Walter Traprock
2007-02-16 05:39:57 UTC
Excerpt from:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2006/Jan06/Hatto2_recordings.htm
Rene Kohler
A survivor of the Holocaust gone missing in the murky wastelands
and unspoken history of Cold War Europe, Rene Kohler (1926-2002)
conducted Joyces concerto recordings during the 90s, directing two
ad-hoc studio orchestras the National Philharmonic-Symphony and
the 68-strong Warsaw Philharmonia.
Brought up in Weimar, Rene was a pupil of Raoul Koczalski [1884-1948,
via his teacher Mikuli a direct descendent by tutelage of Chopin].
He was precocious, playing both Chopin concertos by the age of ten.
In 1936, through Koczalskis recommendation, he briefly continued
studying music at the Jagiellonian University of Krakow. Failing
to be awarded a government scholarship, he moved to Warsaw. In the
Polish capital, unable to join the Conservatoire because of his
Jewish faith, he studied privately with the pianist Stanislaw
Spinalski. In 1940 his left hand was crushed irreparably by a young
German officer, so-called. He survived the Ghetto but in the summer
of 1942 was deported to Treblinka [one of around 300,000 "resettled"
over a period of 52 days between July and September]. Here [or in
the vicinity - one of less than a hundred believed to have survived]
he was found by the advancing Red Army [circa 1944]. Unimpressed
by his mixture of Polish/French and German-Jewish stock, his Soviet
interrogator sent him on a train heading East for a labour camp -
where he remained from 1945 until 1970. Given his freedom, he
returned to Warsaw, with the help of a Russian friend, to try and
sort out his family property. He learnt that a small-holding,
confiscated by the Nazis in 1940/41, had been allocated to a German
family as part of a "Resettlement" scheme. Exacting
"justice"/revenge/retribution on the resettled family in 1945 (they
were killed), the new Polish government then impounded the place,
later to form an integral part of a Communist Party Commune. Rene
found that the Polish authorities refused to recognise the name
"Kohler" as having Polish associations. Their Soviet counterparts
meanwhile denied they'd ever "captured" or held him prisoner. The
East Germans were not interested in the case, claiming that the
Kohlers had left the Weimar area in 1936 of their own "freewill".
In fact they'd fled, an old professor at the Hochschule (whose son
was a Nazi Party member) having warned them, at personal risk,
that they should leave Weimar since all Jews were to be rounded up
the following year to be sent East. Three of the family had already
been murdered. Rene kept such things to himself. He never desired
any attention from the media. Physically he was a mess - probably
why he used to add to his age to account for his appearance. He
died from prostate cancer. [WB-C, adapted]
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2006/Jan06/Hatto2_recordings.htm
Rene Kohler
A survivor of the Holocaust gone missing in the murky wastelands
and unspoken history of Cold War Europe, Rene Kohler (1926-2002)
conducted Joyces concerto recordings during the 90s, directing two
ad-hoc studio orchestras the National Philharmonic-Symphony and
the 68-strong Warsaw Philharmonia.
Brought up in Weimar, Rene was a pupil of Raoul Koczalski [1884-1948,
via his teacher Mikuli a direct descendent by tutelage of Chopin].
He was precocious, playing both Chopin concertos by the age of ten.
In 1936, through Koczalskis recommendation, he briefly continued
studying music at the Jagiellonian University of Krakow. Failing
to be awarded a government scholarship, he moved to Warsaw. In the
Polish capital, unable to join the Conservatoire because of his
Jewish faith, he studied privately with the pianist Stanislaw
Spinalski. In 1940 his left hand was crushed irreparably by a young
German officer, so-called. He survived the Ghetto but in the summer
of 1942 was deported to Treblinka [one of around 300,000 "resettled"
over a period of 52 days between July and September]. Here [or in
the vicinity - one of less than a hundred believed to have survived]
he was found by the advancing Red Army [circa 1944]. Unimpressed
by his mixture of Polish/French and German-Jewish stock, his Soviet
interrogator sent him on a train heading East for a labour camp -
where he remained from 1945 until 1970. Given his freedom, he
returned to Warsaw, with the help of a Russian friend, to try and
sort out his family property. He learnt that a small-holding,
confiscated by the Nazis in 1940/41, had been allocated to a German
family as part of a "Resettlement" scheme. Exacting
"justice"/revenge/retribution on the resettled family in 1945 (they
were killed), the new Polish government then impounded the place,
later to form an integral part of a Communist Party Commune. Rene
found that the Polish authorities refused to recognise the name
"Kohler" as having Polish associations. Their Soviet counterparts
meanwhile denied they'd ever "captured" or held him prisoner. The
East Germans were not interested in the case, claiming that the
Kohlers had left the Weimar area in 1936 of their own "freewill".
In fact they'd fled, an old professor at the Hochschule (whose son
was a Nazi Party member) having warned them, at personal risk,
that they should leave Weimar since all Jews were to be rounded up
the following year to be sent East. Three of the family had already
been murdered. Rene kept such things to himself. He never desired
any attention from the media. Physically he was a mess - probably
why he used to add to his age to account for his appearance. He
died from prostate cancer. [WB-C, adapted]