World Jewish Congress President Ronald S. Lauder on Wednesday hosted the debut performance and album launch of Kamp! Songs and Satire From Theresienstadt at his Neue Galerie in Manhattan on Wednesday. The album is a reconstruction of songs and cabaret acts all written by Jewish artists imprisoned in the concentration camp during World War II.
In the midst of intolerable conditions in the Theresienstadt concentration camp during WWII, some of Europe’s most famous musicians, composers and cabaret stars decided to keep on writing, composing and performing satires and songs in order to entertain and distract their fellow inmates from the atrocities surrounding them. All of the lyrics and most of the music for Kamp! were written by the inmates between 1942 and 1944. These musicians included Leo Straus, Ilse Weber, Karel Svenk, Manfred Greifenhagen, Otto Skutecky and Kurt Gerron.
In October 1992, the well-known Austrian actor and director Alexander Waechter told the story of his great-uncle “Remy” in Chansons und Satiren aus Theresienstadt, a tragic but also ironic production for three performers – man, woman and pianist. All the lyrics and poems came straight from Theresienstadt’s barracks, and original melodies were carefully restored.
The KAMP! Cabaret has carefully reconstructed the pieces, which blend operetta, cabaret and classical music. Some of the poems and cabaret acts were set to music by Sergei Dreznin and Gerhard Bronner between1992 and 2001.
This is the first time such a broad selection of songs has been released in an English adaptation. Lyrics were translated by Tom Neile, according to the true Berlin and Vienna cabaret tradition.
The project is aimed at commemorating and keeping this incredible material alive.
To hear a sampling of the album, click here. Requests for a copy of the album should be sent to media@worldjewishcongress.org.
