The hulking, tragic ruins of the synagogue in Brody, Ukraine were the backdrop for a memorial symphonic concert honoring the great Jewish writer Joseph Roth, who was born in Brody 125 years ago (when it was at the eastern edge of the Austro-Hungarian Empire). He died in Paris 80 years ago. The centerpiece of the program was the 1963 Symphony No. 3 — “Kaddish,” by the American composer Leonard Bernstein.
The concert August 4 inaugurated the LvivMozArt classical music festival, whose theme this year was “music and literature,” with Roth and his work the protagonist. Festival director Oksana Lyniv conducted the Inso-Lviv Youth orchestra and two choirs in the performance.
“The setting of tonight’s event couldn’t be better chosen — the destroyed synagogue of Brody, once one of the biggest Jewish temples in eastern Europe, which lets us reflect also on some of the darkest times of the 20th century and renew our eternal vow — never again,” Austrian Embassy first secretary Florian Kohlfürst said in an introductory speech. (The Austrian government supported the concert project, as part of the Austria-Ukraine Cultural Year 2019.)
For the concert, a big stage, with lighting and powerful sound system, was constructed in front of the gaping ruins of the synagogue in order to accommodate 200 performers — the full orchestra, soloists, and choirs. Rows of seats were set up in front.
While some critics expressed concern that the funding could have better been spent in efforts to preserve the synagogue ruins, others applauded the event for drawing attention to the synagogue and to the Jewish history of Brody. As we wrote in 2017, it is only recently that signage has been put up and other information published highlighting local Jewish history.
In addition to the concert, a bronze bust of Roth was unveiled. An assimilated Jew, Roth was a novelist, journalist, and essayist who traveled widely throughout Europe including to East European Jewish shtetl communities in the 1920s. A sense of exile, despair and displacement in the wake of the Empire’s post World War I disintegration, Jewish assimilation and loss of tradition, and the the Nazi rise to power permeated his work — he fled Berlin for Paris after the 1933 Nazi takeover. His bestknown novel was the 1932 Radetzky March, a family saga chronicling the decline and fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Watch a video of the entire concert (including opening speeches) posted on YouTube by the Lviv City Council:
Read an article in German about the concert
2 comments on “Ukraine: Memorial concert for the author Joseph Roth is held at the hulking ruins of the synagogue in Brody, Ukraine — the town he was born in 125 years ago. Centerpiece is Leonard Bernstein’s “Kaddish””
Been there, done that … My group of Copenhagen visitors to selected Ukrainian cities this summer were glad to know of this gesture.
Roth was a very great writer and a great European, like his close friend Stefan Zweig. They both met tragic
ends, Roth as an achoholic in Paris and Zweig a disillusioned suicide in Brazil. Thankfully, the work of both
of these writers is now being widely translated and published in England and America. Roth’s novels and short stories, in particular, are a joy to read. New readers can expect much pleasure from the work of both writers.