co-teaching a shop that had once been played in a death class in Holocaust art and history at Case camp. Western Reserve University, this fall. “Being a musician, and selected to play in “It took me time to begin to touch the camp orchestra was a highly-prized something like that,” he says. “And I asked position. They were, if you will, the prize him a lot of questions, and from him I know cattle.” a lot of things about how they played, where they played and everything.” This past weekend, Peter Otto was one of 21 members of the Cleveland Orchestra For Weinstein, that instrument was a who got to play one of the Violins of Hope chilling reminder of all the relatives he had in their local concert debut. For Otto, the lost in those prison camps. And for the last relationship between a person and his or

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 34 Oct. 6, 2015

accompaniment to death marches. Some 6 million stories come played a dual role, like Motele Schlein’s. to Maltz Museum’s His enjoys special prominence because in Violins of Hope exhibit 1943, Schlein infiltrated a Nazi soldiers club and he was hired to entertain during meals. by CARLO WOLFF He’d leave the fiddle in the club overnight, going home with an empty case. The next One of the first things you notice, other than day, he’d return with the case, now packed Amnon Weinstein addressing you in a video, with explosives. He eventually had enough is the openness of “Visions of Hope,” the destructive material stored at the club to blow it up when a group of high-ranking new exhibit at the Maltz Museum of Jewish “When we did it in Charlotte, Amnon Nazi officers arrived for a visit. Heritage in Beachwood. probably had 40 some violins. Now he’s closing on 60. As more people learn about In an Oct. 1 interview, Amnon and Avshalom There are no partitions here; walls, yes, but the project, especially in America – there are Weinstein explained that they’ve amassed no barriers, and virtually no corners to turn. so many families that came over – there 60 of these violins and have no idea how have to be more violins and more stories.” Instead, the museum has arranged these many there are. There are 19 at the Maltz Museum, including one that made it to Israel exceptional instruments stage front, as it The Maltz exhibit is the second expression in 1936 for the Palestine Orchestra, which were, occupying glass cases to throw the of Violins of Hope, a multicultural, multi- eventually became the Israel Philharmonic. time, love and work Weinstein poured into institutional project that will run at least Eighteen come from Weinstein’s collection, them into high relief. They sit at the front of until spring. Besides the Maltz Museum, it one from Yad Vashem. semicircular displays, supporting text and involves Case Western Reserve University; video in the background. the Cleveland Orchestra; ideastream (WVIZ/ “In some cases, we know everything about PBS and WCLV-FM 104.9); the Cleveland the violin and its provenance,” said the Weinstein is the Tel Aviv violinmaker who Institute of Music and the Jewish Federation senior Weinstein. In other cases, all they launched Violins of Hope more than two of Cleveland. decades ago in memory of 400 of his know is that the violin was in the Holocaust. And some are so deeply separated from relatives who died in the Holocaust. He and The project’s debut event was a Sept. 27 their origins there’s no way to track their his son, Avshalom, have amassed 60 of Cleveland Orchestra concert featuring Israeli history, his son said. these instruments, all somehow related to virtuoso Shlomo Mintz on a Violin of Hope, the Holocaust. Each has its own story; each in Silver Hall in the new Milton and Tamar These are mostly German-made. resonates anew because father and son Maltz Performing Arts Center on the CWRU have brought them back to life. campus. The violin Mintz played is now at James. A Grymes, chairman of the the Maltz Museum. The exhibit, assembled from scratch, was department of music at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte, curated the more than a year in the making, according Musing on the diverse stories he tells in his Maltz Museum exhibit and is the author of to Ellen Rudolph, Maltz Museum executive “Violins of Hope” book, Grymes said they’re “Violins of Hope,” a book published in 2014. director. a “poignant reminder that the Holocaust is Like the Weinsteins, he was on hand Oct. not one story of 6 million deaths.” “We selected the violins that had the most 1 and 2 during opening ceremonies for the Maltz Museum exhibit. His book tells the stories behind them,” she said Oct. 1. The “It’s 6 million different stories.” aim of highlighting the violins, along with wildly different stories of seven violins. the historical text and video displays that line the walls in an installation long on Grymes became interested in the project round shapes, was to show the “arc of the at UNC, which staged a far smaller version Holocaust” and to demonstrate the complex of Violins of Hope in 2012. “I think it was roles these workaday instruments played in a very important first step,” he said of the the Nazi concentration camps. Charlotte installation. “I think it’s very clear that’s what happening is building on top of Some figured in clandestine orchestras, what we did in Charlotte collectively. others in show orchestras, yet others as

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 35 Oct. 12, 2015

a small amount of comfort to those in Violins of Hope concert, for the opening of Violins of Hope comes concentration camps. Today, the violins Silver Hall in the Milton and Tamar Maltz survive because of the work of Amnon Performing Arts Center. to Cleveland Weinstein, a master violinmaker from Tel Aviv. The programs surrounding the violins by DAWN KENDRICK Cleveland visit are the most extensive to “I want to find any violin in the world date for the collection. Which makes Amnon CLEVELAND -- It’s a collection of that has a story to tell. And put them in very thankful. instruments that has an inspiring conditions that they can tell the story,” connection to history and to the people who violinmaker Amnon Weinstein told WKYC’s Weinstein speaks highly of Cleveland saying played them. Dawn Kendrick. “I’ve been telling it to every one and I will tell it also to you. Cleveland is crazy, on the And for the next few months they here is “Violins of Hope” can be seen at the Maltz good way. This is the most import project on Cleveland. Dawn Kendrick has the story Museum of Jewish Heritage. Nineteen violins in this century.” behind the Violins of Hope. violins are on display, each requiring pains taking work to restore. If you want to hear the Violins of Hope, These remarkable violins have survived the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra the test of time as testimony to the “The biggest restoration was one year and will present a free, community concert at Jewish people who faced the Holocaust a half from sheds of pieces of wood. Then Severance Hall this Wednesday. during World War 2. Their music, gave it is usually 3 to 6 months. It’s huge work,” Armon said.

Amnon’s son, Avshi also restores instruments for the collection. That has grown to 60 violins.

Avshi Weinstein noted that “As many instruments as you see here there are many more which we will not have and many more players we will never hear their stories.”

The Cleveland Orchestra recently held a

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 36 Oct. 19, 2015

from GroundWorks of late. each other in intense, confrontational and GroundWorks consoling movement snapshots that rapidly More indicative of the company’s current flashed before us like someone seeing their DanceTheater strikes preference for contemporary dance works life pass before their eyes. rare chords on and collaboration, the world-premiere of GroundWorks artistic director David Also of note was a touching duet performed evocative Fall Concert Shimotakahara’s “Shadowbox” evoked, in by Bagley and Michael Marquez that was a highly abstracted way, the desperate filled with glancing touches, delicate head Series program and hopeless reality of those in WWII nuzzles and intertwining limbs. The stirring concentration camps. work ended with the chilling image of the (review) dancers lined up across the back of the stage and turning to one side as if preparing by STEVE SUCATO to be marched off to certain death.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- GroundWorks The Fall Concert Series program’s most DanceTheater’s triple bill Friday night in interesting and liberating work turned out to the Allen Theatre at be the world-premiere of New York-based opened with a reprise of Tony-nominated choreographer Kate Weare’s “Far and Near.” choreographer Lynne Taylor-Corbett’s “Unpublished Dialogues,” created for The delightfully energetic abstract work GroundWorks in 2008. set to excerpts of Caroline Shaw’s quirky Pulitzer Prize-winning “Partita For 8 Voices,” Set to music by Pulitzer Prize-winning along with music by Michael Gordon, was American composer Howard Hanson, the - like so many contemporary dance works one act dance-theater work imagined the these days - a collection of movement for day in 1941 in which British author Virginia Part of the “Violins of Hope” project and movement’s sake. Woolf committed suicide. In it, Taylor- in partnership with the Maltz Museum Corbett created a world where Woolf, of Jewish Heritage, Jewish Federation of While inspired in part by a poem by Czeslaw portrayed with sensitivity by Annika Sheaff, Cleveland, and the Cleveland Institute of Milosz, “Far and Near” was all about Weare’s was warmed and haunted by her past. Music, the work featured an often vibrant, keen talent for creating and organizing somewhat dissonant and superbly original dance movement into unexpected and Thought to have suffered from bipolar score by Israeli composer Oded Zehavi, satisfying eye candy and GroundWorks’ disorder, Woolf, in what looked to be her a Schusterman Visiting Israeli Artist to dancers’ brilliance in conveying it. Everyday study, saw visions of her younger self Cleveland. motions and movements such as hopping, (Lauren Garson), her husband (Damien spinning, brisk hand waving and dancers Highfield), and other relatives in happier Zehavi’s driving music, played expertly sniffing at each other’s bodies, along times and times of turmoil. She also recalled by violinist Mirabai Weismehl Rosenfeld, with sweeping unison dance sequences, the innocent seduction by a romantic rocketed to life at the very outset of the scratched an audience itch for clever, interest portrayed by a sultry Felise Bagley. dance work with Rosenfeld performing electrifying entertainment that they live over a pre-recorded soundtrack. rewarded with a standing ovation. The period-looking piece overall had a GroundWorks’ dancers in drab gray playful, Peter Pan-like vibe to it driven by costumes however, moved listlessly in Hanson’s animated score. Taylor-Corbett simple pedestrian movements to that steered clear of a literal depiction of Woolf’s music. demise in the work, tastefully handling her bouts of madness as fights between the Shimotakahara’s choreography, which used imagined characters which Woolf quelled children’s games as both metaphor and a by ripping out pages from her journal jumping-off point for creating dance steps, that seemed to erase those disturbing may have been slow to start but picked up memories. steam and interest as the work progressed, building to powerful heights. The best was a The wonderfully constructed and beautifully frenetic section in which, within the confines danced ballet/classic modern dance hybrid of a small lighted rectangle on the stage was a throwback to works not seen much floor, five dancers, mostly in pairs, engaged

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 37 Oct. 22, 2015

Violins of Hope is a memorial to Holocaust victims by AUSTIN GOODER

“For Jews enduring utter despair and unimaginable evil during the Holocaust, music offered haven and humanity.”

“In some cases, the ability to play the violin spared Jewish musicians from more gruelling labours or even death.”

These are the words found on violinsofhopecle.org. They give context and meaning to a project called Violins of Hope.

Its roots are in an era long before us: the 1930s.

The Nazi war machine ground Europe to Weinstein is referring to Violins of Hope, Goodman describes the unique feeling dust. German Jews were rounded up and a project born out of his passion for violin during the first concert. murdered in cold blood; or otherwise kept repair. to starve and rot in concentration camps. “The moment right before the concert began Jews were marked with Stars of David It involves the claiming and recovery of when the musicians who were playing the and persecuted for their faith. The Jewish violins once played by Jewish musicians in Violins of Hope were asked to stand and suffering didn’t end when the Nazis were the Nazi reign in 1930s Germany. show the instruments was dramatic and finally defeated. solemn. Weinstein finds or receives the violins and As the Allied forces liberated concentration repairs them in his Tel-Aviv shop. He says “And once the music began, you couldn’t camps, the global Jewish community it’s meticulous work. help but be struck by the contrast between was still decades away from peace and the beauty of the music and the fate of the rehabilitation. This year, some small part of These violins are now played by the violins’ original owners,” she continues. that rehabilitation is happening in Ohio. Cleveland Orchestra. Nineteen of them, in fact, are used as part of the performances “Many in the audience were moved to As the shrill, haunting notes of a violin filled at the newly renovated Silver Hall. tears.” the Silver Hall in Cleveland, a little bit of healing began. Lynn Goodman, project manager for Violins The tears are understandable, as Goodman of Hope, says there was a great deal of explains. Holocaust survivors are reaching “All these instruments, when I’m getting excitement about the concert. their 80s and 90s, and there’s an awareness them, are in very, very poor condition. Some in the Jewish community about how there just suffered a lot in the Holocaust.” “There was great anticipation and will soon be no one left to share first-hand excitement, not just immediately before or experiences from Nazi Germany. That’s Amnon Weinstein, the man behind during or after, but for months preceding a world-renowned violin shop in Tel-Aviv, the event,” Goodman says. Hedy Milgrom, senior vice-president of the Israel. He was speaking to the Public Jewish Federation of Cleveland, was also Broadcasting Service. “The planning for Violins of Hope Cleveland there. started more than two years ago, and “It is for millions of people who are dead,” involved 30-plus individuals,” she continues. “The whole concert was a combination of he says. “It is victory. Each concert played is “On the day of the concert, emotions were very mixed emotions and surreality for me,” victory.” palpable and many-layered.” Milgrom says.

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 38 Niagara News Oct. 22, 2015 Welland, Ontario

She helped steer the committee that Two of the violins he’s received, according “Even amid hopelessness, when you hear organized Violins of Hope’s appearance in to Goodman, were played in Auschwitz and music, you feel hope,” she says. Cleveland. Dachau. “Even when what’s in front of you suggests She also had a more intimate connection to Milgrom says these violins help humanize otherwise, you still feel hope.” the concert. the story. Jewish culture has endured. Jewish history “I’m the daughter of Holocaust survivors. My “When you tell the story of what happened is forever preserved by textbooks and mother was a Mengele twin,” she says. through the lens of the individual person, memories. And there’s a note that endures you get to understand the enormity of what through it all. A note that the Holocaust “My mother and her twin sister arrived in happened,” she says. couldn’t and wouldn’t extinguish. It’s a note Auschwitz together and were immediately played proudly by Violins of Hope, on those pulled from the line for [Josef] Mengele to Goodman says it took Weinstein several violins that survived so much more than we have for his experiments.” years to even touch the first Holocaust ever thought possible. The note persists in violin delivered to his violin shop. diaries and books and spoken word. Hope. Milgrom says the music in Auschwitz made her mother optimistic. “It is a physically and emotionally taxing process to restore these instruments,” she “When the cattle cars stopped, and they says. “Amnon’s entire family was killed in were all pushed off the car, the first thing the Holocaust. Only his parents survived by my mother heard was an orchestra playing emigrating to Palestine before the war.” on the platform,” she says. Modern estimates suggest that nearly “My mom turned to her aunt and even after six million Jews were slaughtered in the everything they went through, she said, Holocaust. All of them painters, musicians, ‘See? They even have music here. It can’t be mechanics, bakers, mothers, fathers, all bad.”’ children and more.

For Weinstein, Violins of Hope is a passion Goodman says there are still victories to be project that didn’t come easily. found.

In an interview with National Public Radio, “Every violin that he restores to playing Weinstein revealed he once found a small condition represents a victory. Although amount of ashes inside one of these they tried, the Nazis could not extinguish Holocaust violins. Jewish culture and Jewish history.”

Another report indicated Weinstein found a Milgrom, too, says that music was and is swastika carved inside another. important.

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 39 Oct. 29, 2015

Author Daniel Mendelsohn On Writing And Discovering The Holocaust Anew by KAREN R. LONG

Cultural critic Daniel Mendelsohn paused in Cleveland this October before his written remarks to take in the stunning, restored Temple-Tifereth Israel, repurposed at the heart of a new Maltz Performing Arts Center.

A month earlier, the richly glowing Silver Hall reopened its doors with a performance from the Cleveland Orchestra, occupying the stage where Mendelsohn stood. Essayist and author Daniel Mendelsohn speaks on the Case Western Reserve campus as part of the Think Forum The musicians played “The Creatures of series. Photo credit: Daniel Milner Prometheus” and “Leonore,” both overtures from Beethoven, on 26 instruments rescued his much-honored memoir, “The Lost: A The reader enters “The Lost” through the from the Holocaust. Search for Six of Six Million.” youthful sensibilities of young Daniel, who grew up enthralled by his snappily-dressed, “I am dazzled by the space we are all Eli Wiesel reviewed the book in the successful grandfather, and who spent part sitting in,” said Mendelsohn, gesturing Washington Post nine years ago, finding of his childhood provoking tears in Florida toward the burnished wood and subdued it “rigorous in its search for truth, at once from certain elderly European Jews: the golds. The auditorium reminded him of the tender and exacting.” The New York Times great nephew so closely resembled Schmeil. ruined beauty of many Eastern European praised its meditations on conflicting ways A handful of surviving photos of Jager, synagogues, abandoned with “trees growing of storytelling, a thread that Mendelsohn reprinted in “The Lost,” capture a strong in the middle of them now.” took up in his Cleveland remarks, “’Lost’ echo between the two men’s eyes, mouth Between Memory and History: Writing the and posture. He also wryly noted, as a platter of pink Holocaust for the Next Generation.” shrimp hors d’oeuvres shimmered past When the Germans marched into Bolechow during the faculty reception, “It’s not a The six relatives in Mendelsohn’s subtitle in July 1941, some 6,000 Jews called it home. synagogue anymore.” were a maternal great-uncle, Schmeil In August 1944, as the Soviets’ army arrived, Jager, his wife Ester and their four teenage “48 survivors emerged from the forest, the The celebrated writer, a classicist whose daughters: Lorcka, Frydka, Ruchele and cellars, the haystacks where they had been essays appear in the New Yorker and Bronia. For more than three centuries, the hiding.” the New York Review of Books, traveled family had lived in “a small, pre-Carpathian extensively for five years, visiting , Polish town” called Bolechow, now part of Some sixty years later, Mendelsohn Poland and , as well as Israel, Ukraine. began searching for this remnant. He also Sweden, Denmark and Australia, to report discovered the names of his six relatives

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 40 Oct. 29, 2015

in the Yad Vashem database for Shoah With the perspective of a classicist, victims. Yet the archival information turned Mendelsohn asked his audience – gathered out to be “wrong, all wrong, the spelling of for the first ThinkForum of the academic names, the dates of births and deaths, the year – to consider how catastrophic and spelling of parents’ names.” complex Jewish slavery in Egypt was, now boiled down into the Haggadah, stories “Why does this matter?” he asked. “It reduced to a ritual two hours. matters to me precisely because we are in a hinge moment: still close enough to care “We today are too close to the Holocaust about small things, small inaccuracies that to assess what it will mean,” he said. “My depart from the truth. But in 2000 years, will own, seemingly big book, is not but a grain it matter that a young woman died at 21, of sand. In 2,000 years, Lorcka will have not 18? That large events are made of small disappeared.” details?” Mendelsohn seems reconciled to this Mendelsohn, 55, is deeply interested in the notion. “People of the future will need room moral drift inherent in storytelling. He is to live their own lives.” keenly aware that that his own experience – writing “The Lost” – moved what happened into “the story of what happened.”

The book’s raw material was a fragment of a welter of stories – belonging to “perpetrators, victims, neighbors, survivors.” One such survivor kept her secrets. Meg Grossbard told Mendelsohn, “You think you deserve to know all this because it’s part of ‘history.’ This wasn’t history to me. This was my life. And my life belongs to me . . . If I tell you my story, it will become your story.”

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 41 Nov. 5, 2015

in connection with the opening of Daniel The ties strengthened about two weeks Solon man, Amnon Levin’s photographic exhibition, “Amnon’s later when other Bielski partisans came to Workshop,” at the Roe Green Gallery in the Cleveland, affirming Zelwin’s impression Weinstein’s wife share Jewish Federation of Cleveland building in that not enough people know of the Bielski rare family photo Beachwood. brothers. It’s the story of a Polish resistance group formed by Tuvia, Asael and Zus Bielski by CARLO WOLFF In a recent telephone interview, Zelwin said after the Nazis killed their parents in the the meeting came about through Hedy Nowogrodek ghetto in Byelorussia, formerly Imagine what Robert Zelwin felt when Milgrom, vice president of endowments and Poland. The Bielski group saved Jewish lives he saw his relatives in a black-and-white development at the Federation, a fellow and conducted anti-Nazi raids. It is the photograph from April 1948 showing a member of B’nai Jeshurun Congregation in subject of the 2008 movie, “Defiance.” group of former members of the Bielski Pepper Pike. Milgrom invited Zelwin to lunch Brigade in a displaced persons camp in with her and the Weinsteins. To Assi Weinstein, the encounter with Germany. Zelwin was memorable if not unique. In an When the conversation turned to World email from Tel Aviv, she said she has met Among those partisans: Zelwin’s parents. War II and its aftermath. Zelwin asked Assi “hundreds of ex-partisans who survived Weinstein where her mother went after the in the Bielski brigade. Many lived in Israel. The shock of recognition came over war. To a DP camp in Germany, she said. Many in the U.S. and some in Israel.” Zelwin’s face in mid-October, when the Solon resident met Assi Weinstein, wife of “Where in Germany? Foehrenwald? Really?” She did not know of the Zelwin family until Violins of Hope founder Amnon Weinstein, is how Zelwin replicated the exchange. she met Robert Zelwin in Cleveland, but “My brother was born in Foehrenwald in a there have been similar encounters with DP camp. She said, really? At which point “people who knew my name (quite unusual Amnon reached into this briefcase and in Hebrew: Assaela), were interested in its he pulled out his iPad and started fiddling origin and then told me about their family around with it and he comes up with this who survived with the Bielskis.” picture, a picture I’d seen before.” “I was very happy to find Robert Zelwin so The snapshot showed Zelwin’s father and interested and knowledgeable about his mother, his uncle, his brother’s wife, and parents past, and as always – it feels like a cousin of his mother’s. Zelwin’s aunt is family to meet descendants of partisans,” sitting next to Assi’s mother. Weinstein said.

“It was just amazing,” Zelwin said. “It was just a very unique coincidence.”

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Israel Philharmonic thrills Cleveland audience with ear- opening Dvorak and Ravel (review) by MARK SATOLA

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- It’s always interesting to hear how a different group fits into the acoustic of Severance Hall. When that ensemble is the storied Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, however, under the baton of waltz theme forms, and there were many Music Director for Life , the Bardanashvili cites as formal antecedents fine moments for the orchestra’s solo experience is much more than just an aural the symphonic poems of Liszt and woodwinds. Strings were silken in the novelty. Tchaikovsky’s “Francesca da Rimini.” His smooth delirium of the waltz themes. musical antecedents, at least in this piece, The Israel Philharmonic’s fall tour has taken seem to be 20th century tyros including But it was the Israel Philharmonic’s them just this month to New York, San Varese and Stravinsky in “Rite of Spring” fantastic percussion section that really Francisco, Palm Desert, Los Angeles (where mode. The musical voice, however, which is gave the music an extra kick. Timpanist they played three concerts in two days), sometimes challenging, sometimes almost Dan Moshayev was a marvel of precision Chicago, Cleveland and Dallas. Monday’s cinematic, is the composer’s own. and energy as he forcefully punctuated performance here marked the next-to-last the dance, especially as it careened into its performance in a demanding schedule, “Journey” is not so much a chronological delirious climax. but the ensemble’s intensity and cohesion travelogue as a musical essay, employing belied any tour fatigue. an organic process in which plainly tonal The second half of the program was devoted melody vies with brilliantly deployed to Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9, “From the New The orchestra’s stage set-up guaranteed dissonance, one growing out of the other, World.” Under Mehta’s baton, the orchestra an ear-opening experience. In contrast to with neither finding complete ascendancy, revealed the rich, burnished tone for which the usual arrangement of the Cleveland and a clamorous climax of great power that it’s famous, a sound that derives from its Orchestra, Israel’s first violins, cellos and combines a forceful brass chorale (derived early-20th century origins but has been basses were aligned on the left, with the from a wedding prayer in the opera) and a polished to a 21st-century sheen over the second violins, violas, harps and piano on polytonal tapestry given blazing illumination decades. the right and a large battery of percussion by the large percussion section. clustered in the back stage left. The brass Mehta is no strict formalist. He allowed the stood at the back corner of stage right, well The Israel Philharmonic’s percussionists, orchestra to linger over the many episodes away from the main body of the ensemble. in fact, were stunning in this score, which of loveliness, but also drove them with fire Mehta managed with technical assurance when the music called for it. While this The largest forces were employed for and a fine dramatic sensibility. Co-principal made for a somewhat discursive reading, the opening work, “Journey to the End of violist Roman Spitzer was given a solo bow the effect was nevertheless of a journey the Millennium” by Josef Bardanashvili, a for his worthy contributions. of nostalgia and passion, and Mehta was native of Georgia and a longtime resident called back to the stage four times to a of Israel. While the music is drawn from Percussion was also a star in Ravel’s “La thunderous ovation. A ‘Slavonic Dance’ by Bardanashvili’s opera of the same name, the Valse,” which was given a reading that Dvorak was the audience’s sweet reward. symphonic poem stands, in the composer’s was at once sumptuous and clamorous, words, as “a musical journey of the Jewish as befits the work’s “dancing on a volcano” people from the very first (theoretical) days theme. Mehta beautifully conveyed the to the 20th century.” swirling mists out of which the compelling

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at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage it is in the tradition of similar works by Liszt Israel Philharmonic in Beachwood. The presenters were the and Tchaikovsky and “is built as a musical Cleveland Orchestra, the Maltz Family journey of the Jewish people from the very Orchestra entertains Foundation and the Jewish Federation first (theoretical) days to the 20th century.” sell-out crowd of Cleveland, in partnership with the American Friends of the Israel Philharmonic This work was a journey indeed, and a by CARLO WOLFF Orchestra. largely successful one. Not only did it It was fitting that that entertaining impressively demonstrate the Israel The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra brought Dvorak encore came on the heels of a Philharmonic’s sonic clarity and mastery a sell-out Severance Hall crowd to its majestic rendition of the same composer’s of dynamics, it showcased Bardanashvili’s feet at both beginning and end Nov. 16, “Symphony No. 9,” subtitled “From the command of effect, spanning delicate powering through a performance featuring a New World.” Mehta and the orchestra piccolo solo and thunderous percussion. symphonic classic, a modernist touchstone he’s led since 1977 refreshed the Dvorak Even though the piece at times seemed to and a contemporary Israeli work of drama with panache in the slow movements, wander, capping it with a conga blast was and dazzle. particularly a gorgeous Largo, capping the particularly dramatic. 40-minute work with an Allegro con fuoco alternating a majestic brass leitmotif with This Cleveland date was the next to last wind and string figures blending folk dance on an eight-city, nine-performance tour, and nursery rhyme. according to Raphael Sutton, executive director of the American Friends of the The familiar Dvorak symphony attests Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. This tour to the Czech composer’s embrace of his concluded with a performance in Dallas Nov. adopted country, the . While 17. it incorporates themes from his homeland, it also references Native American motifs In a brief interview before the Severance and in its underlying exuberance reflects Hall performance, Sutton said concerts Dvorak’s affection for the U.S. on this year’s tour have either featured Dvorak’s Ninth or Beethoven’s “Symphony The modernist offering was Maurice Ravel’s No. 3,” the “Eroica.” The Bardanashvili and The Monday night event marked the “La Valse,” a mesmerizing summation of Ravel pieces are constants, he said. Cleveland debut of conductor Zubin a style of music associated with the late Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic’s first 19th-century Vienna of Johann Strauss. The idea for the Israel Philharmonic, which Cleveland performance since 2004. Yoel Levi It started almost inaudibly, like morning goes on U.S. tour every two years, is “not conducted that 2004 concert, which also vapors one senses waking from a dream, only to show Israeli musicians but also featured the pianist Emanuel Ax. string washes buttressing filigreed wind Israeli composition,” he said, calling the instruments as it gathered force. Bardanashvili “a more contemporary piece.” The show started with a bang with “The Star-Spangled Banner,” followed by One sensed that Ravel, who worked on this The AFIPO underwrites 10 percent to 15 “Hatikvah,” the Israeli national anthem. Both starting before World War I and finishing percent of the Israel Philharmonic’s budget, orchestra and audience stood throughout after, was torn about the waltz form Sutton said, adding one purpose of its US these salutes to the bond between the two itself. “La Valse” is an apotheosis, and a tours is to raise additional funds. Since it countries. summation of a style associated with a mounted its first U.S. tour, in 1951, it has vanished, more placid culture. But it also is visited this country 30 times. The show ended with a similar bang, a critique, and in Mehta’s rich interpretation, prompting several standing ovations before it changed from pastoral to tempestuous, musical director Mehta led the orchestra in anger and dissonance supplanting harmony. a spirited encore, Antonin Dvorak’s “Slavonic It ended threatening, frenzied and powerful. Dance, Op. 46, No. 8.” Josef Bardanashvili’s “Journey to the End The performance featured four instruments of the Millennium” was a 25-minute “tone on loan from the “Violins of Hope” exhibition poem” by an Israeli composer who wrote an opera of the same name. According to him,

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 44 Nov. 30, 2015

The release stated that for the story, Violins of Hope a CBS crew conducted interviews with Franz Welser-Möst, music director of the Cleveland to appear on Cleveland Orchestra, Richard J. Bogomolny, ‘CBS Sunday Morning’ the orchestra’s board chair, and Peter Otto, its first associate concertmaster; Milton program Maltz, chair and founder of the Maltz Museum; and Amnon Weinstein, master by CRAIN’S CLEVELAND BUSINESS violinmaker and Violins of Hope founder

The popular Violins of Hope Cleveland The CBS crew “captured the initiative’s exhibition and series of events, a kickoff concert when the actual violins collaboration of local educational and were played by members of the Cleveland cultural nonprofits, is about to get some Orchestra on the occasion of the first-phase national attention. opening of the Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at Case Western The “CBS Sunday Morning” program on Reserve University,” according to the Sunday, Dec. 6, will feature a story about release. Violins of Hope, according to a news release from the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage, Violins of Hope Cleveland was launched in one of the institutions responsible for October and continues into February with the program. Violins of Hope Cleveland activities and events in the Cleveland area. showcases instruments played during the Holocaust by Jewish prisoners in Nazi concentration camps. The violins have been restored to concert quality.

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concert by the Cleveland Orchestra – with Institute of Music, Ideastream, the Jewish Cleveland ‘Violins of several artists including violinist Shlomo Federation of Cleveland, Facing History and Mintz playing instruments rescued from the Ourselves, and the Maltz Museum. Hope’ segment airing Holocaust – at the new Maltz Performing this Sunday on ‘CBS Arts Center at Case Western Reserve University. Also sure to be of central Sunday Morning’ interest: the eponymous exhibition now on display into February at the Maltz Museum by ZACHARY LEWIS of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood.

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Soon the world, or at Look, too, for interviews with Amnon least the rest of the nation, will know the Weinstein, the Israeli violinmaker who power of “Violins of Hope.” spent decades collecting and restoring the instruments now known as the “Violins of Two months after it was taped by a crew Hope”; local project champions Milton Maltz from the television show “CBS Sunday and Richard Bogomolny; and two members Morning,” a segment about the project at of the Cleveland Orchestra: music director last has a broadcast date. Local viewers Franz Welser-Most, who conducted the can tune in at 9 a.m. this Sunday, Dec. 6, on September concert, and first associate WOIO Channel 19. Those outside Northeast concertmaster Peter Otto. Ohio should consult the comprehensive listing of show times posted on the CBS For more information on “Violins of Hope,” Sunday Morning web site. visit violinsofhopecle.org or reach out to any one of the project’s seven lead partners, Expect the CBS program to focus on the including the Cleveland Orchestra, Case “Violins of Hope” kickoff event, a September Western Reserve University, the Cleveland

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“I love that quote,” violinist Annie Fullard as I could. He does want them to be played, Cavani Quartet said during a telephone conversation. “It’s because their bigger meaning comes to life so upsetting that Schulhoff’s life was cut when they are played.” Presents Violins of short.” On Friday, December 4 at 8:00 pm Hope Concert in CIM’s in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Fullard first tried the instrument that Music, the Cavani Quartet (Annie Fullard belonged to Heinrich Haftel, who served Mixon Hall Tonight and Mari Sato, violins, Kirsten Docter, viola, as a first violinist in the Vienna Concert and Merry Peckham, cello) will perform Orchestra before the Nazis made it by MIKE TELIN two pieces by Schulhoff — Divertimento impossible for him to make a living. Haftel for String Quartet, Op. 14 and String Sextet went on to serve as a member of the Composer Erwin Schulhoff, who perished — as part of a CIM Violins of Hope Faculty Palestine Symphony Orchestra, a forerunner in the Holocaust, wrote in his 1919 Recital. of today’s Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. avant-garde music manifesto: The idea of revolution in art has evolved for decades… The concert will also include Antonín “The curator of the exhibit brought out This is particularly true in music, because Dvořák’s Cypresses with Robert Conrad as another instrument that she said was this art form is the liveliest, and as a result narrator, and the traditional Hebrew melody the ‘Auschwitz’ violin,” Fullard recalled. reflects the revolution most strongly Ani Ma’amin (“I Believe”). The Cavani will be “I picked it up and started to play it, and and deeply — the complete escape from joined by guest artists Rebecca Albers, viola, I felt a tremendous sadness that was imperialistic tonality and rhythm, the climb and Julie Albers, cello. A pre-concert lecture overwhelming. I actually couldn’t stop to an ecstatic change for the better. with composer Oded Zehavi (Israel Institute playing it. It has a presence, a voice.” The Schusterman Visiting Artist) and Holocaust owner of the violin is not known, and Fullard survivor Jacqueline Mendels Birn will begin said it is astonishing that Amnon Weinstein at 7:15. was able to put it back together and give it life. The Violins of Hope Cleveland project centers around a collection of nineteen violins currently on display at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. The instruments have been lovingly restored by Israeli luthier Amnon Weinstein as a living memorial to those who perished under the Nazis. During Friday’s concert, Annie Fullard will perform on the “Auschwitz” violin, and Mari Sato will perform on the “Haftel” violin. “Amnon was very generous, and he told me that I should try as many of the instruments

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 47 Dec. 6, 2015

‘Voices of the voiceless’ come to life on Holocaust victims’ violins by MIKE TELIN

When 300 Auschwitz survivors gathered last January for the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camp, the annual commemoration was especially poignant: With survivors now in their 80s and 90s, many worried about how future generations would learn about the Holocaust.

“Never again” has been a vow of survivors, Holocaust scholars, and human rights advocates for decades, even as their education efforts seek new ways to educate about the Holocaust, as first-person Weinstein’s father, who was also a luthier, testimonies dwindle. or stringed-instrument crafstman, escaped In September, Mr. Mintz joined the Europe for Palestine in 1938. But the Cleveland Orchestra for a performance For Israeli violin craftsman Amnon remainder of his family, some 400 people, of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto, Weinstein, music is a way to honor the six were all killed. Schoenberg’s Kol Nidre, and other scores, million Jewish victims killed by the Third with several artists using the victims Reich. But it represents more than despair. Decades ago, one of the younger Mr. Weinstein had rescued from history. Violins Weinstein’s clients brought in an of Hope has held numerous concerts, “Wherever there were violins, there was instrument for restoration: the violin he some featuring the work of Holocaust- hope,” says Mr. Weinstein, who has been was ordered to play at a concentration era Jewish composers, to accompany an working for 20 years to bring the lost violins camp, the case of which still contained exhibit of 19 violins at the Maltz Museum of Holocaust musicians back to life, a project ashes. In 1996, Weinstein set out to collect of Jewish Heritage, closing January 3. In culminating this fall in Violins of Hope, a as many Holocaust-era violins as possible, mid-November, the Israeli Philharmonic Cleveland-area partnership of museum tracing their owners’ stories and carefully Orchestra, founded in 1936 as the Palestine exhibitions, orchestra performances, and refurbishing them to be played today. Orchestra, traveled to Cleveland for a joint lectures to give voice to Jewish communities performance. who embraced music as a means of survival “When I heard [Israeli virtuoso] Shlomo and resilience, even inside concentration Mintz play the violin in Birkenau, it changed “When Amnon created the Violins of Hope, camps. my life. It was at that place and at that it wasn’t to put them on a table and have moment that I heard the power of violins,” somebody look at them,” organizer Richard “An instrument becomes part of the he explains in a film by Blue Press. “It is the Bogomolny told CBS. “It was that they had person which plays it,” Cleveland Orchestra best proof that it is impossible to kill the to be played, because that’s the only way conductor Franz Welser-Möst told CBS’s Jewish culture and the violin which is one of the voices of the voiceless could be heard.” Serena Altschul, in an interview airing the major symbols of Jewish culture.” Sunday, the first night of Hanukkah. “It’s “We cannot afford to move in the direction the voice of that person comes through “It was forbidden to the Jewish to pray,” in of devaluing the life of anyone,” violinist the instrument. And just knowing that the camps, he tells Ms. Altschul, so “the Annie Fullard told Cleveland Classical ahead some of these people who have owned violin was praying for them.” He repeats of her quartet’s own performance with these instruments did not survive, but their famous violinist Isaac Stern’s quip about the Violins of Hope. “We know that artists can personality is still within these instruments, violin’s central role in Jewish music: “’It is the celebrate culture, and connecting with each I find that very moving.” easiest instrument to pick it up and to run other is how we keep our humanity.” away!’”

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The message of the Violins of Hope project alarming echoes of the resistance of many “Dear Donald Trump,” liberal Jewish group may be particularly poignant in the wake of US governors to admitting even handfuls of Bend the Arc wrote, “When we say ‘never violence like the Paris attacks, but also has Syrian refugees to their communities, citing again’ it’s not just about Jews, it’s about a new resonance as cultural and religious security fears. everyone.” figures, including Jewish leaders, decry increasingly aggressive campaign rhetoric The Anti-Defamation League, which fights against American Muslims and Muslim anti-Semitism, has repeatedly criticized refugees fleeing the destruction of ISIS. Republican presidential contenders like Donald Trump and Ben Carson for A mid-November article in The Washington inflammatory speech that stereotypes Post, comparing the plight of today’s Syrian Muslims. refugees with World War II-era Jewish ones, has launched fierce debate between In response to Mr. Trump’s apparent those who find the analogy ahistorical, or support for a “Muslim database,” American offensive, and historians who point out that Jewish Committe Executive Director David many Americans feared European refugees Harris called the idea “morally repugnant, in the 1930s would infiltrate the country not to mention unconstitutional,” according with Communist sympathizers. to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

In a 1939 poll asking if Americans “What Mr. Trump proposes, in this case supported bringing 10,000 Jewish children targeting all Muslims, is a horror movie that to the United States, 61 percent said no: we Jews are quite familiar with,” Mr. Harris a historical lesson that, for many, has added.

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Violins of Hope by MIKE TELIN

The “Violins of Hope” we’re about to hear are from a time when hope seem to be all but lost. Serena Altschul has the story:

When members of the Cleveland Orchestra recently sat down to perform, they faced a daunting task. This would be no ordinary concert: It would take place in an historic synagogue, and it would be played on instruments that had rarely been touched in more than 70 years.

[Music: Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E Minor.]

The goal was not just to make beautiful the moment that the war was finished, they music, but to give voice to millions who never touched the instrument again, most “Always when people asked Isaac Stern why were silenced in one of humanity’s darkest of them.” so many Jewish people are playing the violin, chapters. his answer was very simple: ‘It is the easiest In the camps, the violin could also be an instrument to pick it up and to run away!’” “It’s for music,” said Israeli craftsman Amnon instrument of defiance. Weinstein. “It’s for violin. It’s for survivors. Besides portability, the violin has another It’s for the Holocaust.” “It was forbidden to the Jewish to pray,” said unique quality: Its design originated in Weinstein.” So, “the violin was praying for 16th century Italy, where it was created The concert was the culmination of decades them.” to emulate the range of a female soprano of work by Weinstein, a second-generation voice. luthier -- a builder of stringed instruments. “So, it’s sacred,” said Altschul. His father escaped Europe before World War So it was no accident that when the II, but the rest of the family perished. “Yeah. And to be out of this horrible place Cleveland Orchestra performed, guest for five minutes. You know the value of soloist Shlomo Mintz played notes that To honor their memory, and those of that? For five minutes in a free world? Some literally cried out for the silenced. everyone who died in the Holocaust, he and people say that always when he played the his son have collected and restored dozens violin, he was in a concert hall. You opened “An instrument becomes part of the person of instruments that survived. the door, you see the barbed wire.” which plays it,” said Cleveland Orchestra conductor Franz Welser-Möst. “It’s the “I had a guy who came over to me, he “Transports you somewhere else.” voice of that person comes through the played on the way to the gas chamber,” said instrument. And just knowing that some Weinstein. “And he gave me his violin. He “Completely,” said Weinstein. “That’s the of these people who have owned these wanted to restore it. And when I opened the power of music.” instruments did not survive, but their violin, there was black powder inside. And personality is still within these instruments, for me, this is coming only from one place.” Music is deeply rooted in Jewish tradition. I find that very moving.” Persecuted throughout European history, Many of the instruments in Weinstein’s Jews were often on the move, in search of Welser-Möst and violinist Peter Otto collection were used in concentration camp a safe place. Music became a refuge, and a were keenly aware of the history of the orchestras organized by the Nazis. source of joy. instruments.

“And before the orchestra, in front of them, “Have you seen Chagall painting? This was a Altschul asked, “What happens to an there was a pile of all these dead people,” part of the culture,” said Weinstein. “It was a instrument if it isn’t played?” said Weinstein. “And yet, they played. So cheap instrument. Everybody could afford it.

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“After a while, it just loses the sound,” said “When Amnon created the Violins of Hope, Otto. “It sounds tight. It just loses its spirit, it wasn’t to put them on a table and have so to speak.” somebody look at them,” said Bogomolny. “It was that they had to be played, because “So an instrument that’s well-played and that’s the only way the voices of the loved and used sounds richer?” voiceless could be heard.”

“It sounds richer, it sounds more open. It’s “So how did it feel to be in that incredible like a really good singer singing freely and space and have this project finally come using everything they got, you know, in their together?” asked Altschul. body. I can only suspect what this violin would sound like if it was played for, let’s “Well, I’m fairly short -- I’m about five foot say, a year every day.” five,” said Maltz. “I felt like I was ten feet tall.” Which is why a museum display of Weinstein’s instruments, called “Violins The audience was uplifted as well. The of Hope,” at Cleveland’s Maltz Museum Violins of Hope were no longer silent. of Jewish Heritage, includes regular performances. “Violin is talking, violin is singing,” said Weinstein. “And if you have good way to Richard Bogomolny and Milton Maltz are listen, you can listen to all the stories.” the driving forces behind the exhibit and concert.

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week. The series drew some 10,000 middle- master violinmaker Amnon Weinstein of Students learn lessons and high-school students from Northeast Tel Aviv, are on view at the Maltz Museum. Ohio, eager to take a field trip to one of Several figured in the educational concerts. from Violins of Hope Cleveland’s most prestigious and celebrated venues. To amplify the musical selections, graduate by CARLO WOLFF students in the CWRU/Cleveland Play What these kids experienced was a dense, House MFA Acting Program acted out Violins of Hope, the multimedia, entertaining program interspersing musical Holocaust-related stories, underlining the multicultural program based on stringed selections with theatrical interludes program’s themes. instruments that survived the Holocaust, is designed to communicate the horror of the winding down. But it’s not going quietly. Holocaust and the themes of resistance, According to Joan Katz Napoli, the resilience, remembrance and reflection. orchestra’s director of education and “Violins of Hope,” a creative and moving Facing History and Ourselves, a partner in community programs, the script was a exhibition at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Violins of Hope, formulated those themes. collaboration between the orchestra and Heritage in Beachwood, will come to a close the Play House. She developed a basic on Jan. 3, ending a program in the making Before the 10:10 a.m. show Dec. 4, the outline, and there was “a lot of editing back for years. It involves seven of the leading Beachwood High School string ensemble and forth.” cultural institutions in Greater Cleveland. performed in the balcony of Severance, welcoming students spanning Cleveland While the two institutions have worked Three of those – the Cleveland Orchestra, public schools and suburban Jewish day together before, this was the first for the Case Western Reserve University and the schools as they streamed into the building. orchestra’s education concerts, Katz Napoli Cleveland Play House – were involved in six said. It was “just far more elaborate than educational concerts at Severance Hall, the The concert was eclectic, ranging from what I’ve done in the past for education orchestra’s home in University Circle, last Dmitri Shostakovich’s spirited and angular concerts, and because we had the Violins allegro molto from his “Chamber Symphony of Hope theme to work with, it was a very for String Orchestra” to Ernest Bloch’s substantial body of both music and history. “Simchas Torah” (from “Baal Shem”), concluding with the lyrical overture to “La “You have a lot to get into a concert just scala di seta.” Gioacchino Rossini’s piece was under an hour,” said Katz Napoli, a Cleveland featured when Arturo Toscanini conducted Heights resident who attends The Temple- the first concert of the Palestine Symphony Tifereth Israel in Beachwood and Cleveland. Orchestra in 1936. That organization “The fact that it moved seamlessly was would evolve into the Israel Philharmonic really beneficial.” Orchestra.

The underlying notion of Violins of Hope is that these instruments – which were played in concentration camp orchestras and occasionally served as weapons – perpetuate and celebrate humanity. Eighteen of them, out of a collection of nearly 60 amassed by program founder/

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 52 Dec. 10, 2015

to life when all hope seems lost. Our city is know if that’s what the architects intended, Violins and hope also the home of the magnificent Cleveland but watching the people walk into the Orchestra, and part of the story of these building that held a part of their heritage, I by KATHRYN MATTHEWS (HUEY) violins is a very important remembering: remembered the things I learned in school members of our orchestra have performed about the Bible and those old, old stories. Last Sunday after worship, several wonderful concerts with these musical And on that day, I thought I heard a song members of Amistad Chapel UCC traveled instruments, brought back to life and of hope playing, softly but so persistently, to the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in purpose, and singing anew an ancient song. underneath it all. an eastern suburb of Cleveland to view –– to Do we often get to feel the kind of thrilling experience –– the special exhibit, “Violins joy that one feels, listening to these violins Sparking Ministry Conversations of Hope,” a collection of restored violins playing their soaring melodies of hope? Who that “survived” the concentration camps of could ever have imagined it? In what ways does remembering bring World War II. We wandered from one display you and your congregation hope? Why are case to the next, reading about each violin, As I left the museum that day, holding all stories told in your church –– to remind watching a film of the artist who lovingly these things in my heart, I turned back listeners of what they ought to do, or to restored these remarkable works of art, and looked at the building I was leaving. remind them of what God has done and will and listening to the voices of guides who It occurred to me that its simple beauty do? told the stories of the people who played and graceful strength might suggest the them in the most tragic circumstances one loveliness of the Temple long ago. I don’t can imagine. There were entire orchestras in the ghettos and camps, playing for the captors who demanded to be entertained, or providing a few last moments of beauty for prisoners on their way to their deaths. One musician handed his instrument to someone for safekeeping, saying, “At least the violin will survive.”

I left the museum with a heavy heart, but deeply moved by the stories I had heard: running through my mind were the words of Psalm 137, “On the willows there, we hung up our lyres …” The heartache and desolation of ancient exile resonated down through the centuries, but so did the persistent spirit that called the people of Israel to remember –– remember what God has done and what God has promised to do. Remember who you are, and remember to tell your children these stories so that they will remember, too.

Perhaps the greatest gift of remembering is the way it keeps something alive within us, and maybe even brings something back

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 53 Jan. 6, 2016

The visual centerpiece of a multicultural, leading cultural arts partners, approximately Violins of Hope leaves multi-institutional effort, the Maltz display 12 affiliate organizations and somewhere went up on Oct. 2, 2015, and came down around 50 funders. It probably can be done its legacy here Jan. 6. Besides the museum, that effort on a smaller scale, but we’ve set a high bar involved Case Western Reserve University, with this initiative.” by CARLO WOLFF The Cleveland Orchestra, the Cleveland Institute of Music, ideastream, Facing And what is its legacy? Violins of Hope, an unusually moving History and Ourselves, and the Jewish exhibition at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Federation of Cleveland. At its launch last “Amnon Weinstein’s passion and the Heritage, has left the Beachwood building Sept. 27, The Cleveland Orchestra allied stories behind the violins inspired each of after 82 days and attendance of nearly with Israeli violin virtuoso Shlomo Mintz in us to work internally to contribute the very 16,000, according to Ellen Rudolph, executive a sold-out concert inaugurating the Milton best to the project as a whole,” Rudolph director of the museum. Its legacy will and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at wrote. “In addition to the cross-pollination continue to resonate, Rudolph suggested. The Temple-Tifereth Israel on the western of audiences and the lasting educational edge of the CWRU campus in Cleveland. materials generated, I believe that Violins A tribute to stringed instruments that Mintz performed a Mendelssohn concerto of Hope Cleveland will serve as a model survived the Holocaust – and to the people on a Holocaust violin. for how our region can come together to who played them – Violins also attested to produce once-in-a-lifetime events and the devotion of Amnon Weinstein, the Tel Another highlight was the Dec. 6, 2015 experiences that continue to put Northeast Aviv violinmaker who has amassed nearly television broadcast about Violins of Hope Ohio on the world stage.” 60 of these instruments, mainly violins. on “CBS This Morning.” Weinstein lost hundreds of relatives in the Holocaust. His project is now a family affair. Will the exhibit just ended at the Maltz Museum travel to other museums? In an email, Rudolph said the project ranked among the top five of the 21 major “There has been interest from other exhibitions the Maltz Museum has mounted communities, especially since the ‘CBS since it opened in October 2005. Some drew Sunday Morning’ piece,” Rudolph wrote. more, but they also lasted longer. Rudolph “However, bringing the Violins of Hope here said this was second only to the museum’s and wrapping their appearance with music, opening exhibition, “Cradle to Christianity,” in educational, and artistic programming was the number of visitors per day. possible because of the efforts of seven

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 54 Jan. 15, 2016

Heights High students learn about Violins of Hope by CLEVELAND JEWISH NEWS

More than 30 Cleveland Heights High School students from the Lessons of the Holocaust course and the AFS Foreign Exchange club visited the Violins of Hope exhibit at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood in December.

The traveling exhibit includes 19 violins that survived the Holocaust in Europe. The trip was organized by Mark Sack, Lessons of the Holocaust teacher, and Carolyn Robb, AFS adviser.

“I felt it was important for the Heights High students and our international students Students from the Lessons of the Holocaust course and the AFS Foreign Exchange club at Cleveland Heights High to see and hear these special violins,” School visit the Violins of Hope exhibit at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood. Sack said in a press release. “The violins The museum docents for the student group are a powerful reminder of unimaginable were two Heights High retired teachers, experiences, but are also a testament to the Adrienne Yelsky and Mary Anne Brennan. resilience of the human spirit and the power of music to lift hearts and raise hopes for a The exhibit ended Jan. 3. better future.

“We want students to learn about our collective past, and we believe that the knowledge will help them create a better future for all humanity.”

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 55 Jan. 20, 2016

‘Violins of Hope’ project left deep, long-lasting impact on Northeast Ohio (analysis) by ZACHARY LEWIS

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Emotions ran high during “Violins of Hope.” Around those instruments pulled from the ashes of the Holocaust understandably flowed whole oceans of sentiment.

But the project, now ended, also bears up under cold scrutiny. Whether considered as an exhibit, musical program, educational effort or community collaboration, “Violins of Hope” stands as a marked success. the second-best-attended show in that “Cleveland went all in on this in a way that Fact is, “Violins of Hope” was one venue’s history. Project-wide, encounters was really impressive,” he said. “Maybe astonishing enterprise. surely numbered in the hundreds of that’s the main benefit: that other cities will thousands. look at this and say, ‘Oh yes, we can do this, “My orchestra, my temple, my city,” said too.’ “ Cleveland Orchestra education director Joan “[S]tudents...were able to connect with Katz Napoli, in reference to the “Violins of history in a powerful and visceral way,” said Equally significant was the way “Violins Hope” kickoff concert at the Maltz Center for Ellen Rudolph, executive director of the of Hope” rallied Cleveland’s nonprofit the Performing Arts at the Temple-Tifereth Maltz museum. “[T]he educational reach of sector. For once, individual missions barely Israel. “I’ve never been so proud of anything. the initiative was broad, and its impact will mattered. Through this project, groups that It just doesn’t get any better than that.” be long-lasting.” rarely if ever engage with each other learned to collaborate, and found acres of common Here’s the thing, though. It does, and did, get Cleveland as a whole certainly came out ground. better. For “Violins of Hope” was more than on top. In addition to the project itself just one event. It was an entire network. and the new Maltz Center, the Cleveland Now, should another such opportunity for In addition to its anchor exhibition and Orchestra’s “Violins of Hope” kickoff concert interdisciplinary partnership present itself, public performance, the project reached in September cast the entire city in a contacts and a working blueprint will already countless people through concerts, media favorable light, through positive reports be in place. coverage, related college courses, lectures, in national media and a feature on “CBS and ongoing work by schoolteachers in Sunday Morning.” “Every partner came so unselfishly to the classrooms across the region. table,” said Katz Napoli. “Everyone wanted Daniel Goldmark, a professor of music to participate at the highest level. It was Those affected, in other words, weren’t just at Case Western Reserve University and such a gift to be able to deal with content, the 2,000 who attended the opening concert teacher of a “Violins of Hope” course, said to focus on creating the best possible at the Maltz Center, or the 16,000 visitors Northeast Ohio emerged before the nation experience. We’re forever bound in new who made the exhibition at the Maltz as a beacon of civic initiative. ways.” Museum of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood

Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 56 Jan. 20, 2016

“Most of the students had very little background on the Holocaust before that,” Geller said. “For them, it was a meaningful way to understand and access the history of what happened. I think it helped elucidate many of the overall themes of the project.”

None of this would have been as effective without the violins.

Professors and schoolteachers could have taught lessons without “Violins of Hope.” The exhibition would have been stirring had the instruments remained under glass. The orchestra could have played any number of related concerts.

But as Bormann and thousands of others in Northeast Ohio can testify firsthand, the impact of seeing and hearing the instruments up close and in person turned what might have been an intellectual exercise into a profound, soul-stirring linkup One highlight of this broad partnership “It had this dark, throaty sound that gave with humanity. was an education concert, featuring the me chills,” recalled Bormann of the violin Cleveland Orchestra alongside actors selected for her by Amnon Weinstein, the “So many people have tried to keep what affiliated with Case Western Reserve Israeli violinmaker and repairman at the happened [in the Holocaust] in the public University and the Cleveland Play House. heart of “Violins of Hope.” “It actually made eye,” Goldmark said. “But this was a unique Pooling their resources, they put on a show my hair stand up a little bit. I felt like I was way of doing it. Having the actual violins melding words and music, and together really connecting with the past.” here made it really significant. People may left some 10,000 middle-school and high not even realize yet how visceral a thing it school students with a potent message of While Bormann and others were having was.” tolerance and proof of art’s power to trump their experiences, connections of a much evil. different but no less profound sort were being made nearby. “Without a doubt,” said Katz Napoli, “it was the most meaningful education concert In a classroom on the other side of Case in all my years. No student who saw that Western Reserve University, Goldmark performance will ever forget it. They’ll and fellow professor Jay Geller spent last always remember coming to Severance Hall semester teaching all sorts of novel lessons and learning about the ‘Violins of Hope.’ “ in “The Holocaust and the Arts,” a course based on the culture and history behind Only a few, of course, got the true best “Violins of Hope.” experience, the chance to actually hold and play the “Violins of Hope,” to feel their Would that everyone could enroll in such a weight, hear their sounds up close and course. After attending a dress rehearsal commune by touch with the spirits of their of the “Violins of Hope” kickoff concert, an former owners. eclectic bunch of students from across the university examined art in all its forms One such person was Katherine Bormann, during the Holocaust, and how such art was a violinist in the Cleveland Orchestra. For presented. They also saw and applied what her, and undoubtedly all others in the they learned at the Holocaust Memorial orchestra and the select few students at Center, outside Detroit. the Cleveland Institute of Music and Baldwin Wallace Conservatory permitted to handle The course, an elective open to all, may or the instruments, “Violins of Hope” was may not reappear on the school’s academic nothing short of life-changing. calendar. Without question, though, the professors said they believe the class they Violins of Hope Cleveland | Media Hits 57 taught left a deep impact.