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The Waltz King
Amid celebrations marking the
100th anniversary of his death, composer
Johann Strauss'Jewish roots emerge.
TIALATIRE DE 5 VARIETES
7
Sunday, April 25, 1999 • 4:00 p.m
Kahn Building, West Bloomfield
Members: $5 / Non-Members: $8
This classical pianist is well-known
in the Detroit area. You may have
heard him on WOMC and WJR
radio. He has played for President
Clinton, now he will play for you!
This is a family show for
ages 10 and up!
Co-Sponsored by:
Jewish Educator's Council &
4/16
1999
Dou BLETREE
GUEST SUITES'
D.tTROIT . SDUrnrlttD.
Funded in part by: Manny & Natalie
Charach'Endowment Fund, Haddow
Endowment for the Arts,DeRoy
Testamentary Foundation, Boaz
Siegel Culture Fund, Benard L.
Maas Foundation, Hiram
Dorfman and David Engelbert
Trustees, and the Ray and
Atara Zimmerman
Philanthropic Fund.
* Accommodations provided
by the DoubleTree Guest
Suites of Southfield.
86 Detroit Jewish News
museums continued to hide the corn-
poser's roots.
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Strauss' third wife, Adele, was
s Austrian organizers plan
Jewish, as was his surviving stepdaugh-
celebrations to mark the cen-
ter, Alice Meisner-Strauss.
tenary of the death of "Waltz
After the war, she was given back
King" Johann Strauss in
some of the family possessions that
June, reports are emerging that when
had been appropriated by the
the Nazis co-opted Strauss as a great
Germans and by Austria's pro-Nazi
regime, but she was imme-
"German" composer and
diately instructed to sell
incorporated his music into
them back cheaply to the
the pantheon of Teutonic
A poster for a
French production
cultural achievements, they
city museum.
of Johann Strauss'
In particular, the poverty-
carefully airbrushed out his
"Die Fledermaus."
stricken Meisner-Strauss was
Jewish ancestry.
ordered to return the jewel of
According to Otto
the collection — Strauss's
Brusatti, head of Vienna's
music collection, it had been "general-
handwritten score of the comic opera
ly understood" that Strauss was of
Die Fledermaus — as a "gift" to the
Jewish descent, but when Hitler came
museum.
to power, Austria's pro-Nazi leaders
Now, with the approaching centen-
arranged for the removal of a baptism
nial celebrations, there are growing
book from the city's cathedral that
demands for family heirlooms, esti-
documented Strauss' Jewish roots.
mated by Brusatti to be worth some
Brusatti also charged that after the
$30 million, to be handed back to
war, officials in charge of Vienna's
Strauss' descendants.
DOUGLAS DAVIS
A