South Hills concert celebrates life of local Holocaust survivor
The pieces include the three movements of “Holocaust Remembrances,” which memorializes millions like Chandler who lived or were felled during the war.
Howard Chandler was just a child, an 11-year-old boy, living in Poland when the Nazis invaded on Sept. 1, 1939 — and next week, music inspired by his life story will be heard in Pittsburgh’s South Hills.
After the invasion, Chandler quickly became acquainted with the Third Reich’s brutality as he and his family were forced into a ghetto with up to 5,000 other Jews. Three years later, Chandler saw much of his family for the last time; trains shipped them, one by one, to Treblinka, where they were murdered.
Chandler endured.
After working for two more years in a slave-labor camp in Wierzbnik, Poland, Chandler, too, was taken to a concentration camp. But, there, he reunited with his brother and father.
The fate of Chandler’s father is unclear. Though he was presumed murdered in Birkenau, his son recently discovered evidence that suggested the elder Chandler was instead sent to the German camp at Stutthof, where he died.
Chandler returned to his Polish hometown in the late 1980s. Since 2011, he has made an annual pilgrimage with the Pittsburgh-based group Classrooms Without Borders to share his survivor testimony.
Next week, Chandler’s life and his struggles will be set to music as the Bay Chamber Players perform a “Spring Is Near” concert — a tribute to Chandler and those who survived the atrocities of World War II.
The performance, scheduled to begin at 4 p.m. on March 3 at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Brentwood, will feature compositions by Saint- Saens Dauber, Bruch, Boulanger, Beethoven and Massenet, event organizers said.
The afternoon’s centerpiece, however, will be a musical performance featuring new work by Gilbert Bigenho, a Pittsburgh-based musician inspired by Chandler’s experiences. The pieces include “Broken Wings,” an evocative work written for piano, violin, and voice, as well as the three movements of “Holocaust Remembrances,” which memorializes millions like Chandler who lived or were felled during the war.
Zipora “Tsipy” Gur, the founder and executive director of Classrooms Without Borders, has taken students and educators annually to Europe for years now. (There are still a few openings for this summer’s slated trips.)
Chandler’s stories, shared as the group winds down roads where concentration camps once stood, make the history resonate, Gur said. It also helps illustrate why that history is rather timely in 2024 — as antisemitism has spiked around the world and, some say, the Jewish state is waging war in Gaza over its right to exist.
“There is no better time to teach about the Holocaust than now,” Gur said.
“What I see is so many teachers we’ve worked with over the years, it’s their chance now to be the upstanders,” she added.
Bigenho, who joined Chandler on one of the Classrooms Without Borders tours, will play his violin on March 3 alongside vocalist Barbara Winters, a native of Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, and pianist Will Phifer.
Gur, for one, feels people will be moved by the event.
“Music is a language that surpasses boundaries and resonates with our shared humanity,” she said. “In honoring the survivors and victims of the Holocaust through music, we ensure that their stories endure, and we affirm our commitment to never forget.”
The event is open to everyone. A donation of $15 is suggested and will be taken at the door.
Originally a string trio, the Bay Chamber Players evolved into an ensemble featuring piano, violin and clarinet trio, Bigenho said. The group tours extensively throughout the eastern United States, enjoying a wide variety of styles and a combination of players.
For more information, email Info@stpetersbrentwood.org. PJC
Justin Vellucci is a freelance writer living in Pittsburgh.
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