Mikis Theodorakis - Mauthausen Trilogy - In Memoriam Of Liberation

Today we celebrate the 70th anniversary of May 8, 1945 - the the end of World War II in Europe, specifically the capitulation of Nazi forces to the Allies (the Soviet Union, Canada, France, United Kingdom, United States and other principal Allied nations) on May 8, 1945.

This is an opportunity to show our respect for the survivors of Nazi persecution and mass murder, and to listen to what they can tell us about the best and the worst of human behaviour.

"During the Second World War the poet Iacovos Kambanellis was a prisoner in Camp Mauthausen. In 1965 he wrote four poems about this period and asked the Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis to put them to music. The poems are now world-famous as the Mauthausen trilogy. Thanks to Maria Farantouri the trilogy has become very popular.

The recordings on this album date from 1995 and 1999. The four poems are sung in three different languages (Greek, Hebrew and English) by Farantouri, Elinoar Moav Veniadis and Nadia Weinberg respectively. You might think that it's boring to listen to the same songs over and over again, with only the languages varying, but that is not the case.

The Hebrew version has a very classical approach and has a completely different atmosphere than the English one, which is influenced by jazz, or the Greek one, which is very close to the original Farantouri recordings. The Hebrew part of the album surprised me most. Veniadis makes me want to cry. She gives such a power to the songs that I can feel the poems in every part of my body. The same applies to Farantouri when she is singing in her low voice, which is the opposite of Veniadis' voice.

The English version is nice because, as you understand the lyrics, you get a notion of what the songs are about - but that's all. Weinberg turns them into popular tunes, sung well technically but with little emotion."
(Eelco Schilder, FolkWorld CD Reviews)

"This is the most awesome CD of new classical music that I have heard in a long time. I am a long-time fan of Theodorakis' music in any event. This setting of four poems written by in Mauthausen by a survivor of the camp is a stirring testament to the triumph of humanity against fascism, and of course, for Jews, much more. The recording of the original cantata, live, at a memorial held at Mauthausen in July 1995, in Greek, features the amazing voice of Maria Farantouri who first recorded the piece in 1995. Additional recordings were made in Hebrew, and then in English between 1995 and 1999. The CD concludes with remarks by Simon Wiesenthal, also recorded at the Memorial at Mauthausen in 1995.
Well, that's the bones--the where and when. The power of the music amazes. The versions are mixed so that the album opens with Hebrew, then Greek. When the English version of "Song of Songs" makes the lyrics comes on, reprising the Hebrew that opened the album, the familiarity of the music makes the words all the more powerful, "Beyond the bleak and frozen square / Above the yellow linen star / No heart will ever beat again / Because the beautiful have lost their way to paradise...." But this is not a sad album, despite the words. It is an affirmation that life is strong, and continues, and that humanity's spirit is unquenchable. Indeed, the yearning, the loss of god, are grounded in the more immediate, as the military march sounds of "When the war is over" chime in Hebrew, one last time, as the album concludes with the English version of the poem: "Oh girl with fearful eyes come listen to me / Oh girl with frozen hands please hear my yearning / Forget me not when this cruel war is truly over."

I am unbearably moved and strengthened by this album. The lithe, almost carefree flute of "The Fugitive", The shock of the opening "Song of Songs," first in Hebrew, is followed by the more forceful Greek version, and the singer's reprise of words first sung 30 years earlier, as the audience makes the connection and claps in recognition. The gentle arrangements of the English, contrasting the more forceful Greek and the span of art song--as if of folk songs set for stage--in the Hebrew arrangement. The different arrangements, voices, the different languages, all strengthen the core poetry and give the music even more power. The translations are superb. The closing "When the war is over in Hebrew, "Simkhat olam bo'i la-sha'ar" (Joy of the world come to the gateway) is perfect (even better than the English, I think--it makes me wonder if the English, somewhat less evocative, is translated from the Greek or from the Hebrew). The song first is song as more of a gentle love song, and then acquires power and near-operatic weight, countered, suddenly, by the words, in German, by Simon Wiesenthal. The words are translated in the liner notes:

... If we were ever to forget, repress or falsify what happened, our past would return to us over and again, unvanquished, and would prevent us and our descendants from building our future, in a way that is right and worthy of man.
I say this to you as someone who survived the death block of Mauthausen as by a miracle.

This is a vital album. A "must have". " (from: http://www.klezmershack.com)

Mikis Theodorakis- Mauthausen Trilogy - In Memoriam Of Liberation
(256 kbps, small cover art included)