How did composers and musicians persecuted by Hitler go on to shape the soundscape of the last century? Some fled Germany, navigating xenophobia and entirely different creative terrain. Others were forced to create under a ruthless dictatorship or in concentration camps and ghettos.

In The Music of Exile Michael Haas sensitively records the story of this musical diaspora, torn between old and new worlds, from the musicians interned as enemy aliens in the UK to the Hollywood compositions of Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Kurt Weill’s stage work. The Exilarte Centre co-founder, previously music curator at Vienna’s Jewish Museum, talks with classical music writer Jessica Duchen.

An event from Jewish Book Week 2024