Music and the Holocaust: "We Made Music in Hell"
In May 2020, I was granted the Gideon Klein Award by the Jewish Studies Department at Northeastern University. For 7 months, I worked on a research paper and accompanying musical collage. In this essay, I argue that although music is usually experienced as a positive power, music can and has been used as a form of torture throughout history, especially by the Nazis in Holocaust concentration camps. I examine how the effect of music on the human body can change with its context by discussing the different methods of sonic torture that were utilized in concentration camps: forced singing, music from radio, and camp orchestras. I assess and present specific songs, musically and lyrically, to explore the reason behind these choices, with clear applications to our own day. Overall, I prove that music has the power to drive different emotional experiences and is fundamentally dependent on the context in which it is played or performed.