Persecuted Music

The research project is entitled "Persecuted Music: To the History of the Musicians, Murdered and Persecuted from Austria during the ns-Regime - Considering the Documentation of their Works." Taking under special consideration of all the publications in this field until now the history of the murdered and pursued Austrian musicians shall be extensively researched and presented within its context. Their live and work are to be documented and have to be explained in the biographical context in order to prevent them from falling into oblivion - not at least as a pre-condition for scientific analysis and - as far as performable works are concerned - their performance. Generally the term "music in persecution", which is providing the title, shall devote full attention to both the musicians who reached safety of the exile and to those became victim to mass murder and other forms of persecution. At the same time the project raises the question of possible "inner emigration" considering the aesthetic dimension of the ns-music policy (the construction of "entartete Musik" as a mechanism of selection). There is a distinction between so-called "classical music" and "light music", but the distinction itself means no exclusion or hierarchical graduation in view of the importance of a particular type of musicians. Apart from the few well known artists, the main idea of the project is to draw attention to the large number of less successful artists and their works, in order to save them from falling into oblivion. The documentation will focus on the individual situation and development of every single person. Starting point is a data base (containing at present informations about 4200 murdered and pursued musicians) - the objective of the project will be to lay the foundation of a encyclopedial presentation. Persecuted Music as a fundamental break in the history of culture, as well as the history of music, has hardly recieved special attention. The project shall create the necessary foundations in order to close this gap. The earlier intense research can start and continue the more can get documented and therefore recovered. Through interviews with survivors and former refugees, it can still be possible to get valuable information, which should become integrated into both the documentation of the collected data and archived materials.