Last week, at the invitation of International March of the Living (MOTL), I traveled to Poland to perform at the Holocaust memorial ceremony, held in Auschwitz-Birkenau. In addition to playing at the Auschwitz ceremony, I performed at a concert honoring the liberators who were the first to enter concentration camps and discover Nazi atrocities. I also visited sites around Poland, including the mass graves near Tykocin and the Treblinka concentration camp. As I flew back to the USA, I found that I was at a loss for words. Without a doubt, this was one of the most profoundly moving weeks of my life, yet at the same time I didn’t quite know what to say.

Tykocin is a small village in northeastern Poland. Around the time of WWII it was inhabited by 1800 Jewish residents. Over the course of two days, as the Nazis came in, nearly all the residents of this village were taken to the nearby forest and executed in waves. Three pits were dug and the residents were forced to stand in them as they were shot one group at a time, each standing upon the bodies of the previously shot group. The Treblinka concentration camp was responsible for the death of over 800,000 Jews. This camp was designed to execute thousands within hours of arrival. Mass graves and several cremation pits, one of which survives today, were used to dispose of the dead bodies.

Upon visiting each of these sites and hearing details of the indescribable subhuman perversity shown by the Nazis, I would find myself go through the same pattern of thought and emotion: shock, a passionate anger and frankly, hate, sadness, and grief.

And then suddenly, on the day of the Yom Hashoah ceremony at Auschwitz, I began to experience hope. In preparation for the ceremony I arrived early and walked the length of the overwhelmingly enormous field at the Bierkenau death camp to get to a makeshift stage at the other end. An eerie silence filled the space as I quietly walked by myself. After a week of seeing the remnants of Holocaust atrocities first-hand, I was beset by sadness and confusion. After warming up, I stood off in the wings getting ready to open the Yom Hashoah ceremony with music. As I waited, I suddenly saw the first of over 10,000 people start marching onto the field of Birkenau; many of them young, together with Holocaust survivors, veterans, VIP’s, Jews, and non-Jews all walking arm in arm down the same path countless numbers walked to their deaths. This was hope in physical form – the future, understanding, love, and a commitment to good. Inspired, I went out on stage.

As at Auschwitz, both at Tykocin and Treblinka, I pulled out my violin and played. At Tykocin I stood by one of the mass graves and played Ravel’s Kaddish (click here to watch the performance). At Treblinka, I stood by the remaining cremation pit and played Kol Nidre at the site were so many were turned to ash. The sound of music cutting through the quiet, hallowed silence said more than I could ever express with words. What is there to say? These horrific events happened, and they will forever be burned into our history. All we can do now is always remember what happened and work together to make sure such evil and hate never shows its face again. Never again.

This past week, I spent 6 days as an artist in residence at the University of Massachusetts (Amherst). In addition to working with the students in the music department and performing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor, I spent much of the week playing for and speaking to large groups of non-music majors, who as part of their general education curriculum take classes exposing them to music and other arts. I was truly impressed by the commitment UMass showed to giving everybody an opportunity to experience art.

In one week, I spoke to nearly 600 college students who, over the course of the year, were covering everything from traditional Sonata form in the Baroque and Classical periods to Indian Ragas. We talked about the inner workings of the Mendelssohn Concerto, the Romantic period, the 20th century composers on my new album, dissonance, and even 12-tone music. Over the course of these classes, I probably heard and answered upwards of 150 questions, many of them great, well-thought-out points – some of them concepts about playing that even I myself will continue to think about.

More schools and universities need to learn from programs such as this. Music, much like all art, is a reflection of life. Better than anything, it can capture a sad, happy, angry, or even twisted moment in time and beautifully mirror it for all to see. Music can help us understand further, reflect and relive, and express what we feel compelled to say during the times when our words helplessly succumb to the rush of thoughts and emotions.

Music is important – and that’s putting it mildly. So why then is music (the arts) always one of the first things to get the boot when things get tough? Even though this is somewhat of a blanket generalization, I think most would find it hard to deny the diminishing regard for arts in education, particularly in public ones. The knee-jerk reaction to cut the arts as a stopgap budget measure, especially in the United States, is an abominable disservice to our future. The result is an entire generation with limited or no exposure to the arts. Access to quality arts education should be a right, not a vague possibility.

But the point of this is not to be negative; it is to raise awareness about what we are doing right and how we can continue to perpetuate it. There are a number of exemplary programs that aim to counter this downward trend, such as the El Sistema program, which aims to directly involve young children, often from low-income backgrounds, in an intense orchestral musical experience, as has been so successfully accomplished by the Sistema program in Venezuela. This includes, as I saw this week, schools such as UMass and its efforts to bring music to as many as possible.

Of course I’m not saying the goal should be to churn out leagues of musicians (that
would mean too much competition for us!), but rather to simply provide everyone the opportunity to be exposed to this vital form of human expression; to allow us all to look at the musical “reflection” and see life staring us right back. Imagine if today we all sat down to listen to some Brahms, Beatles, and Louis Armstrong, just perhaps, we might learn a bit more about ourselves…and others too.

Of the composers on my debut album, I first got to know the music of Dmitri Shostakovich. His story is an incredible example of defiance. Like so many other artists, social leaders, and ordinary individuals in mid-20th century Soviet life, he was sidelined by his unwillingness to adhere to the establishment of strict communist society. What is even more amazing is that Shostakovich was personally singled out by Stalin as a social rebel. Shostakovich was a pain in his side. In hindsight, it’s quite fascinating to think that a quiet, demure man such as Shostakovich could provoke such a passionate hate from a giant, powerful autocrat such as Stalin.

But in reality, life for Shostakovich was extraordinarily difficult. For much of his career he composed in fear: fear of losing income, fear of ruining his career, fear for his family and friends (many of whom were arrested or killed), and fear for his life. As Stalin and his associates began to shake up all of Soviet society, they directly attacked all art that was perceived to be “not for the people.” One of the most direct blows that Shostakovich experienced was the now very famous denunciation of his opera Lady Macbeth. This was a major turning point for Shostakovich that put him directly in the cross-hairs of Stalin’s sights.

Music became a sort of secret outlet for Shostakovich, perhaps the only outlet available to him. He struggled with the score as he composed; trying to appease authorities while expressing his true emotions. The expression is utterly pure and raw. So many of Shostakovich’s works convey honesty and plead with the listener to hear what he’s saying; it is brave. The fact of the matter is that he was writing music and pushing a boundary that could have easily cost him his life. It is the ultimate defiance.

Defiance seems like too severe a subject matter to base one’s first album on. Yet it is something we can all relate to, in our own individual way. We’ve all at some point defied authority, reality, and life to get somewhere else, to be in a different place. This is certainly true for my family. When we left the Soviet Union in 1989, we did so to escape the tremendous and unfair pressures placed upon us because of our beliefs. Like so many other Jewish families in the USSR, life was filled with an ever-present stigma associated with being Jewish.

Although we could have continued to get through life like this, it dawned upon my parents that it would only be right to give my brother and myself the opportunity to grow up free from these pressures. To believe whatever you wish, to say and do whatever you want, and the ability to truly forge your own path are things too many of us today easily take for granted. But this is something my family had to fight for. That defiance towards authority and the status quo, and belief in progress is something that continues to inspire me every day.

Although many of us can be grateful that we do not have to fight for our lives and freedom of expression quite like Shostakovich did, we can stand to learn a lot from his life and music. This is one of the reasons I have made defiance the theme for my first album. Together with the equally powerful music of Alfred Schnittke, Arvo Pärt, and Joseph Achron, this album is a tribute to their stories and the power of the human spirit.

You can purchase my album Here: http://www.marquisclassics.com/429_def.aspx

It ships on January 31st in the United States.