Moritz Meier

Moritz Meier (born February 10, 1883 in Frankfurt am Main ; died around October 14, 1944 in Auschwitz concentration camp ) was a German conductor , accompanist , pianist , chamber musician , music teacher and a victim of the Holocaust .

Life

The son of an office servant worked until 1933 as a conductor, conductor, pianist, chamber musician and music teacher for organ, piano, harmonium, violin and theory. From October 1, 1906, he worked for the Frankfurter Theater AG. Just five years later, Meier's contract was extended to the functions of a solo répétiteur and a second conductor at the theater by Artistic Director Emil Claar . In 1919 Meier rose to the rank of deputy music director at the theater and also took over the first violin. When the theater got into severe financial difficulties in 1921, Moritz Meier had to be content with the function of a simple stage musician again. Increasing health problems finally forced his departure on August 1, 1925. Moritz Meier changed sides, and the active stage musician became a music teacher.

In 1933 the life of the Jewish artist changed dramatically as a result of the seizure of power . Meier initially kept himself afloat with his educational work, but restrictions soon followed there too. Since 1937 he was only allowed to teach Jewish students, and so Meier tried to earn some extra money by working as an organist in the Offenbach synagogue, until this opportunity was no longer given as a result of the so-called Reichskristallnacht on November 9, 1938. After this pogrom , Meier was deported to the Buchenwald concentration camp for several weeks until mid-December 1938 . Financially already in extremely precarious circumstances, Moritz Meier was ordered to cut his retirement income by 19 percent as a further state harassment at the beginning of 1941 .

When Moritz Meier and his wife Antonie were deported from Frankfurt on September 15, 1942 with Transport XII / 3, No. 742 to the Theresienstadt ghetto , the artist was allowed to take at least his violin, the heart of his art, with them. However, this instrument was taken away from him by the camp management on arrival. After more than two years in the old people's ghetto, the old couple Meier were transported on (Transport Eq, No. 526) to the Auschwitz extermination camp on October 12, 1944, where both were probably sent to the gas chamber immediately after their arrival . Moritz Meier's name is listed on the commemorative plaque of the Städtische Bühnen, his son, born in 1921, escaped from the Nazis to Great Britain in 1939.

Literature and Sources

• Heike Drummer / Jutta Zwilling (arrangement), Jewish Museum Frankfurt am Main (ed.), Database of the Neuer Börneplatz memorial.
• Judith Freise / Joachim Martini, Jewish musicians in Frankfurt 1933–1942, Frankfurt am Main 1990, p. 49 (Appendix).
• Friedrich Ebert Foundation (ed.), Between Exclusion and Destruction. Jewish musicians in Leipzig and Frankfurt a. M. 1933-1945. Booklet accompanying the exhibition of the same name by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation. Leipzig 1996, p. 60.
• Institute for City History Magistrate Record 7980; Personnel files 10119, 59735.
• Kay Less : Between the stage and the barracks. Lexicon of persecuted theater, film and music artists from 1933 to 1945 . With a foreword by Paul Spiegel . Metropol, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-938690-10-9 , p. 401.

Web links

• Moritz Meier on ffmhist.de
• Moritz Meier on ushmm.org
• Moritz Meier on holocaust.cz