Credit: Music at Kohl
The San Francisco Bay Area is hosting the Violins of Hope project through March 15 in a series of concerts, lectures and exhibitions at various venues including Music at Kohl Mansion, a concert series located in a majestic building on the campus of Mercy High School in Burlingame that was built in 1914 and now owned and sponsored by the Sisters of Mercy.
Violins of Hope is the brainchild of Amnon Weinstein who, along with his son Avshalom has dedicated over twenty years to restoring violins that were once played in solo, chamber music or Klezmer repertoire in ghettos and at Nazi concentration camps by European Jews who were imprisoned during the Second World War. Many did not survive the holocaust but some of their instruments did and found their way into Weinstein’s atelier in Tel Aviv where he began a mission of restoration and remembrance.
The collection houses around 80 instruments, mostly violins with a few violas and cellos and some were used during a January 18 concert at Music at Kohl Mansion – of which the same program was repeated the next day. Highlighting the evening was the world premiere of Intonations: Songs from the Violins of Hope by Jake Heggie and librettist Gene Sheer (of Moby Dick and It’s a Wonderful Life fame) with mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke, violinist Daniel Hope and a quartet of players from the San Francisco Opera Orchestra.
Russell Bartoli reviewed the concert. He is a San Francisco-based cellist and chamber musician. He is a member of the Grace Note Chamber Players, Co-Director of the Golden Gate Chamber Players and Co-Principal cello of the Bay Area Rainbow Symphony in San Francisco. He received a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Southern California and studied with Gabor Rejto, Laszlo Varga and Lawrence Lesser.
Saturday evening I attended a unique concert in the cultural life of the San Francisco Bay Area. It was a concert at the Kohl Mansion in Burlingame which was the opening event in a series called Violins of Hope. The title is taken from the book Violins of Hope: Violins of the Holocaust - Instruments of Hope and Liberation in Mankind’s Darkest Hour by James Grymes (Harper Collins, 2014). Grymes recounts the work of Amnon and Avshalom Weinstein, the father-son Israeli luthiers who gather and lovingly restore some 80 violins and a few violas and cellos that were played on by Jewish prisoners of German concentration camps during the Second World War.
One by one these instruments were brought to Weinstein’s workshop in Tel Aviv where he and his son took a deep breath and began to collect and repair them. The story behind each and its owner or player has been researched and the collection has been shown in exhibitions worldwide. It is difficult to imagine that these instruments were once played near Nazi gas chambers in camps such as Auschwitz, leaving ashes inside the interior for the Weinstein’s to deal with decades later.
But the violin has always represented a symbol of high European culture, especially among European Jews where the bond between instrument and player became spiritual. One can go on and on about some of the greatest exponents such as Heifetz, Milstein, Oistrakh, Elman, Menuhin, Perlman, Zuckerman.
The concert began with Avshalom Weinstein’s introductory talk about the genesis of the project which cast a serious and regenerative feel to the evening – with Amnon Weinstein and James Grymes looking on. The instruments used were carefully selected by the performers from the Violins of Hope collection.
The outstanding local musicians from the San Francisco Opera Orchestra included violinists Kay Stern (the Opera Orchestra’s concertmaster), Dawn Harms (Music Director of the Bay Area Rainbow Symphony), violist Patricia Heller and cellist Emil Miland. The instruments used were German made and of fine quality. In the resonant main hall of the Kohl mansion with its cathedral-like ceiling, each sounded rich and warm. For example, the cello had a golden brown varnish and its tone was deep and penetrating.
The concert’s first half was devoted to two string quartets in Schubert’s Quartettsatz in C minor and Mendelssohn’s quartet, Op. 80, one of his last works. The Quartettsatz is a fleet single movement piece in 6/8 time and largely a showpiece for the first violin, namely Kay Stern. It alternates between dramatic 16-note passages and lyrical melodies that modulate to remote areas. The Nazi’s banned Mendelssohn’s works making this quartet seem all the more appropriate for the program.
Mendelssohn’s Op. 80 is the composer’s darkest and most serious work and written as a tribute to his late sister Fanny, herself a composer of great ability. In both the first movement and the Finale there are anguished cries and declamations from all four instruments which seem to melt into passages of tender resignation. And the touching slow movement is a profession of brotherly love for Fanny. Both the Schubert and Mendelssohn quartets were given an interpretation filled with lustrous sonority and convincing expressivity. The players seemed to transcend the difficulties of using these precious restored instruments for the first time and were able to draw out a beautiful blending of sound.
After intermission, Jake Heggie’s Intonations: Songs from the Violins of Hope was given a premiere by the San Francisco Opera Orchestra members, violinist Daniel Hope (Artistic Director of the New Century Chamber Orchestra among other posts), and Grammy award winning mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke. The work is a song cycle to texts by Gene Scheer that contain 7 song movements: Ashes, Exile, Concert, Motele, Feivel and Lament, for string quartet alone. Heggie is a master of the art song and knows how to set the English language for voice with clarity and sensitivity. His writing is tonal, approachable, neo-romantic and eclectic and as such, wins appreciation from the public and singers and string players, as well.
Intonations draws from Hebraic melodies as well as numerous quotations from Mendelssohn’s violin concerto – and each vocal movement tells the story of a particular violin and concentration camp inmate who played it. Settings include a violinist who played across from a gas chamber and one who was forced to play at a Nazi officers club. Cooke filled the cavernous room with a velvety and focused tone in bringing expressive nuances to the text – as did Hope who drew out an amazing tonal command that elevated the many soliloquy-like solo passages to new heights in collaboration with the restored instrument.
After the closing movement Liberation was performed Sean Mori, a 17 year old violinist walked on stage to join Hope in a duet which symbolized the rise of future generations that carry on the legacy of concentration camp victims and survivors. The music and text of Heggie’s work made an immediate connection with the audience who gave a spontaneous standing ovation – understanding that the Violins of Hope project is a testament to the humanity and courage of those who were part of one of history’s darkest hours.
A champagne and dessert reception followed. The concert was recorded for a future television broadcast. Note from Editor Leonne Lewis: The Violins of Hope project is coming to Southern California March and April with venues that include The Soraya (California State University, Northridge) and the Long Beach Symphony.