Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion is thrilled to present a special Q&A with HUC-JIR faculty member Cantor Gerald Cohen, the composer of Steal a Pencil for Me, an opera in two acts that captures one of the Holocaust’s most poignant love stories. Created by Cantor Cohen and librettist Deborah Brevoort, the opera is set against […]
Pittsfield High string quartet channels a dark but defiant corner of music history in ‘Playing for Our Lives’ Posted Monday, July 15, 2019 6:42 pm, Berkshire Eagle By Jenn Smith Here for link to original article in the Berkshire Eagle LENOX — Out of one of the darkest eras in human history, the Holocaust, rose some powerful musical performances […]
The world premiere of Steal a Pencil for Me opens this Thursday evening—and few people know better than Opera Colorado Music Director Ari Pelto the long and exciting process of getting this new opera ready for the stage. Over the past five years, he’s spent countless hours working through the piece with composer Gerald Cohen and librettist Deborah Brevoort, then working with stage director Omer Ben Seadia and her creative team as they got the production ready. And now, after a breakneck rehearsal schedule over the past month, Pelto is thrilled for Opera Colorado audiences who are just days away from experiencing the beautiful music and powerful message of Steal a Pencil for Me. Today we check in with Pelto about his experiences with this opera…
The real life story for a new opera was right under composer Gerald Cohen’s nose. As cantor of the Shaarei Tikvah synagogue in Scarsdale, New York, Cohen had known Holocaust survivors Ina and Jaap Polak — members of the congregation there — for over twenty years when he conceived the idea of setting their story to music. Their romance inside a concentration camp had already been the basis of a film documentary called ” Steal a Pencil for Me,” and Cohen easily convinced the couple to consent to and participate in an operatic retelling. But Jaap was 97 at the time and Ina 87, so they urged him to write it quickly. The two were among a group of Dutch Jews deported to the Bergen-Belsen camp in the last year of World War II…
Gerald Cohen on Music, Religion, and the Bridge Between by Molly Sheridan Westchester Prize-winning composer Gerald Cohen is a cantor at Temple Shaarei Tikvah in Scarsdale, New York, and when I spoke with him, I have to admit that I was most curious about what that means with regard to his music. What it is […]