Citizen of the Staatsoper: Erich Kleiber's Musical Migration

Conductor Erich Kleiber was born in Vienna, made his reputation in Berlin, fled Nazism for Latin America, and tried briefly to return to postwar East Berlin before dying in 1956. His life illustrates the wide diversity in mid-century migratory stories. For so many of Kleiber's fellow migrants, flight disrupted established structures, contexts and networks. More recently, scholars have emphasized refugees' creative self-reinvention. Kleiber's story illustrates both these outcomes while embodying neither; his narrative is one of musical and political continuity, involving a particular kind of Habsburg cultural nostalgia, insulated by his wealth and fame.

Germany Fails to Realign Turkey, 1941

This chapter studies Germany's failure to induce Turkey to defect from the British alliance and join the Axis in 1941. If Berlin were to convince Ankara to break its alliance with Britain and become a German ally, it had to deliver a handsome and credible package of rewards that advanced Turkey's most important revisionist aims in the region — namely, the (re)acquisition of territory in Bulgaria, the Dodecanese Islands, Syria, and Iraq. In seeking to divorce Turkey from Britain — and to use it as a pass-through for moving men and arms against British forces in the Middle East — Berlin intimated that such rewards were obtainable and initiated secret negotiations to find a bargain. But the negotiations ran into a wall. Ankara's price for realignment would require Germany to make promises that challenged important interests of its key allies at that time — Italy, Vichy France, and Japan. About to start a war against the Soviet Union, Berlin would not risk alienating those partners, so it abandoned the attempt. Its decision to retreat was made easier because German leaders did not then perceive Turkey to have high strategic weight.

The Artists’ Cemetery

The development of a public commemorative culture in East Germany extended into the development of new funerary rites for cultural figureheads and everyday citizens. Chapter 5 charts the ruling party’s efforts to restructure the spaces and sounds of national sepulchral culture by examining the funerals for six artists buried at a plot reserved for members of the Academy of the Arts in East Berlin. Each artist was honored with a state funeral, aimed not to console the bereaved, but to canonize the deceased as socialist heroes. At these events, the deceased’s friends and family made deliberate efforts to reclaim their legacy within the space of the cemetery itself, and continued these personal reflections through musical homage. In doing so, these mourners were continually renegotiating their relationship to the deceased. This chapter thus shows how the relationship between private mourning and public commemoration was in a state of negotiation throughout East Germany’s forty-year existence.

The Anniversary Year of 1971 and the Dawn of Détente

In 1971 the Jewish communities of East and West Berlin celebrated their three-hundredth anniversary. The anniversary year coincided with a juncture during which the two halves of the divided city sought greater proximity and thus was framed by noteworthy political and cultural events. East Berlin’s anniversary celebrations were intertwined with two commemorations. These publicly and very visibly perpetuated the image of Jews as victims of fascism. In parallel, East Berlin saw the premiere of the long-awaited local production of Fiddler on the Roof. On the other side of the Wall, the Jewish community had reached a comfortable and high plateau with regular cultural events in its community center. It offered an ever-expanding cultural program, with a broad variety of concerts and recitals. In clear contrast to East Berlin, the West Berlin community offered a rich array of anniversary events that displayed the community’s alliance with Israel, the United States, and West Germany.

The Establishment of the Jüdische Gemeinde von Groß-Berlin

In the aftermath of the purges of 1952/1953, the Jewish community in Berlin was divided into East and West constituencies. This chapter traces the trajectory of the East Berlin community from this division until 1971. Against all odds and in the midst of turmoil, communal life in East Berlin continued, centered around its only synagogue, which was rededicated in 1953 as Friedenstempel. Rykestraße Synagogue became a cultural hub. It instigated a series of synagogue concerts and opened its doors for the annual commemorations of the November pogroms. Given the dearth of cantors, the community also maintained contacts with West Berlin, which regularly freed its cantors from their duties so that they could assist, especially for funerals at the Weißensee cemetery and for special events. The continual presence of cantors from West Berlin was most significant. It gave way to a mobility of musical practices both in Kultus and concerts.

Deterioration and Recovery

In the 1970s and early 1980s the Jewish community in East Berlin was able to restore its declining cultural life, in spite of a shrinking membership. Events at the new culture hall at Oranienburger Straße ensued with programs featuring discussions of Judaism, Yiddish literature, and other literary works, as well as recitals. Unlike the community center at Fasanenstraße in West Berlin, the East Berlin community closely adhered to Jewish cultural heritage and especially embraced Yiddish culture. In parallel, Yiddish music as a perceived expression of Jewish secularity and antifascism began to attain a new position in mainstream events, a development mainly driven by Lin Jaldati. Aside from this, the Jewish community maintained their Kultus at Rykestraße Synagogue, continued the series of synagogue concerts, and the annual Kristallnacht commemorations. In parallel to the community, alternative Jewish groups began to form.