I first became aware of the Violins of Hope in 2008, just after the instruments had been featured in the historic concert at the foot of Jerusalem’s Old City walls. At that time, three administrators and colleagues from my university—Ken Lambla (dean of the College of Arts and Architecture at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte), Royce Lumpkin (chair of the Department of Music), and David Russell (Anne R. Belk distinguished professor of violin)—were initiating a plan to bring the Violins of Hope to the Western Hemisphere for the first time. This bold initiative came to fruition in April 2012, when UNC Charlotte and numerous cultural and educational partners came together for an impressive series of exhibitions, performances, lectures, and films.
As my university planned for the events in Charlotte, I grew increasingly fascinated by what I was hearing about Amnon Weinstein. My recent research had focused on music in Hungary before, during, and after the Holocaust, so the Violins of Hope project resonated with me on a human, artistic, and scholarly level—a perfect storm of intellectual curiosity. In February 2011, I spent a week with Amnon and his charming wife Assi in Tel Aviv, seeing the instruments for myself and learning more about Amnon’s journey. It was during this trip that I became inspired to write a book about the violins and the musicians who once played them.
Over the course of researching Violins of Hope, I have been honored to meet and interview the descendants of several of the figures profiled in this book, including Freddy Davidovitz; Seffi Hanegbi; Nadir Krongold; Berit, Liv, and Ernst Simon Glaser, as well as their stepbrother, Torleif Torgersen; Mona and Solveig Levin; Helen Wininger Livnat; and Ze’ev Weininger. In Norway in particular, I received friendly assistance from Steinar Birkeland and Thomas Hellum (Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation), Hilde Holbæk-Hanssen (Music Information Center), Lorentz Reitan (Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra), and Magne Seland (National Library). Stanley Bergman, John Cox, Susanna Glaser, David Goldman, Mindle Crystel Gross, Joseph Itiel, Martin Jacobs, Henia Lewin, Myra Mniewski, Nofar Moshe, Anne Parelius, and Benjamin Still also provided a great deal of assistance throughout my research. I am especially grateful to my agent, John Rudolph of Dystel & Goderich Literary Management, for believing in this project from the very beginning, as well as to my editor Claire Wachtel and associate editor Hannah Wood at HarperCollins for their expert assistance in seeing the book through to publication.
I would like to express my gratitude to the Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and Yad Vashem, as well as to Ernst Simon Glaser, Nadir Krongold, Helen Wininger Livnat, and Amnon Weinstein for giving me permission to reproduce historical photographs from their collections. The views or opinions expressed in this book, and the context in which the images are used, do not necessarily reflect the views or policy of, nor imply approval or endorsement by, those institutions and individuals.
This work was supported in part by funds provided by the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and its College of Arts and Architecture. Invaluable support was also provided by the Lois Lehrman Grass Foundation.
I am very grateful to my father Robert J. Grymes for his assistance and companionship during my research trips to Israel, as well as to my brother Chris for his continual encouragement. Most of all, I must thank my wife Elizabeth and our daughter Helen for their love and patience. I simply could not have written this book without their support.