April 23, 2025By Clive Paget Man’s inhumanity to man is also at the heart of Gerald Cohen’s opera Steal a Pencil for Me. Based on the true story of Holocaust survivors Jaap and Ina Polak, a couple whom Cohen knew personally, the source material is letters that passed secretly from one to the other while […]
All Music Reviews ‘Steal a Pencil for Me’
By James Manheim The idea of a love story set in the Nazi concentration camps during World War I seems unexpected in the extreme… Yet the story here is true, and before this opera by Gerald Cohen, it was covered in a 2007 documentary, also titled Steal a Pencil for Me. Jaap Polak and Ina […]
The Whole Note Reviews ‘Steal a Pencil for Me’
April 2025Gerald Cohen – Steal a Pencil for MeOpera Colorado; Ari PeltoSono Luminus SLE-20034 The evil Nazi era of the 30s and 40s stole more than six million lives. But that Holocaust during World War II held many miracles in secret. One of these unfolds on this exquisite double-disc, in a deeply expressive opera with […]
Steal a Pencil for Me: The New Recording of an Important Opera Composed by an Assistant Professor in the H. L. Miller Cantorial School
The New Recording of an Important Opera Composed by a Jewish Theological Seminary Assistant Professor in the H. L. Miller Cantorial School The recording of Steal a Pencil for Me, an opera by composer Gerald Cohen (Assistant Professor, H. L. Miller Cantorial School) and librettist Deborah Brevoort, has just been released on Sono Luminus Recordings. Read […]
American Record Guide review of Voyagers
Review by Barry KilpatrickJan-Feb 2024American Record Guide (Vol. 87, Issue 1) COHEN: Voyagers; Playing for Our Lives; Preludes & Debka Narek Arutyunian, cl; Colin Williams, trb; Cassatt Quartet. innova Recordings 090. 65 minutes Here is the Cassatt Quartet in works by Gerald Cohen. Two are collaborations with soloists. The 4-movement, 29-minute Voyagers (2017) has clarinetist […]
‘Voyagers’ Review in Gapplegate Classical-Modern Music Review
Read the full review at Gerald Cohen, Voyagers, New Music for String Quartet, Clarinet and Trombone, Gapplegate Classical-Modern Music Review. “What matters in the end is the authentic and dedicated performativity of it all, the highly crafted and careful building of a particular work from the ground up with great care, skill, and eloquently inventive […]
Religion News Service: 5 years after massacre, Tree of Life rabbi inspires ‘A Psalm for Pittsburg
Psalm 121, which gave Rabbi Jeffrey Myers solace in the wake of the tragedy, has been set to music in a piece commissioned by the Tree of Life congregation and composed by Gerald Cohen. Learn more about the piece: A PSALM FOR PITTSBURGH – ESA EINAI (PSALM 121) Learn more about the November 8th premiere […]
New York Classical Review: A timely world premiere resonates with echoes of the Holocaust
Timeliness in works of art is an uncertain thing. A headline may inspire a piece, but by the time the public sees the work, later developments may have passed it by. Conversely, a worthy work of general interest may be lifted by events to a more acute kind of significance… Learn more about the piece: […]
Opera News
“Sometimes, truth is stranger than opera. In this touching work by composer Gerald Cohen and librettist Deborah Brevoort (seen Jan. 25), Jaap, an unhappily married fellow, falls for Ina, an engaged woman just before they are both swept away by the Nazis along as part of a group of 400 Amsterdam Jews… Baritone Gideon Dabi (Jaap) and soprano Inna Dukach (Ina) delivered Cohen’s accessible writing with admirable control and ideal enunciation… Company music director Ari Pelto… guided a solid, sympathetic accompaniment through the score’s many mood shifts and changes in meter. “
“VOYAGERS” REVIEW, FROM SOUNDWORDSIGHT.COM
World Premiere of Voyagers, for String Quartet and Clarinet at Hayden Planetarium, American Museum of Natural History, November 28, 2017:
One of the most important tasks for the current classical music world is bringing the wonderful range of today’s classical compositions and the spectacular talents of its performers to contemporary audiences in new and engaging ways. The Cassatt String Quartet, with clarinetist Vasko Dukovski, certainly endeavored to do that with their performance of Gerald Cohen’s Voyagers, for String Quartet and Clarinet…