Recovered Voices: Exiled Composers and Hollywood Film Music

Violinist Adam Millstein and pianist Dominic Cheli will perform a one hour selection of music by composers who shaped the sound of film music. All of the composers were from different parts of Europe and were forced into exile following the rise of the Third Reich due to their Jewish Heritage. The musical works and composers will be introduced from the stage with a guided musicological/historical “tour” by Mr. Millstein. All of the composers ended up working in Hollywood with the exception of Mieczysław Weinberg who wrote prolifically for film in the Soviet Union.

Below is a list of the composers, their native country, and selected films scored:

Erich Wolfgang Korngold(1897-1957): Austria/Czech Republic (born in Brno, at the time part of Austria-Hungary, grew up in Vienna). The Adventures of Robinhood, Kings Row, The Sea Wolf

Alexander Tansman (1897-1986): Poland/France. Flesh and Fantasy, Paris Underground

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (1895-1968): Italy. And Then There Were None, The Brave Bulls, The Long Wait

Mieczysław Weinberg (1919-1996): Poland/Soviet Union. The Cranes are Flying

The Ziering-Conlon Initiative for Recovered Voices is a unique resource at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, California that promotes the study and performance of music by composers suppressed by the Nazis. The Nazis effectively destroyed the lives and legacies of two generations of composers, many of whom subsequently were stripped from their possible places within the canon of 20th-century classical music. This was not due to the aesthetic merit of their works, but rather to the political, racial and, eventually, genocidal policies of the Third Reich. Through performance, education, and advocacy for this wrongfully neglected music the mission of the Recovered Voices Initiative is to correct this glaring omission from the repertoire of classical music.

Adam Millstein is the Program Manager of the Ziering-Conlon Initiative for Recovered Voices at the Colburn School. He is a violinist who is developing a multifaceted career as a performer, lecturer, and music curator. He is currently pursuing his Artist Diploma at the Colburn School in Los Angeles under the renowned pedagogue, Robert Lipsett. He holds his Masters Degree from Colburn and his Bachelor of Musical Arts Degree from the University of Michigan, where he studied with Danielle Belen.

Dominic Cheli embraces the role of an artist-citizen in his multifaceted career as performer, educator, composer, and director. He is described as an “inspired keyboardist” (artsfuse) whose playing is “spontaneous yet perfect, the best of how a young person can play.” (Symphony Magazine). His rapidly advancing career included his Walt Disney Concert Hall Debut with the Colburn Orchestra where Dominic was “mesmerizing, (he) transfixed the audience.” (LA Times).

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