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Eva Schloss

Eva Schloss, Holocaust survivor and step-sister of Anne Frank, shares her extraordinary life story with Michael Berkeley and reveals the music that has been most important to her.

Holocaust survivor Eva Schloss shares her extraordinary life story with Michael Berkeley and reveals the music that has brought her comfort, that conjures memories, and that brings her joy.

Eva Schloss was born into a happy middle-class Jewish family in Vienna in 1929, but her childhood came to an abrupt end when she was nine and had to flee with her parents and older brother to escape the Nazis.

Before going into hiding in Amsterdam Eva's family befriended Anne Frank's family, and after the war, the Frank legacy was to play a large part in her life - Eva's mother married Otto Frank and Eva and her mother worked tirelessly to promote Anne Frank's legacy through her diary.

Like the Franks, Eva's family was betrayed, and she and her mother were captured by the Gestapo on her 15th birthday and transported to the Birkenau concentration camp. They were two of only a few prisoners still alive when the camp was liberated in January 1945. Her beloved brother and father did not survive the neighbouring camp of Auschwitz.

Somehow Eva learned to live alongside the memories of those terrible years and after the war rebuilt her life in England. Now in her 80s she tours the world spreading her message of reconciliation and hope, and in 2012 she received an MBE for her work with the Anne Frank Trust and other Holocaust charities.

Eva's choices of music include Beethoven, Mendelssohn and Strauss, who take her back to her happy Viennese childhood, as well as music by Mahler through which she recalls the pain of her teenage years.

Produced by Jane Greenwood.

A Loftus production for Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú Radio 3.

1 hour

Last on

Sun 8 May 2016 12:00

Clip

Music Played

  • Ludwig van Beethoven

    Symphony No.5 (1st mvt: Allegro con Brio)

    Orchestra: Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. Conductor: Riccardo Chailly.
  • George Gershwin

    Rhapsody in Blue (Excerpt)

    Orchestra: Columbia Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Leonard Bernstein.
  • Felix Mendelssohn

    Violin Concerto in E minor (1st mvt: Allegro molto appassionato)

    Orchestra: Amsterdam Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. Conductor: Bernard Haitink. Performer: Itzhak Perlman.
  • Gustav Mahler

    Nun will die Sonn' so hell aufgeh'n (Kindertotenlieder)

    Orchestra: Hallé. Conductor: John Barbirolli. Singer: Janet Baker.
  • The Jacksons

    ABC

  • Robert Schumann

    Cello Concerto in A minor (1st mvt: Nicht zu schnell)

    Orchestra: Philharmonia Orchestra. Conductor: Daniel Barenboim. Performer: Jacqueline du Pré.
  • Johann Strauss II

    Wiener Blut

    Orchestra: Berlin Philharmonic. Conductor: Herbert von Karajan.

Broadcasts

  • Sun 15 Jun 2014 12:00
  • Sun 8 May 2016 12:00

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