We are presenting a number of concerts to provide context and prepare for Kaddish: The Holocaust Memorial premiere by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra on Thursday 31 October 2024 in Hamer Hall.

The next concert, Lost Love Songs will be performed at 6.30pm on 25 July 2024 in Melbourne (see flyer below).

The concert will be the first modern performances of love songs and other works by Erwin Schulhoff, Heinz Lewin (aka Heinz Letton), CS Taube and James Simon, all killed during the Holocaust. Also Leo Kok, who survived but whose hands were ruined by Nazi torturers, ending his musical career. Accompanied by projected images by murdered Jewish artists, including Felix Nussbaum, Otto Freundlich, Charlotte Salomon and Malva Schalek.

This unique concert’s legacy is the cultural recovery of so many manuscripts which Dr Peggy Polias (Head Engraver for The Flowers of Peace) and Dr Cyrus Meurant have typeset, the best of which will be performed and recorded, with all materials created being gifted freely to encourage and enable future performances. We do so to mark 80 years since the execution of so many important Jewish musicians and artists from Terezin / Theresienstadt, in Auschwitz in the 2nd half of 1944.

This concert is part of the Flowers of Peace’s Music of Memory series - Chris Latham’s artist-in-residence output for the Australian War Memorial, with whom Alan Hicks and Christina Wilson have performed and recorded extensively over the last decade.

The concert will be performed without applause.