"Sag, daß Jerusalem ist"

In the organizer's words:

In the concert reading "Sag, dass Jerusalem ist", Britta Shulamit Jakobi and Hanno Dinger perform excerpts from the correspondence between Paul Celan and Ilona Shmueli.

Musical direction: Roman Salyutov
Soloists of the Yachad Chamber Orchestra
Speakers: Britta Shulamit Jakobi and Hanno Dinger

The correspondence between Paul Celan and Ilana Shmueli is certainly one of the most important and touching in the entire Celan correspondence. Ilana Shmueli knew Paul Celan from their youth in Czernowitz - long before the Shoah. However, the two did not meet again until 1965 in Paris. This correspondence dates from this time. It is an impressive document of mutual love, affection and trust. The two met again in Israel, where Celan was trying to learn Hebrew. This meeting and their long conversations became a kind of caesura in Paul Celan's life and poetry. The correspondence and Celan's trip to Israel are an important testimony to a European poetic-intellectual reception of Israel that is unparalleled in the world of poetry. Excerpts from Celan's and Shmueli's correspondence will be recited.

Their words will be musically framed by Victor Ullmann, Ernest Bloch, Maurice Ravel, Felix Mendelsohn, Francis Poulenc and Naomie Shemer, played by soloists from the Yachad Chamber Orchestra. The compositions of these wonderful artists from the time before and during the Shoah are early musical testimonies, they are victims of the Shoah who did not survive, but their music reaches beyond time. Paul Celan's poetry deals with his survival throughout his life. His world of thoughts and experiences echoes from the past into the present and future.

This event is being held in cooperation with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.