James Simon (musician)

James Simon (born September 29, 1880 in Berlin ; died October 12, 1944 in Auschwitz concentration camp ) was a German composer , pianist and music writer who was counted among the late Romanticists.

Life

Simon studied at the university in Berlin, among others with Max Bruch . He was also a student of the pianist and composer Conrad Ansorge . He did his doctorate in Munich on Abbé Vogler , taught at the Klindworth-Scharwenka Conservatory from 1907 to 1919 and then worked as a freelancer. Around 1933 he emigrated to Amsterdam via Zurich , where he gave private lessons. Various friends supported him. In 1941 he was arrested and first deported to the Westerbork transit camp and later to the Theresienstadt ghetto . On October 12, 1944, he was sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp deported and murdered there.

During the Moscow trials in 1937, the older son, Jörn Martin Simon, went missing. The younger son, Ulrich Ernst Simon , emigrated to England, converted to Christianity and later taught theology at King's College, London.

James Simon wrote a. a. Faust in music (1906) and composed songs, choral works, chamber music and the opera Frau im Stein (1925).

Literature (selection)

Siegmund Kaznelson (ed.): Jews in the German cultural area . Berlin 1962.
Walter Tetzlaff: 2000 short biographies of important German Jews of the 20th century. Askania, Lindhorst 1982, ISBN 3-921730-10-4 .
Habakuk Traber, Elmar Weingarten (ed.): Displaced music. Berlin composer in exile . Argon Verlag, Berlin 1987

Web links

Wikisource: James Simon - Sources and full texts

James Simon , Photo at holocaustmusic.ort

Individual evidence

↑ Priests And Prelates: The Daily Telegraph Clerical Obituaries 2006 p162 ed. Trevor Beeson "His brother later met a similar fate in the Soviet Union When he came to England in 1933 he was already badly bruised by his experience of a disintegrated German culture, and was grateful to find what seemed to him at the time to be a ... "

personal data
SURNAME	Simon, James
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German composer, pianist and music writer
DATE OF BIRTH	September 29, 1880
PLACE OF BIRTH	Berlin
DATE OF DEATH	October 12, 1944
Place of death	Auschwitz concentration camp

[1] Priests And Prelates: The Daily Telegraph Clerical Obituaries 2006 p162 ed. Trevor Beeson "His brother later met a similar fate in the Soviet Union When he came to England in 1933 he was already badly bruised by his experience of a disintegrated German culture, and was grateful to find what seemed to him at the time to be a ... "