The work of a poet who perished after being transported to Auschwitz inspires a unique event of music this autumn.
Prof Julian Marshall has composed five works under the collective name of The Welten Project, inspired by poetry by Gertrud Kolmar, who was arrested and sent to Auschwitz concentration camp in 1943.
On Friday 3 October, Marshall will the share the story and process of the project and play a specially curated playlist at an evening at Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh, Suffolk.
Kolmar was born in December 1894 into a Jewish family in Berlin. After training as a teacher, she worked with orphaned and disadvantaged children, later working as a governess. Following her mother’s death in 1930, she Gertrud assumed full-time responsibilities for the family household.
Here she wrote novels, a historical study of Robespierre, and several cycles of poetry, including the Welten (Worlds) in 1937. In 1941 she was conscripted to a munitions’ factory, two years before she was herself was arrested and deported to Auschwitz.
“Towards the end of 2024, I began to feel that an event offering some sort of consolidation and contextualisation of Welten Project works written so far would be worth exploring. I had for some time become aware that from each of the five existing works there could be drawn a kind of distilled, concentrated playlist – a carefully curated compilation that could become a new ‘whole work’ in of itself,” said Prof Marshall.
The music will include recorded performances by James Gilchrist, Melanie Pappenheim, Miranda Ostler, Avigal Tlalim, Louisa Clein, Sophie Harris, Lucy Railton, Raj Bhaumik, Philharmonia Orchestra cellos (sextet), The Rupa Ensemble, and Schoolhouse 6 Ensemble – conducted by Howard Moody.
- Visit the Jubilee Hall Ticketsource for more details and tickets.
