Playing to Death's tune

Music was heard in many of the concentration camps and ghettos throughout Nazi Europe. It was used as a symbol of comradeship amongst the Jews throughout the extreme poverty, depression and the death that surrounded them. Ghetto songs could be used as a diversion from reality and to keep traditions going.

Though songs from before the war were still sung, life in the ghettos and concentration camps led to new songs usually with no accompaniment. Many Jewish musicians had sold their instruments for money or food in and before they were moved to the ghettos and many instruments had been stolen by the Germans. These songs were often inspired by the latest gossip and news. However some of the songs were personal experiences that often included the death of friends or family or of their treatment by the Germans.

However, some instruments were played in the ghettos. Though not as common, classical music and instrumental work was also composed and performed in some ghettos and labour camps.  For many of the Nazi victims, music was an important means of preserving their humanity. This music is a form of audio historical documentation telling of the emotions and events that their authors experienced.

Street songs were a style of  ghetto music, emphasising four dominant themes: hunger, corrupt administration, hope for freedom, and a call for revolt. A majority of ghetto street songs were sung to preexisting melodies, a technique known as contra fact. Contra fact became necessary because composers couldn't generate new music fast enough for all of the lyrics being written.

At some of the death camps the Nazis created orchestras of prisoner musicians, making them play while their fellow prisoners marched to the gas chambers. Many musicians were forced to watch as their friends and families walked past them to their death. Auschwitz alone had six orchestras, one orchestra was thought to contain 100-120 musicians.

Resistance songs:

Out of all the songs sung in the ghetto the song of the Partisans by Hirsh Glik was the one that spread like wildfire. "Zog nit keynmol az du geyst dem letstn vet" ("Never Say that You Are Trodding the Final Path"). This song became one of the official resistance hymns of the Eastern European partisan  brigades. It was translated into Hebrew, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Romanian, Dutch, and English. It was a well known song in many of the concentration camps.

One member of an Auschwitz woman's orchestra was named Fania Fenelon. In her book 'Playing for time' she describes that though she had clean clothes and daily showers, she was made to play "gay, light music and marching music for hours on end while our eyes witnessed the marching of thousands of people to the gas chambers and ovens."

 

Sources:

fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/arts/MUSVICTI.htm

Picture-Mauthausen Concentration Camp orchestra