Arriving at the Prosserman JCC in search of the Leah Posluns Theatre for the Likht Ensemble’s The Shoah Songbook, I had a sneaking suspicion that I’d somehow arrived at the wrong place. There is a large campus around the Jewish community centre, after all, and perhaps I was meant to be looking for some smaller outbuilding. There seemed to be plenty of activity inside, but while I could see children coming and going out of a gym I wasn’t seeing anything that looked overmuch like a theatre. The locked door wasn’t exactly encouraging either.
As it turns out I’d simply tried to enter at the wrong side of the building. When I made my way around to the correct entrance I could see the name “Leah Posluns Theatre” clear as day on the side of the building. I again felt slightly out of my element as a security guard checked my name off a list before letting me in, but once inside I found the theatre just fine.
Before I start talking about the actual show, in which pianist Nate Ben-Horin and soprano Jaclyn Grossman played some compelling repertoire of Holocaust-era Jewish compositions, I’ll make one further comment on the venue. I was quite struck by how lively the space was with other activity on what was, to be frank, a pretty miserable Saturday evening. The JCC is a lovely spot and plainly has a great deal of diverse programming going on. I’m probably not going to make the hike all the way from Broadview for next weekend’s Rob Reiner tribute screening of When Harry Met Sally, but hey, if you’re already in North York why not give it a go?
The program began with a rendition of the oh-so-familiar “Oyfn Pripetchik”: familiar enough for even a lapsed Roman Catholic to thoroughly recognize. This was done with a somber intensity, which nicely set the tone for what was to come. Thereafter the Shoah-specific programming commenced with a set of songs from Edwin Geist, whose handwritten compositions were saved by a friend after his death. These built up some dramatic intensity that was well complemented by the following piece “Zingst un Tantst in Ridelekh” by an unknown composer. This piece about singing and dancing1 had a playful and animated sound though it came to a disquieting and ominous ending, its ostensibly jocular topic undercut by the bad omen of the SS upstairs.
The night’s program took us through a complicated musical terrain, featuring pleasant segments frequently undercut by that ever-present sense of foreboding. This having been said, the repertoire, if emotionally fraught at times, was not entirely downbeat. Rather what was striking about it was the range of feeling, often hopeful rather than morose, that animated the proceedings throughout. Of course, even in the most dire of circumstances human beings and their art are nothing if not multifaceted and the work had plenty of contrast and variety.
Speaking of contrast, the first half of the recital closed with a set of two songs more or less centered on springtime. Rather than presenting the typically pleasant bucolic images of nature coming to life, these pieces had a sense of violent awakening to them.2 Viktor Ullmann’s “Wendla im Garten” confronted us with a striking and tumultuous sound, and some particularly piercing notes from the ensemble seemed to send a jolt through the room. The duo also made a decision to play Abraham Brudno’s “Friling”3 at a speedier and upbeat pace that eventually verged on manic and, to my mind at least, brought the season’s threatening vitality into focus.
The seasonal structure continued after intermission with some more summery sounds. A highlight in this segment was Martin Roman’s lively “Karussel”, during which an array of lights lit up on the piano and across the stage to amplify the number’s scintillating carnivalesque atmosphere. Violinist Daniel Temnik joined for a couple numbers as well, and made for a welcome addition throughout the pieces where he and his expressive playing were featured.
Kicking off the next autumnal section was a Polonaise by Szymon Laks, whose musical skills helped him to survive the camps in his role as head conductor at Auschwitz. The slightly dirge-like (or so I found it) “Der Herbst ist da!” by Leon Kaczmarek followed the Polonaise: this was a surviving piece that the ensemble had evidently unearthed in their researches. Perhaps I needn’t belabour the point but it is quite something to be exposed to art that survived such cataclysmic horror.
Finally, and all too fitting for this time of year, winter came to the stage. The last few songs were bookended by dramatically different tones, as Miriam Harel’s “Kalt” brought the bleakness of winter in the ghetto to life. Still, we did not finish the evening in a dejected mood: Rather the final piece of the night was “Vayl ikh bin a Yidale”, which closed things on a defiant note. This song, which the performers described as embodying sarcastic Yiddish humour, had a punchy and combative sound to it that they played for all it was worth.
The Shoah Songbook made for a genuinely entertaining evening of music regardless of its topical relevance. The pieces had much to recommend them, and due credit must be given to the work of Nate Ben-Horin in arranging many of these selections. I hardly need to mention that Jaclyn Grossman’s voice is something to write home about when she gets going, but I’ll say it anyway. She was as always a commanding presence through all the highs and lows of the performance.
I see that The Shoah Songbook is en route to Montreal and the Musée des beaux-arts next weekend for what promises to be a somewhat different program. So, I guess if you’re closer to Montreal than to North York on Sunday you might as well skip When Harry Met Sally and check out the Likht Ensemble instead.
Surely you put that much together from the “Zingst un Tantst” portion of the title, right?
As someone who’s chronically out of sorts when the weather starts to warm up, I can sympathize
With an arrangement by Nate Ben-Horin, the program informs us