Music of Exile: The Untold Story of the Composers who Fled Hitler

What becomes of a composer when persecution and exile mean their authentic music no longer finds an audience? In the 1930s, composers and musicians began to flee Hitler's Germany, seeking new lives across the globe. The experience of exile was multifaceted: while some of their works were celebrated in their new homelands, these composers had lost their familiar cultural contexts and were compelled to navigate xenophobia alongside entirely different creative landscapes. Others, far less fortunate, endured a form of internal exile – composing under a ruthless dictatorship or within the confines of concentration camps and ghettos.

Michael Haas sensitively chronicles the experiences of this musical diaspora. Torn between contrasting cultures and traditions, these composers produced music that often synthesised elements of both old and new worlds, with some works becoming central to today's repertoire while others were sadly relegated to obscurity. Encompassing the musicians interned as enemy aliens in the United Kingdom, the brilliant Hollywood compositions of Erich Wolfgang Korngold, and the Brecht-inspired theatre music of Kurt Weill, Haas demonstrates how these musicians significantly shaped the twentieth-century soundscape. His work also offers a poignant record of the immeasurable effects of war on cultural expression.