38 April 11 • 2019
jn

continued from page 36

Students from MSU’
s University Chorale and State Singers will perform at the concert.

arts&life

during the time he lived, still could 
see beyond his own ideas, and he 
happened to like Jewish folk music,” 
she says. “The melodies were so jolly 
yet a story being told may not be 
happy. He studied this, came across 
the Babi Yar tragedy and worked 
with the poet.”
Michael Serling explains there was 
a great deal of censorship in the post-
war Soviet Union, so Shostakovich 
had to show strength in completing 
the symphony.
“He didn’
t want to compromise 
it,” Serling says. “The way I under-
stand the piece, it’
s very defiant of 
anti-Semitism in the world. He’
s 
trying to make a statement about 
how horrible anti-Semitism is, 
and it’
s very timely. We’
ve not seen 
anti-Semitism unfolding as it is in 
a long time. We hope that the piece 
will stand against bigotry, racism and 
anti-Semitism.”
Simon will cover the history of the 
massacres at Babi Yar in the broader 
history of the Holocaust and also the 
contextual history of “I Never Saw 
Another Butterfly,” discussing why 
the place and time of the children’
s 
poems were so critical in the overall 
history of the Holocaust.
“I’
d like people to come away 
with not just the knowledge but the 
feeling of the gravity and enormity 
of what happened to Jews in the 
moment and more widely during the 
Holocaust and what was lost,” Simon 
explains. “The second piece, about 
Theresienstadt and young kids who 
were writing poetry and were enor-

mously talented, [points out] what 
was lost in terms of numbers and 
individual potential.”
Bartig will give his perspective as 
context for listening to the pieces.
“The Shostakovich work is com-
plex, and it has a very interesting 
history — both in Soviet history 
and Shostakovich’
s personal history,” 
Bartig says. “We’
ll try to place this 
program both in commemoration of 
culture and Soviet history. 
“I’
ll be placing the symphony in 
Shostakovich’
s own career — how 
he came to write it, how he came to 
collaborate with Yevtushenko and the 
circumstances of its premiere in 1962.
“I’
d like audiences to experience 
what a powerful medium music can 
be for commemoration. The whole 
program is about different aspects of 
commemoration.” ■

details
The first presentation of “Shostakovich Babi Yar: Remembering the Holocaust” 
will begin at 7 p.m. Saturday, April 27, at the Wharton Center for the Performing Arts 
in East Lansing. $16-$18. 1-800 -WHARTON. whartoncenter.com. The second 
will begin at 2 p.m. Sunday, April 28, at Orchestra Hall in Detroit. $18. 
(313) 576-5111. dso.org.

Guest baritone soloist Mark Rucker 

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