Ruth Leon recommends… Orchestra of Exiles – Bronislaw Huberman
Ruth Leon recommendsOrchestra of Exiles – Bronislaw Huberman
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This week, when we remember those who died in the Holocaust in Europe, comes this excellent documentary about those who didn’t die, thanks to the efforts of one man. The great violinist Bronislaw Huberman, seeing that the Nazis were decimating German orchestras by denying Jewish musicians work, decided to put his fame and commitment towards saving as many as possible by forming a new orchestra in Palestine.
Giving up his own career for the duration, he combed Eastern Europe, gathering the best Jewish musicians from Poland, Germany, Austria, and Holland, and fighting to get them certificates that would allow them to leave Europe and come to the desert land where there was nothing but sand and the possibility of making music again. This land became Israel and this orchestra became the Israel Philharmonic, still one of the world’s great orchestras.
There are interviews with many who were there at the start and with today’s international stars, all still associated with the IPO – Pinchas Zukerman, Itzchak Perlman, Zubin Mehta, Joshua Bell (who now plays Huberman’s Stradivarius), and many others – and there is music playing throughout.
It’s such a heart-warming story of adversity and triumph against the background of one of the darkest periods in our history. This week and always, remember the Holocaust and remember too those, who like Huberman, shone a light into the darkness.
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