Hans Krasa was a Czech composer whose music career was cut tragically short during the Holocaust. Born in 1899, Krasa was a young prodigy who had begun composing as early as the age of ten. He studied composition at the German Music Academy in Prague and, in 1921, his graduation project Four Orchestral Songs was performed to much acclaim by his contemporaries. He continued composing in Prague throughout the following decade as well as associating with Czech intellectuals and painters.
Krasa would compose his most widely known work, Brundibar, in 1938. It was written as a submission for a children’s opera contest hosted by the Czechoslovak Ministry of Education. Before the winner of the competition could be announced, Nazi Germany had taken control of the country in March 1939. Afterwards, Brundibar was performed twice in secret in 1941. Krasa would not have the opportunity to see these performances before being arrested by the Nazis and deported to the Terezin concentration camp in northern Bohemia one year later.
Terezin was one of many concentration camps meant to transit prisoners to Auschwitz. Being an intermediary between prisons, this meant the camp could afford to focus on propaganda; inmates were allowed to practice the arts (music, stage plays, and art) in order to craft an image of a prosperous and happy life within Terezin to the rest of the world.
When the international community suspected the Nazis of committing atrocities against Jews, Terezin was prepared to fool the outside world. In the summer of 1944, Red Cross delegates from Denmark visited the camp in order to investigate the rumors. The Nazis guided them through a predetermined path through Terezin, showing a false image of children playing jubilantly in parks and several businesses run by inmates.
What the Red Cross never saw was the malnourishment, disease, and physical abuse that the prisoners were subject to every day in the camp. Nevertheless, the delegates left satisfied, reporting that the Jews were happy and content in Terezin. The façade had worked.
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Musical performances by the prisoners were also part of the Red Cross visit, an aspect in which Hans Krasa played a central part. He had been appointed Head of Musical Activities in the camp, composing and promoting music alongside his fellow artists. He eventually began rehearsals for Brundibar with the children at Terezin, but the process was drawn out for two months due to the constant transit of children to and from the camp.
The opera’s story is centered around a group of children who perform music in the streets to make money, but the villain, an organ grinder named Brundibar (for whom the opera is named after), attempts to thwart the children’s performances. Afterwards, a group of woodland creatures help the children overcome the organ grinder and eventually drive him away.
The opera premiered on September 1943 within the barracks of Terezin, becoming beloved among the prisoners. It would be performed weekly thereafter, including during the Red Cross investigation. Its final performance would be in autumn of 1944 when the final set of prisoners was transported from the camp, Krasa being among them.
A full performance of Brundibar by the Cincinnati Chamber Opera.
Decades later, survivors of Terezin remember Brundibar with deep fondness, a light in the darkness that was the Holocaust. The opera is still performed to this day throughout the world, a reminder of the human spirit’s will to persevere in even the harshest of conditions. Ultimately, Krasa would die in Auschwitz in October 1944, but not without leaving behind one of the most significant pieces of art in the Holocaust’s history.
Written by Fernando Gomez
Sources: Holocaust Music, Terezin, Orel Foundation